Red dress made from a liberated flag

I came across a story yesterday that I'm still thinking about today. 

91 year old Beatrice Jackman was a Danish spy during World War II.  Her fiance stole a Nazi flag from the balcony of the Reichstag building in Berlin.  Also in a stolen Mercedes  he delivered the flag to Beatrice as a gesture of his love (or as a gesture of the resistance). 

She removed the swastika and then took the red cotton (a rarity at the time) to a dressmaker.  When the war ended, she wore the dress to celebrate. 



credit

 Not only is it a gorgeous dress, but it has so much history; representing so many things! 

The dress recently was auctioned for more than 2100 pounds. 

Read the story HERE

Field Sweater

Last winter, Anthropologie had a cute cardi on their racks. With a pricetag upwards of $100, it certainly wasn't going to be making it home to my wardrobe anytime soon. 

I knew it would be simple enough to copy, so I always kept an eye open for striped cardis.  Last week at Target, I snagged a Mossimo brand striped cardi for $15.  With some lace I already had on hand I recreated the look.

Voila!

Come & knock on our door...

We've been Waiting for you.... (cue Three's Company opening credits)

While I was slaving away on the bathroom, my sister/tenent/housewife was working hard on the front door. 

Before

After

The neighbors love it.  I do too!!

Need your help!

Forgive me if you've already received an email, but I'm looking for your help! 

Some of you may or may not know that I have been brewing a website idea for several months now. It will primarily be a fashion/style related site with potential spin-offs down the road. I have 6+ months of content and ideas ITCHING to go live, but I am stumped on a name. Each one I've come up with (and have fallen completely in love with) appears to already be taken (boo!).


So... to help me out a little, I've created a small survey (6 questions!) that will hopefully help me settle on name and get things a-rollin'!

CLICK HERE!

Thanks so much!

My new favorite room

Back in July, we tore out the tile in my entryway and front bathroom and then we (meaning not necessarily me) retiled the bathroom. And there it has sat for 60ish days.


Last week I started on the rest of the bathroom. In my mind it would take two days. One day to remove the wallpaper and prep the walls and one day to paint. WRONG. We are looking at a 10 day project here including the occasional evening after work. Once the wallpaper was off, the two layers of paint underneath was chipped (ugly) and in no position to be sanded, painted over or even removed for that matter - even with the help of my superhero love that I fell for so long ago. Add a repetitive stress injury to my right shoulder and let’s just say it’s been a challenge.


By the second Sunday, I was finally ready for the fun part. Painting. I had a blast. Here’s the before (taken when I moved in)

Here are a bunch of the afters (the sink isn't installed yet, so all pictures are looking upwards - and yes I have some touch up painting to do, but please ignore that) 

With the ceilng sloping down and then meeting the wall, I opted for stripes. A formally trained designer would say that the stripes elongate the room and brighten / break up the dark-color-in-a-small-space, but really I just love yellow and wanted something fun, different, and somewhat classy.

I kept the yellow shelf and the yellow mirror and used those for the flavor foundation of the room (my inspiration for the stripes). The deep blue paint is ironically not color I intended on purchasing/painting – again another lesson in trying out a paint swatch before buying.  The original intent with was to purchase a sample and do a test swatch (like a good homeowner). They gave me a quart instead and while I didn’t do the recommended test swatch, the color combo is better than I imagined AND the room took the entire quart for the sample price!

Even the interior bathroom doors got a few coats of paint for high contrast. 


Stay tuned for a post on the sink! I know, you’re thinking ‘Sink?! What can be so exciting about a sink?’ Not too much other than a little dance with Serrendipity :)

Is anyone there...?

So sorry (again!)  for the absenses. 
 Now that I'm thirty (cough-cough-two), I decided I needed more balance.  Work, Health, Friend-time, Me-time...  So I've decided to ground myself like an insubordinate teenager.  Work less, go out less and spend more time on the things that matter - eating better, exercise, making curtains for my sister's room, all of the things I should be doing, but haven't had the time to.  Also like an insubordinate teenager, I'm finding loopholes and reasons/excuses to get out of being grounded. 

Owell. 

My most recent house project is an *AWESOME* bathroom make-over, complete with long sought after sink that literally (well almost literally) jumped out at me while on my saturday morning run.  Pictures coming soon (once I get my sink installed!)

I also have  a newly painted front door (that the neighbors are raving about) and a couple other projects up my sleeve to share with you.  One involves a sweater remake from my dealer. 

Since I am writing this at 10pm and its too dark for photos, and no blog post is a good blog post without photos, let me share with you pictures from my birthday. 


Disneyland!!   The Anniest Place on Earth!  I spent my birthday two years ago in Disneyland and this year, I wanted to repeat the feat!  My sister, Castle and his wife decided to join!  Notice my blue bow on my Minnie Ears?  I made it!

My Mickey birthday cake (see my last Toontown birthday picture here)

See the cups we're holding?  Those are Margaritas from California Adventure.  There is a sign at the register stating the maximum any adult can purchase in any transation is two.   So I ordered one for myself and one for my older-than-21-sister.  They wouldn't give me the one for my sister unless she was present (she wasn't), so I pointed to the sign and said 'fine, I'll take two for me'.   They gave me the evil eye and poured my two margaritas.  Halfway to Sully, I met up with my sister and gave her my second half-melted and otherwise untouched margarita.  I just finished recounting the story to her when the out-of-breath margarita attendant nearly tackled me to confirm I lied about both being for me but more importantly to check my sister's ID.  On one hand it was funny.  On the other hand it was annoying, but on the third hand, at least they're doing their job to keep alcohol off the hands and breath of America's youth. 
 

Everybody say "HI CASTLE!"

Who- Who is this?  (I don't remember but I thought he was adorable!)

Naptime

Don't you hate it when

you fall out of bed

in the middle of a nap?