Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving! This is our first Thanksgiving in our "new" house! It'll be small, Chris's family will all be in Connecticut so it's just a couple of my family members, I'll be posting some pics of baking our feast on Instagram @wouldntitbelovely, so be sure to check in and see how it's coming along! I'll be enjoying all the holiday festivities, so no posts on Thursday or Friday. Be sure to check in on Monday, the first week of December will be full of gift guides for the holiday season!

Kitchen Reno in Process!

Above is what our kitchen looked like when we bought the house. Notice the lovely brown cabinets, off white appliances and linoleum counter top. My favorite was the time machine sized microwave (that didn't work) and overall dark and depressing feeling! We didn't have the budget for a fancy shmancy full overhaul, so I had to get creative.  We did a couple things right when we moved in a year ago. We painted the cabinets right away, then got a new counter top and some new appliances as the year went on. The past two weekends have been all about the final touches! I decided to move around some of the upper cabinets and we're adding some open shelving and a new backsplash as you can see from the pics below! I can't wait to share the final room when it's all done! I feel like it's finally all coming together to be exactly what I wanted! (How much do you love that picture of my Dad? We had been doing the backsplash all weekend and were both feeling the aches and pains!)

Wood Trim, Keep It or Paint It?

Sources from left to right, top to bottom, one, two, three, four.

I just saw the third picture in the collage above and it got me thinking about wood trim. The trend right now is to paint ALL THE WOOD EVERYWHERE in your house white. When the hubby and I moved into our house, thats what we did, but that's because all the trim in our house was CRAP. If your wood trim is thin, and not great quality, strait builders grade trim, by all means, paint it, it's makes a world of difference. On the other hand, if you have beautiful, heavy. well made trim, do not, under any circumstance paint it. It may look great for a while, and make you feel modern and trendy, but in the long run, you'll regret it, and future generations will rue the day you decided to do it. As shown in the pictures above, you can have a trendy and modern looking home and keep your beautiful wood trim!

Hand Lettering: Fit as a Fiddle

I've had a song from "Singing in the Rain" stuck in my head for what feels like weeks. One of the lines in it it "fit as a fiddle and ready for love" which is just kind of adorable and sweet.

On a personal note, for some crazy reason, when I got home from Russia, I decided that the way to beat jet-lag would be doing a project. A project that would keep me from taking naps. What project you ask? FINALLY FINISHING THE KITCHEN!! Which involves taking down all the upper cabinets, moving them around a bit, and building shelves so I can have an open shelving area, doing the tile backsplash, and touching up all the painting I did right when we moved in! Starting it with only two weekends before Thanksgiving has put me on a serious timeline! So this weekend I need to get busy! It's about 1/2 done and I'm getting pumped for it to be complete!

Custom Wedding Logo Sign

Today I wanted to share one of my favorite little extras for a wedding, custom signage! I made this lighted wooden sign for Elaine and Steve's wedding. It's a wonderful extra decor element for the bar, seating card table, or in this case, the gift table. It's designed to look like all the other elements from their wedding day (see the links below for all the other elements I designed for their wedding day). I love design elements like this because they are great even after the wedding day! Now they have this lovely sign to hang on their walls of their New York apartment!

Other design elements for their wedding can be found at the following links:  invitations, design process, save the dates, guest guidebooks, programs, place cards & holders, word bubble signs, confetti bags, and favors.

Smart Shelf Ideas

I'm am a collector who never seems to have enough storage, which is why I LOVE smart shelving ideas!

1. Art Shelf: If you're someone with a large art collection, or who has a hard time putting holes in your walls, the art shelf is a great solution. You can layer all your art pieces, photos, and little do-dads to make a lovely little collage. I love how this home owner used a clamp lamp on the edge of the shelf! It's such a smart solution when you may not have room for a table in the corner but still need some light
2. Little Corner Shelf: This is such a great solution when there isn't enough space in a bedroom for a side stable, this little corner shelf gives you just enough room to hold a light, a book and a glass of water! 
3. Over the Door Shelf: If you have a small bathroom like me, this little shelf over your door is a smart way to take advantage of unused space
4. Ski Shelves: My Poppop loved skiing and we have a couple sets of antique skis and I have never had any clue what to do with them. I love the idea of turning them into shelves! It keeps the house from feeling like a mountain lodge but still incorporates a fun element of surprise into an art display! 

