Deck the Halls 2010

I have flocked, glittered, hot glued, dremmeled, hammered, sawed, baked, hung, re-hung, arranged, and rearranged for nearly two weeks but I’m finally ready to show off the Christmas decorations.

I’m particularly pleased with the vintage pom-pom tree decked out in silver and blue. The winter village underneath is home to 60’s pinecone elves, bottle brush trees and glittered houses we’ve collected over the years. Nick and Linus helped me glitter an inexpensive plastic farm set adding more sparkle to the Daddy tree.

For the main floor I created a snowy feeling with the garland for the banister and flocking wreaths myself that I hung in the dining room with blue and silver faux bois ribbon.

This time of year I love to fill my favorite white pottery pieces with either yummy things to eat or pretty things to look at, like my collection of pinecones.

We always do a kid tree for the playroom and this year’s was cut down by yours truly. The beautiful and fresh Noble Fir is hung with red and gold ornaments, Peanuts characters and gingerbread Ls and Ns.

Merry Christmas!

12 Days of Christmas Decorations

I'm always surprised how quickly home Christmas decorations go up, including the tree, so soon after Thanksgiving. Not in my house as a kid. Mom always trimmed the house two weeks before Christmas and then took everything down the day after – and if the tree was dry, down that came after gifts were open. A practical sentimentalist my mom who liked a clean house as much as her Tom and Jerry punch.

When it comes to my own holiday decorating I take after my mother. The planning and watching for new ideas begins in October but nothing is ever put up until December. I favor settling on a theme or color pallet when decking the halls to keep the house from feeling like an elf exploded everywhere. Sticking to a theme means on any given year some decorations get displayed while others are repacked for next time, giving us something different to enjoy each year. While we don’t dismantle everything on Boxing Day we do begin the New Year with a clean house and not a trace of glitter.

Since we’ve become parents I have made a point of doing a kid’s tree in the playroom, the one Santa leaves his haul under. The past two years I’ve decorated the boys’ tree with homemade gingerbread cookies: the alphabet decked out in red and white candy followed by green and blue trains. They boys were charmed by them, they made the room smell good and were safe for a 2 year old to occasionally snack on.

One of my favorite themes was a woodland Christmas, when I glittered and spray painted plastic deer. Another year I made wreaths from gum drops. Color pallets have ranged from silver and gold, gold and brown and blue and brown. In my book, the color choices or decorations can be centered around just the tree, one room or the entire house.

Visions of red, white and silver are currently dancing in my head. Visit next week to see how my halls are decked this year.

Dining Room: Before & After

I believe changing a light fixture is one of the easiest things that can most transform a room. Good and beautiful lighting is necessary to all the activities in your home, especially in the dining room. If you are considering a change in the light about your dining table taking the extra step and center the fixture over your dining room table. More often than not an electrician you never knew (and long before you even moved into your home) hung the current fixture in the center most spot of the ceiling. This makes sense to an electrician but certainly not an interior designer. Now you are stuck with a table and a light that don’t get along. A handy person can do a quick internet search and find a how-to on moving the junction box yourself or, as a fan of out-sourcing, you can hire an electrician for the job. It will seem like an inconvenience and cost some extra money, but this simple change will make you’ll fall in love with your dining room again and every time you sit down for a family meal or just walk by you’ll appreciate the harmony you created. That is priceless.


That’s exactly what we did in this Bryant dining room. The smoked and etched glass fixture had to go. We swapped it out with the more elegant Round Pendant Shade from Restoration Hardware. It was centered over a consignment shop dining table and pulled together with oval back dining chairs from West Elm. Now the modern lines of the seating compliment the classic shape of the fixture and the expandable table fits the period of the mid-century home.

Ballard House 2.0: Light fixture fix

Completely replacing the 3 pendant lights in our kitchen wasn’t in our immediate budget, but I couldn’t live with the frosted glass shades put up by the previous owner. The fixtures are only a few years old, and their bronze finish matches the rest of the lights and door knobs throughout the house. It finally occurred to me to simply replace the glass.

(Before: The frosted shades felt frumpy)

What I thought would be a quick and easy decorating fix did take several trips to hardware and lighting stores to find shades that fit and that I liked. The winner was from Harold’s Lighting in Wallingford. At $10 each, this affordable shade instantly made the kitchen feel more modern and sleek.

Inexpensive, transformative and no special tools required – your decorator’s secret for the day.

Preserving a bit of autumn

The boys and I drove up to Leavenworth, 2 hours east of Seattle, to meet out of state family. Along the drive through the Cascade Mountains, yellow, gold and red started to peek through the green leaves and I was wishing I had brought a saw and cut a few branches for a leaf preserving project I’ve wanted to try out. As luck would have it, there in park in the middle of Leavenworth was a pile of tree branches bursting with autumn colors. Always a good sport, my Aunt Lora Lee helped me load some rather large branches in the back of the car. Then the real quest started. My leaf preserving project required glycerin which helps keep the leaves pliable and keeps their colors from fading, sometimes for years. Finding this agent (a by-product of soap making) was not easy, and after 3 days of phone calls, visits to every craft and natural store I could think of, I finally found it at Zenith Supplies in Seattle. By now, even though I kept them in water, my branches started to dry out a little. Still I crated these two arrangements in the house, mixing glycerin with water and a little dish soap to help break up the surface tension and to allow the glycerin to be more easily absorbed. I’m very pleased with how the leaves look and if it they don’t preserve this time, there’s still a few weeks to head to the hills and try to find a fresh batch of leaves. I’ll let you know how things turn out. Happy autumn!

