good bye holidays. by orange

The husband thought that I would resist taking down the holiday decorations until Feb. 1st due to my love of all things Christmas.  This weekend, the de-christmas-fication of the Nicholson household begun.  All things Christmas holiday, except for the tree, are put away in the closet.  And the tree, well I blame that on not enough time (not sure if that is 100% accurate).  We missed the boy scout tree pick up...so we have to haul it to the dump.  And my in laws started the "you know you're a red neck when"...(your christmas tree is up...still.).  This week, or next weekend - I promise.

For Christmas I recieved a gift card from my in-laws to one of my favorite places - Pier 1.  So, with the holiday stockings down, the holiday pillows put away I thought it is the perfect time to put that gift card to good use.  Check out my findings...

pier 1 pillows that I've been eyeing for some time...on sale!

new piece to put above the fireplace

vase for the mantle - on sale as well!

some fun recycled magazine rubberband-like balls for the center of the dining table

not a new item...but from pier 1 as well, I "re-purposed" it to the fancy/living room area

the final look

retail therapy with a gift card really helped lift my un-holiday spirits

orange paint! by orange

If you've been reading the blog you know that violet and I love decorating and re-decorating. Whether it be a new pillow, a new throw rug, a chalkboard wall or a new duvet. Well this weekend with the upcoming Seattle stay-cation the husband and I decided to purchase a new duvet (yay!!!) and some paint. Here are the grand purchases!

For the bedroom:

1. Marimekko Tamburiini Duvet
2. Patrice Sheets

1. Behr "startling orange" paint
2. Inspirational photo

With the paint kick, the husband and I talked up many ideas for using chalkboard paint. Here is what we decided on: a chalkboard large frame in our "family/hang out" room. Kind of like this photo:

Basically, we will paint part of our large wall with tinted green chalkboard paint, then buy or make a white frame to fit around the painted area. We are thinking about a 4x6 ft chalkboard area...




So we of course bought some of this:













Today we are working on putting all of this together! I'll show pictures once it is complete - cross your fingers!