Travel: Moscow, Russia

So I'm back from my quick trip to Russia. It was very much like what I expected and at the same time, not what I expected at all. Winter in Moscow is grey. Very grey. The architecture was not at all what I expected. The city center is really amazingly beautiful, and the architecture is a lovely mix of styles, and  Red Square is pretty amazing. I missed a crazy protest in Red Square by just one day (it would have been a crazy story to have seen that!). I bought myself a beautiful set of Russian nesting dolls which are now living among with my other travel nick-nacks. I just have to say a little something about all these pictures too:

1. Saint Basil's Cathedral: thats me, I really cant get over how cool this Church is, I just love all the detail and color.
2. The buildings in Red Square are amazing, just look at that brick work! 
3. So I had to snap this pic, you can see a little rainbow hidden in the mural on that building. I like to think it's a little gay pride despite all the persecution going on there at the moment. 
4. I love the lamp posts on this street, I also love wide walkways like this where no cars are allowed. You never find streets like this in America, a place catering completely to pedestrians. 
5. Me and a co-worker getting a pic with Stalin and Lenin looks alikes, just because it's ridiculous that there are people dressing up to make money from tourists like us.
6. Spotted this man walking his dog with his itty bitty kitten sitting on his head. 
7. My perdy new nesting dolls! 

Winter Wedding Details

1. Winter Cake   2. Car Wreath   3. Winter Berry Place Cards   4. Cotton Centerpieces   

5. Cotton and Pine Cone Bouquet   6. Fur Wraps

Winter weddings never seem to get much press, but there are so many lovely wintery elements that you can work in to make your wedding special and memorable without just falling into the obvious snow flake trap. I love the idea of bringing in leafy wreathes, cotton elements, wood pieces, winter berries and fur wraps to create a cozy and wintery feel!

Hand Lettering: "Follow Your Heart But Take Your Brain With You"

I love this saying. It appeals to my practical & dreaming heart!

I just got home from Russia late last night, I'll share some photos with you next week!

I'm getting excited for the official start of the holiday season! Because even though they are already playing Christmas music on the radio, I refuse to start listening until AFTER thanksgiving! I'm hosting Thanksgiving in our new house this year for the first time! Have I ever cooked a Turkey? No. I'm more excited about decorating and making it all look pretty. The turkey can't be that hard right?

Sneak Peek: Save the Dates

I've been toiling away on some save the dates, we're making sure they go out BEFORE the holiday card onslaught. It's a photo postcard, so most of it is done on the computer, but to give it a little something special, I decided to hand letter their names and wedding logo. This is a little pic of me working on it while Lincoln snoozes on the couch. The full reveal will be in the next couple weeks!

Fireplace Fillers

1. White Books   2. Colored Books   3. Log Ends   4. Log Sides   5. Miscellaneous Whimsy   5. Bones

We have one fireplace in our house, and unfortunately, it's not in the living room. It's in the man cave. Also, when furnishing the mancave, we kept our old, VERY comfortable couch. Alas, that couch has is a lounge sectional and the only place in the room that couch fits, puts the lounge extension part  in front of the fireplace, which means we will pretty much NEVER light a fire in it. So, I've been trying to think of fun things to do with it! Because it's the man cave, the bones are calling to me, but I fear that our Mastiff Truman would decide to gnaw on them, so I think the logs or the books would be the best idea. I've got to give this some more serious thought!

DIY Book Profiles

I don't know if I've said this before, but I LOVE books. I love the feel and smell and curling up with one for hours. That being said, I have a plethora of books, even though I've more or less converted to the kindle, books still seem to accumulate in our house. I had some old books that would never be reread, so I decided to do a little art project.

I have a thing for silhouettes, and I saw these book letters at Anthropologie, and decided I could do something similar but with profiles of me, the hubby, and the dogs! I think I like the dog ones the best! something about their profiles just works better on display. I think these would make great DIY Christmas / Holiday gifts for family members and friends! They could also be a great addition to a wedding display!

