Fall Decor

I need to think about something else, and leave it to Style at Home to send their newsletter today featuring fall decor. [Enter angels singing].

I love fall and I love decor.

Some of my favourite tips, must-haves and accessories to bring in the fall?

1. Candles, candles, candles

I love these 2 festive ones from Bath & Body Works, and wish I'd picked them up when I was in Toronto a couple weeks ago:

And these Gourmet Apple Pie scented candles from Pier 1:2. New pillows & throws.

Or at least, recovered pillows. I plan on recovering a couple of ours if I ever look up how to sew a zipper, so I can remove it in a nice (coincidentally) fall-coloured fabric I picked up a while ago. Others I like include these 2 from, you guessed it, Pier 1:

3. Candle Holders, Centrepieces & uncheesy Decor:

I'm sorry, but I don't like too-literal fall decor with cornucopias overflowing with squash or hay or stuff like that. And yes, I have been to homes where they're all around. Although-I have been known to have some hokey decor on the 2-3 days surrounding Hallowe'en. Hey-sometimes it's just fun!

I love the centrepieces that the Thrifty Decor Chick has been posting on her blog. Seasonal, warm and still very pretty.

I don't at all mind, and in fact even have, some ceramic pumpkins and other squash. But they're subtle and I think pretty, and I do love me some florals. All are older or from HomeSense, so I can't have pics of them without taking some, but here are some other items I really like (conveniently, all from Pier 1-sorry, I just love it there and they always have good stuff):

And just for fun, how cute is this to give out your Hallowe'en candy from?

Ikea Home Planner

OK, seriously cool!

Has anyone ever tried this? It's Ikea's home planning program and I just tried it for a theoretical kitchen re-do and it's fantastical!

Hubs and I are entertaining some ideas...several of which include some completely redone rooms. Having the one-track mind that I do, I had to act on it immediately, so I was looking at ways to roughly price it out before further consideration.

Enter Ikea.

I downloaded the program and got to work on familiarizing myself with the program with a space I know quite well-our current kitchen.

It's super easy to use and in about 30 minutes, I'd created this:Although, the coolest part came with a little press of the 3D button at the top, which resulted in:

Come on...that's just straight up neat.

And although the 3D view was the coolest part, the absolute best part was when I hit the button that looked like a calculator. Sure enough-it gives you the cost of your choices...and mine? $3,604.83 +tax.

Are you serious??? That's insane. I have no idea what I was picking...as I said, it was just a trial run to familiarize myself, but there's a pretty sick gooseneck faucet, some walnut countertops and mucho pot drawers. I was expecting about 3-4 times that...clearly I'm horribly uninformed.

Anyway, this little exercise (/time waster) was a very valuable one and opens up a couple more possibilities to the ideas we've been entertaining.

Seriously-try it.

Stolen Simple Projects

First of all, although it may seem like I sing their praises a little too much, I assure you, Style at Home has never heard of this little blog, me, or that I post on here and talk in real life about them a little too much.

With that said, here are some totally stolen simple ideas from my Style at Home newsletter:

Button Lampshades : I love this idea, and it really is that simple. You never think to dress up a lampshade, pillow, or even top with buttons or ribbon, but, done right, it could make it a totally new piece.

Covered Canisters : Again, totally obvious, and I've actually tried something similar with a cylinder piggy bank before. A great way to reuse and to inject colour or pattern into a room on the cheap!

Framed Papers : Admittedly, this display isn't all that nice. For my taste anyways. But some nice craft paper or even gift wrap (because you can never find something to wrap with the scraps) framed in a bathroom, nook or even in the kitchen could be really nice. And...yep-cheap.

Covered Stools : A nice way to pick up plain jane stools (or even homemade) and give 'em some pizzazz (or flare if you're into Office Space...yes please)

Paint Can Candles : Totally cute homemade gift, hostess gift or favour if you're an avid painter, or can get some friends to save some up for you. And cheap as can be.

Crafts abound

As mentioned previously, my older sisters birthday was this past Tuesday. I actually kind of surprised myself and had planned her gift weeks in advance and completed portions of it. Who am I?

The first gift was an idea via Make it and Love it, which after my blog gush, my sister devoured and sent me a 'suggestion' for a July goal. It was Ashley's water bottle sling. I didn't think anything of it because I personally had no use for one, but my sister's a teacher, coach and overall pretty active person, so I can see how it could come in handy. So I tried once on the leftover fabric from the drapes that never were, and it was actually pretty straight forward (once you had the tension right). Once I was confident that was correct, I tried it on some cute upholstery fabric I picked up. In the end, I was able to sew a (mostly) straight line and there's only a few spots where the tension was messed up.

Here's (an awful photo of) the finished product:
Next, since my sister and her husband were returning from a year living in St Maarten, I wanted to get them something that could remind them of their time there. I brainstormed but couldn't think of anything appropriate that wouldn't be better if they chose it themselves. Then I came across another blog where they were raving about Wordle. I went and played around with ideas, searched through my sisters facebook page for names of places they went/loved/etc and tried to remember amidst the drunken stuper of our visit some strong memories.

Then I had to decide on colours. I thought beachy would make sense, but you needed a bit of a dark colour in there too, and their wedding colours were brown & turquise, so I went with that. Unfortunately wordle doesn't have any colour schemes like that, so I had to find codes for web colours. I found a pretty wicked one, Colour Codes that made it easy-peasy.

