Hello Ann Wood Handmade

For those of you haven't heard of Ann Wood Handmade, I'm happy to introduce you. For those of you have - she just put some adorable little birds and lovely sweethearts up for sale on her site. Most of the items are made out of vintage and antique materials. Her stuff sells out fast, and there's often along periods before she has more available on her site! So if you're looking for a little something extra for a special spot in your home, or if you're looking for a great wedding cake topper - stop on over!

Here are the birds available to order.

Here are the sweethearts available.

We had some sweethearts on our own wedding cake - and I adore them! She even matched the flowers on our birds to our wedding flowers!

Ann also makes some lovely other little creatures and amazing paper mache items - none are for sale right now, but check back often!

Hope you enjoy these little guys as much as I do!

A little DIY

Remember a few days ago when I posted about a little project I had done using divine twine? Well I wanted to show it to you all. I volunteered to help out with my sister in laws escort cards for her wedding last week. I had purchased a bunch of manzanita branches for Thanksgiving centerpieces last fall and they've been sitting in our house taking up space and collecting dust ever since so I figured I should find a good way to put them to use. So here is what I came up with.

Here is a little close up. I made mini tissue poms (these were the most time consuming part). And the actual cards were cardstock with the names printed and I stamped them with a mum stamp from Paper Source. I then used mini clothespins to actually attach the cards to the divine twine that was hanging from the branches.

Here is the bride to be and on the left is her fiance helping to hang some escort cards.

Here are some of my inspiration images.

Bathroom Update

So you haven't seen anything new yet from our bathroom because, well, there is nothing new to show you. When I last left you with photos of our tile, I was pumped for our washer and dryer to be delivered now that we finally had a floor. Well they were delivered, problem being that the wrong dryer was delivered. This story is really much longer and more painful (financially) than this but it took a week to get the right dryer delivered. So it was a dead week for the room. Then the following week our tile was supposed to be delivered, and it was, but in true form for us. It was the wrong tile. We then had to take the tile back to home depot, watch them scan 100 tiles individually, and an hour later that tile was returned and the correct tile had been reordered. Add another week to our timeline. Then this past week was my sister in laws wedding, so we were too busy with things for that to deal with people in our house doing work. So we now have the right tile in, and the plan/hope is that the tile will be completed this week. I am uber excited for this.

Here is what we actually ordered.

Here is what we got.

Yep. Not even close. I love renovating. love love love it (please note sarcasm). I just need to keep thinking about the end results. Which will hopefully be here someday. Hope all your projects are coming along better than ours!

Hello Bedroom Inspiration

My bedroom is a place I've been stuck on for a while. For some reason I have a really hard time deciding on a look for this room. We have a lot of other work to do in our home before I concentrate on this area but this weekend I found an amazing bedroom over at Style Me Pretty. It was photographed by Gia Canali as the home where a wedding was taking place. I'm completely obsessed with the images, and I am now certain I have the inspiration and design plan I want to use for our master bedroom when the time comes.

I love all the little details in this room. What I love the most is the neutral, calming palette, with just soft touches of color. I think I'll use some soft teals and soft pinks to accent the whites and creamy colors. I really think this is absolutely perfect and will be keeping it filed away until its time to redo this room. Until then I'll just keep peaking at it occasionally.

Hello Divine Twine

I just used Divine Twine for a little project I was working on for my sister in laws wedding. I'm a big fan - great for little craft projects, DIY's, and beautiful wrapping accents. After purchasing the twine, I got my confirmation email along with a link to their own little flickr account where people have posted images of projects they used the twine on. I thought I would share a few of my favorites on here.

Last image from here. All other images can be found here.

Hello Homegoods

Hello, my name is Beth, and I am addicted to Homegoods. Really though, it's sick. If I could, I would go there everyday, and not just to my one local homegoods but to everyone within an hour drive. I'll admit there are days when I go in and I am slightly disappointed by their selection, and days where I go in and maybe only find 1 or 2 little items I really enjoy. But then there are days I walk in and it's like I've hit the motherload, and those days my friends, make up for all the others.

Let's start with lighting. They have an absurd amount of amazing lamps and all at really great prices, here is what was in stock on one random visit.

Love the shape of all of these, and I adore the shades on the two outer lamps.

Blue Lamp anyone?

I took this baby home with me. It will go in our guest room/office space one day when we actually get around to finishing it. By then though my mind will probably have some new plan in mind, and I'll need to head back to homegoods for a new

lamp to match my new idea (see, like I said - sick).

Here is a Homegoods lamp I purchased some time ago along with some Homegoods vases.

These guys were amazing. I literally stood there gawking for a few minutes. Foo dogs - complete with lucite bases! Are you kidding me?! Problem being they were $20 and I already have two foo dogs and I just couldn't justify the purchase (and when I say justify I mean to my husband, because I could clearly see why these little pups would be worth $20).

A closeup - can you see that lucite base a little better now?!

And now the furniture.

Oh beautiful settee complete with a wingback and nail head trim. I love you so. I have no place to put you so I had to leave you behind, but believe me, I love you.

A great dining chair, or desk chair, or anywhere chair - once again complete with a little nail head trim.

I obsessed over this gal. She was $800 and I didn't need it (although I kept trying to tell myself I did). I think this would have made a great sideboard, sadly it really didn't fit into our budget of zero dollars.

It looked a lot like this guy from Anthropologie, only about half the price. It actually hurts my heart a little every time I think about how I just left it there. So we'll move on.

This is another piece I obsessed over. And when I say obsessed, I mean I went back to this particular Homegoods store on 4 different occasions just to stare at this beauty. Once again not in the budget, left it deserted in the store. Someone did come and take her home, however, and ended my string of torturous trips to Homegoods.

Now these next few images are from one very successful trip to Homegoods.

I got a few great design books at a major discount - Kelly Hoppen, Mitchell Gold & Bob Williams and Metropolitan Home. This place was a bit of a gold mine on this day.

Here is the end result of all those miscellaneous items - along with a West Elm Parsons desk (craigslist find) and some retro lamps that I lusted after for a long time before finally finding on ebay.

And last but not least - a couple weeks ago Erin over at Elements of Style had a contest in which she asked readers to send in pictures of their bargain buys for their home. I sent in this armoire (which we actually use as a hutch in our dining/living area). I purchased it off ebay for $300, free shipping included. I thought this was a great price considering what you see items like this going for over at Pieces.

Mine. $300

Pieces, Inc. $3695

Pieces, Inc. $3895

I was ecstatic when I found out I was one of her five winners. Can you guess what the prize was? You got it - a Homegoods gift card. I guess that is a great (free) excuse to go back!