Ballard Bungalow: Before + After

The Ballard Bungalow project is complete and turned out picture perfect. We tried a few new (even risky?) things and the results paid off.

Before: This rectangle room was cramped with no flow to the furnishings, lack luster paint and a drab floor.

The clients have two dogs, so we needed to pick colors and materials that would be paw and fur friendly. They also wanted a semi-formal room to curl up with a book as well as entertain. We chose Benjamin Moore Light Khaki in an egg shell finish for the walls. One of the true stars of the room is the vintage ceiling light fixture that’s original to the house. In order to highlight the light and give some sizzle to the room, the ceiling was painted with Benjamin Moore’s Newburyport Blue in a flat finish (why flat?).

It was important to the clients that we avoid purchasing from big box retailers and repurpose as much furniture and finishes as possible. The vintage camel back sofa came from The House in Magnolia and other furnishings were found online. With the dogs in mind, Flor tiles in a celery color were laid in the living room. Should anything happen, be it dog or drink, the tiles can easily be replaced and afforded a perfect fit for this unusually sized room.

Flower gig: commitment ceremony

Arranging flowers for the dinner table is much different than coordinating arrangements for commitment ceremony, but I was up for the challenge when good friends asked for my help for their July celebration.


The couple wanted to balance the traditional with the masculine -- the sturdy but soft colored lily was their flower of choice and fit the bill.


The boutonnieres and corsages tied in with the blue and brown color scheme and complimented all the guests of honor. The couple was thrilled, the view was spectacular and the evening was perfect . Congratulations Christopher and Jim!

Pick a paint for the 5th wall

Next time you're deciding on a color for a room try this: look up. It could be your ceiling that needs a new look. Think of it as the 5th wall and make it the room's accent wall. We recently painted a client’s living room ceiling Newburyport Blue from Benjamin Moore, and the results are stunning. We used a matte finish on the ceiling. A Semi-gloss or glossier paint may reflect more light, creating a the a visual "stop" that can be distracting. The painted ceiling in the bungalow/craftsman home works beautifully with the color palette we picked for the home. More on what we did with the rest of the house coming soon; until then, get a ladder and start painting up.


A few more examples of painted ceilings. How lovely!

Add some Mid-Century to your mix

My blogging has been slow these days as I’ve been spending most of my time in the mid-century, combing some of Seattle’s best vintage and antique shops looking for lounge chairs, dining chairs and tables with just the right touch of Mad Men chic: understated beauty, simple lines, streamline shapes. One item that caught my eye for both my clients and my own home is a credenza. Once the item to store your turn table, a credenza can easily be converted to house a modern entertainment center (that’s what I’m holding out for) or sleek storage in a home office. If you are looking for a touch of the mid-century to add to your décor, this sleek and functional piece is the one to have.

Ballard House 2.0

We've lived in our house in Seattle's Ballard neighborhood for a year and a half, and it was time for a few personal updates. We got very lucky with this place: our neighbor, a contractor, bought the 1926 house, gutted it and re-did everything. Thankfully he (and his wife) have a good eye and made some tasteful decisions. Still, after living here for over a year and through all the seasons we wanted to make some changes. We started in the dining area, one of the rooms that sold us on the house. Previously a sunroom, it is surrounded by charming pane windows original to the home. They are not the most weather resistant; the west facing windows draw in heat in the summer and hardly keep a breeze out during winter. Too beautiful to replace, I wanted the least invasive window coverings that wouldn’t hide the beautiful molding and also provide some insulation. Drapes seemed too fussy for the room, and any top-down-bottom-up option hardly seemed kid friendly. Roller shades were just the fit, simple, subtle and appropriate for the space.

We also replaced the light fixture with the Meurice Pendant light from Jonathan Adler. I love the mix of the modern light with the classic windows. The fixture's bronze finish matches the rest of the lights and door knobs in the house with a touch of faux bamboo, something that makes me very happy.

Finally, we unpacked our collection of white pottery for display in the corner built in and had all the windows in the house professionally cleaned, inside and out. What a change that made. Look for more Ballard house updates. Like any good home project, there’s always something new to do.

Shell Terrariums

Walking around the Seattle Design Center this week, I fell in love with these shell terrarium. Such a great idea and so easy to do. Perfect way to display your shell collection, or just buy one that's already done (which is probably what I'll do).

Consider Carnations

I adore carnations, but I understand their bad rap --- they hardly stand out in the grocery store and as a gift, if you keep that bad plastic wrapper and the baby’s breath, they come off as cheap. But it’s precisely because carnations are budget-friendly and have a long bloom that you can buy several bunches and create a big-impact, even chic, arrangement. The shape of carnations allows you to create soft, lush and substantial displays; it’s all about playing up their strengths and packaging them the right way. Plus, carnations come in so many cool shades. I like to group them in one color, such as this pink arrangement I did for Valentine’s Day. The next time someone tries to disparage the dear old flower, remind them that the carnation is scientifically known as Dianthus caryophyllus, the "flower of love" or "flower of the gods."