Supplies:

1. Old books
2. Pretty paper, I bought mine from Paper Source and decided to stick to a metallic and neutral color pallet
3. Modge Podge 
4. Paintbrush
5. Sandpaper

Tools:

1. Bandsaw (though I imagine you could do this with an exacto blade, the bandsaw is just faster!)

Process:

1. Make profiles of the people or animals you plan to use, scale them to fit the book and trace outline onto the cover
2. Cut out profile using a band saw or exacto blade
3. Sand edges of the book cover
4. After cutting the edges, the were browned by the band saw, so I decided to lux them up a bit like really nice books and spray paint the page edges gold. As you're covering the books, just go crazy with the spray paint and make sure the book edge is fully gilded. Give it about an hour to dry. 
5. Trace new book shape onto the paper you plan to cover the book with. Cut around the edges leaving a 1/2 inch boarder.
6. Brush Modge Podge onto the paper and smooth it onto the book. Do it one piece at a time, i.e. the back first, then the spine, then the front, smoothing out the paper as you go.
7. Fold the extra paper over the edges of the book, you will need to put slits in the paper to accommodate the curves. 
8. To make the inside cover looks finished, Modge Podge the first and last pages to the cover. 
9. Cut a 3 inch piece of paper the length of the spine and Modge Podge it onto the book, curling the ends around the edges of the book.
10. Let dry and display! 

Wedding Rice Toss Alternatives

1. Push Pop Confetti   2. Rose Petal Toss   3. Confetti Toss   4. Bird Seed Toss   

5. Cap Guns   6. PomPom Toss

I love when couples run down the aisle after they say "I do" running through rice, I think it's stuck in my head from watching Cinderella a million times as a kid. Though we all know how bad rice is for the birds, there are some great alternatives out there now! I'm not a huge fan of bubbles, but these are some great rice toss alternatives! I think the little guns and pompoms are my favorite. I just made some little birch cones to hold rose petals for a wedding a couple weekends ago and they were so much fun and made for great pictures! 

Baby it's Cold Outside: Off to Russia

I leave for Moscow, Russia on Sunday! It's a short work trip for Reebok (my day design job if you're just tuning in), it's a big market for us, and we're going to check out the area! I've never been and really don't know what to expect other then that it will be pretty cold and that I'll need to keep my political opinions to myself! I'll be sure to post pics once I get back on Friday! Have a great weekend!

Wedding Photo-booth Chalk Word Bubbles

Another little extra I designed for Elaine and Steve's Wedding were custom chalk word bubbles. One of the things Elaine was most excited about for her wedding was the photo-booth. Though the photo booth supplies most of the props for their photo-booth, we wanted to guests to be able to "say something" in their pictures. Hence the chalkboard word bubbles! I made them out of wood, with a chalkboard front, wood border, and leather handles on the back. These are some of the pictures from the photo booth, Chris and I are the ones on the right! The photo booth company was also able to include the wedding logo at the bottom of the photo strips which was a great way to tie it all together! Other design elements for their wedding can be found at the following links:  invitations, design process, save the dates, guest guidebooks, programs, place cards & holders, confetti bags, and favors.

DIY Bathroom Vanities

1. Rustic Table   2. Board Table   3. Mid-Century Modern Dresser   4. Antique Dresser

Our primary bathroom is small, but has a BIG bulky single vanity that is much too ornate for my taste. I've been trolling the websites for Lowes, Home Depot, Overstock, Ikea and others for a nice single vanity for under $500, but nothing has really been striking my fancy. Which has me thinking about DIYing it. I love the idea of turning an existing piece of furniture into a vanity. Between our house and my parents house, we have a couple of vanities that just might fit the bill. If I coated them with marine grade shellac I think it could be pretty awesome! What do you think?

DIY Throw Pillows

Sometimes the easiest way to refresh a room is to make new throw pillows. It's an easy way to introduce new patterns and colors into a room without spending too much money. I had bought some Merrimeko fabric last time I was in Boston and decided it would be a fun print in our living room. Since it was a little pricy I bought just enough for the fronts of two pillows, figuring I could use some cheep fabric for the back. I paired it with a basic striped fabric I bought from Ikea and some pompom trim I had laying around, I'm pretty happy with how they came out!

