Wednesday, May 28, 2014

A New Lamp


I stumbled upon a new alabaster lamp the day I bought our new chair. I say stumbled because although I have been indeed needing additional table lamps for our house, I hadn't expected to find one in our price range. 

In fact, I have come to realize just how hard it is to find beautiful antique lamps - affordably. 


I love the carved leaves on this alabaster lamp and its lovely accompanying alabaster finial. This lamp was purchased for $60, which was surprising considering that it is in such wonderful condition (no broken pieces, no significant chips, etc.). 

All it needed was a good re-wiring, which I've just had done. 

If you're an alabaster/marble lamp collector like I am, you will know that these days you can expect to pay well over $100 for one (due to their popularity in the last several years). And even at that price, you'll find that they are not in all that of great condition. 

We were bundled up in our mittens and hats today. A chilly, wet cold front moved in yesterday, which even made me take out a pair of wool socks. 

But Spring is here...the handful of lilac bushes are blooming in our yard. I haven't had the desire to clip any yet as the blossoms are sparse. Perhaps the cold winter was hard on lilacs this year. 

P.S. Shari at Little Blue Deer has given my blog another sprucing up! I love working with her! 

Wednesday, May 7, 2014

Daffodils at Dusk


Our co-op had fresh daffodils in from a local farm. I believe this variety is White Lion. Daffodils have such a sunny disposition. They can't help but conjure a smile on just about anyone. 

They sing spring, spring, spring...

Sunday, May 4, 2014

Downstairs Bathroom


This is the downstairs bathroom in our rental house as it looked when we moved in. It was one of the rooms I pondered about most as there is obviously no changing almond bisque porcelain out for white or replacing a bath cabinet very easily .

So after I pondered and pondered and pondered some more, I came up with a plan. 

Just embrace it. 


I felt that the dark sink cabinet just weighed down the tiny room so I had Patricia Banner at Cottage by Design make a lovely skirt for it. She sent me swatches of various linen colors and I chose a light sage green. It makes an enormous difference and really softens the room. Thank you Patricia! 

The other change is the faucet. The old one was peeling (that's the line I started with when I told Mike I wanted to replace it) and was of course, just plain unattractive.  I found an affordable chrome one at Home Depot. 


I opted to switch out the oak toilet seat for an almond bisque one (this is me embracing it). This immediately streamlined the loo area and made the almond bisque seem much more white than beige. 

The dark cabinet on the wall was an easy removal. I replaced it with the old Louis Phillipe-style mirror that was over our guest house fireplace. I had higher hopes for this mirror as I absolutely love it but I couldn't deny that it made a huge improvement in this little room. So over the loo it went. 

My mom arrives tomorrow so our house is giddy with excitement! 

Enjoy your wonderful spring week! 

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