Here's the finished product:
I think it's pretty cool to have such personalized art, and I'm deciding what themes to make for our own place.

Third, of course, was a card I had to make in accordance with my monthly goals. Admittedly, it's a little juvenile and she's an ancient 31 years old (:P just teasing), but cute none the less:

And the finished gift (unwrapped of course):

Which she genuinely seemed to like (although her husband made fun of her having a water bottle sling-whatever she asked for it!).

I never set out to be so budget conscious on her gift, but these were 2 things that I knew she'd like and took an awful lot more thought and effort than a La Senza gc or a random last minute purchase. Sometimes homemade doesn't have to scream homemade or cheap, so I think I may put a bit more thought into other gifts as well-it was kinda fun.

Have a great weekend!

Monthly Visitor

Heh heh---not to worry, I'm not one to discuss that monthly visitor. This is one I hugely look forward to each month and not in a I'm a flooze kind of way either.

Enough of that---I got my latest issue of Canada's Style at Home magazine in the mail yesterday! Woo Hoo! It's the August issue, which is kind of absurd since it's only JUNE 24, but lemme tell ya--it's a good one!

(I suppose it bears mentioning that if you think anyone from Style at Home knows anything about me or this post, you're crazy. I just love it and want to share the greatness with my 1 and only reader)

I think it might be my favourite issue yet and I'm trying not to finish it all at once so it lasts until the next issue arrives. So last night I just flipped through it and pretty much every page I stopped at-crap.

There's a cute feature on thrifty, although no less thoughtful, hostess gifts specifically aimed at cottage visitors:

This one's a cute gardening themed gift.

And these ones include a puzzle & game fits, a nice jam set, a pet-centric gift, a bbq-ers dream gift and even a s'mores gift set-yum!

The 'We Love It' feature (where editors pick their faves for that months category) is all about monograms, which is so trendy right now, and obviously, I'm a fan for myself and for gifts:

Admittedly, this months High-Low feature isn't one of my faves (you can check out some fabulous ones here), but I always love picking which aspects are my favourite and realizing that sometimes the less expensive things (although still out of my budget) are ones I prefer over the mucho dinero options:

The Decorator's Notebook feature is all about dressing patio doors, and features some great inspiration pics:

And there's a great Table Style feature showcasing several ideas for a green and white table setting (such a great summery combo):

And, of course, the cover story, which features an amazing PEI home (there's also a great feature on another cottage, but at a certain point I was photographing and posting every single page, so I had to pick my faves):

Isn't it amazing? Just look at that kitchen! And the mud room/entrance! I can't wait until next month when they post these stories to their site so I can save several of the higher-res images to my inspiration folder):

And the large dinind area that features exposed beams and a harvested custom-made super-large table:

And the bedrooms and bathroom are equally as inspiration-worthy with a built-in bookcase and great beadboard:

There's also a feature on sheers, which contrary to my design un-saavy boss who's currently decorating his dream home, are NOT out of style. Quite the opposite, in fact:

And yet another great home featured with fantastic design and personal touches:

And, hello! A feature all about ice cream! Talk about speaking to your readers!

And....just when you think you're done-they give you a teaser for next months issue (September already? Egads!)...Organizing & Kitchens! I'm had a bit of sensory overload with that one. Look at that banquette with a built-in drawer---come on! And I have to wait another month?

Anyways, I've gushed enough, but if you're in Canada (I don't know if it's in every province, but it says Canada, so I presume so), I strongly urge you to pick this one up---it's a keeper.

If not, the website has so many ideas and inspiration too, it's a huge problem for my work productivity, but great for me :)

Enjoy---I know I will.

Family Room Brainwave

With the family room on my brain and time on my hands, I hit up icovia room designer thingy to play around.

It's a great tool to have that lets you sort out furniture arrangement. It's not quite as cool-dude as floorplanner, but it's a lot simpler to use and you can use it indefinitely. It's basically my paint to everyone else's photoshop.

Anyways, not the point of the post. The point is this: while I was doing up absurd options for the family room (seriously-there were 15 versions at one point) I was trying to think of different ways to make the space work.

Here's the plan as it is currently:

Pretty sparse. I don't know off the top of my head the dimensions of our furniture so I did it all based on spatial reasoning....ha! Whatever-I guessed.

And here are some of the standard options I created (I acknowledge that the minor differences probably aren't even noticeable by anyone else):
And then I thought, well hubs and I love our little bistro table on the front porch, so how hard/ugly/weird would it be to try something like that in the family room? Afterall, it's right beside the kitchen and we aren't even close to getting our breakfast bar idea off the ground. Also---it's a flippin' floorplan planning software-it couldn't hurt.

So I added a couple alternative options that allow for a little bistro table or bar/pub table that can tuck into the corner or pulled out a bit if needed (and bonus: extra seating and a great place for snacks):

For visual ideas of how it would look, I just went with the last floorplan I was working on, which happens to involve the least amount of moving furniture :) Convenient!

So, I don't know. I'm not sure what I think (quel surprise) but I'm definitely intrigued by this option. I know hubs is going to vetoe it right away, so I'll have to have him think about it for a while before ruling it out. (Hey-it works-he's changed his mind about an area rug...now I'm just working on the size).

Please let me know your thoughts---do you like any of the floorplans above? What are your thoughts on the bar table idea? I'm clearly in need of an indecisiveness intervention.