When it comes to choosing fabrics, patterns and colors for throw pillows, don't stress out about it too much, things don't have to match perfectly to look great. My Mom always jokes that I don't like anything to match because I never want to buy furniture, plates, or linens in sets, I like to mix and match to get something that feels unique. My basic rule of thumb, make sure the scale of the patterns and color pallets feel like they could be friends, they don't need to be twins or even siblings, they just need to look like they could hang out together and have a good time! See the full how too below.

So let me preface this DIY by saying I am by no means a pro at sewing. I'm awesome at strait lines and basic patterns, but it's something I do out of necessity, not love. So I'm sure there are better and more "by the book" methods to make pillows, but this is mine and it has worked pretty well! I avoid sewing in zippers because I find them annoying and I hate changing the foot on my sewing machine, so this is a great way to make pillows for a beginner (or lazy) sewer!

Supplies & Tools:

1. Fabric (I made 15x15in pillows, so usually 1/2 yard of fabric for a pillow is more than enough)
2. Thread that matches your fabric
3. Sewing machine
4. Fabric Scissors
5. Pompom trim (optional)

Process:

1. Cut front square of fabric, cut it about 1inch longer and wider than you need for seem allowance
2. For the back, I like to make a pocket to slide the pillow into so I don't have to sew in a zipper. So cut two pieces of fabric the same height as the front, but the length of the two should only be about 2/3 the length of the front.
3. Finish one edge of each of the back pieces of fabric (the long edge) see photo above.
4. Layer the front fabric and back fabric with the good side facing each other, making sure the two back pieces take up the same amount of space as the front, they should have a couple inches of overlap to create your "pocket" style pillow case.
5. Pin the edges of the fabric for sewing, if you are using trim, pin that along the edge as well. When pinning, put in the pins horizontal to where the seem will go so that you don't need to remove them as you sew!
6. Once you've sewn all the edges, remove all your pins and turn it right side out! Slide in your pillow insert or stuffing and you're good to go! Yay pillows!

Outdoor Wedding Ceremony Decor

Outdoor ceremonies can be so memorable and unique! Though it can be stressful checking the weather every day leading up to your ceremony, when you get a beautiful day, nothing is better! One of the challenges of outdoor ceremonies is deciding how to decorate and define your ceremony space. These are some of my favorite ideas to make your outdoor ceremony memorable.

1. Streamer Pew Markers: This is such an easy and inexpensive alternative to floral pew markers, and after the ceremony they can be great fun in photos!
2. Program Mailboxes: I love this idea to hold all the programs at at outdoor ceremony. It's so sweet and a great way to keep them from blowing away on a windy day!
3. Door Aisle Entry: I've seen a couple iterations of this idea. You can even set them up in such a way that two of the ushers can hold them before the bride starts walking down the aisle, blocking her from the guests until she reaches the aisle, then moves them aside before she starts her walk down the aisle. That way you can still have a grand entry in an outdoor setting!
4. Hanging Garland: Hanging ribbons or garland from trees is a great way to add a little extra romance to an outdoor ceremony. They add something special to the site and make for great pictures.
5. Hanging Lace Rings: This is a super simple and impactful decor idea. Just buy embroidery hoops in a variety of sizes from a craft store, stretch lace in them and then trim the extra around the edges. When you hang them from trees they can be a lovely backdrop as you say your vows, or create a perfect picture spot.
6. Balloons: Using large round balloons placed around the perimeter of your seating area helps define your ceremony space, creating a more intimate feel. Make sure not to use too many, in a setting like this, less is more!

Hand Lettering: "It's Kind Of Fun To Do The Impossible"

 I'm pretty proud that this is my first Walt Disney quote thus far. The hubby and I have the "Disney Love" deep in our bones. I've been having some serious Disney cravings lately. It's been almost two years since we've been do Disney World, which is a LONG time for us (granted, we've been to Disneyland and Hong Kong Disney in that time, but those were short day trips and don't quite satisfy the craving). So, on Tuesday night, I decided to tag along with my Aunt, Uncle and little cousin, on their trip to Disney world.... THIS WEEKEND! It was a little cray cray finding a flight and figuring out what to with the dogs since the hubby is on his way to China. But, WHEN THERE'S A WILL THERE'S A WAY, and I really wanted to go! SO this afternoon I'll be on my way to Disney World! It's my happy place. Hope you have a great weekend, but if you're not at Disney, it won't be as good as mine.