Seasonal Wreaths

Holiday wreaths and their adornment of homes and especially doors have occurred for hundreds of years. They are meant to be a symbol of growth and everlasting life and are often made from materials such as flowers, leaves, and evergreens. 

The wreath as an object spans history and is rooted in religion as far back as the Persian Empire. Originally a circlet or wreath was called a "diadem" and was worn as a headbands adorned in gold and jewels. Wreaths were even used to symbolize success and victory such as the laurel leaves used to crown victors of Olympic Games.

At some point they transitioned from jewelry and instead began to adorn walls as a decoration. Today, beautifully decorated wreaths are not only an integral part of the December holidays, but have grown in popularity throughout the year, decorated to fit each season.

The most common use of this symbol is the Advent wreath. Although its true origin is unknown, some believe it was inspired by the Swedish Crown of Lights, a candle-bearing crown worn by young Swedish girls on St. Lucia's Day. St. Lucia was a young Christian martyr who gave her entire dowry to the poor.

The making of wreaths is an ancient and honored art that began about a thousand years before the birth of Christ and the celebration of Christmas. The Christmas Wreath symbolizes the strength of life overcoming the forces of winter. The custom of hanging a wreath on the front door of your home probably came from the ancient practice to celebrate victory or success.

At Christmas, the wreath is symbolic of Christian immortality. The circle and the sphere are symbols of immortality. The traditional colors of Christmas are green and red. Green represents the continuance of life through the winter and the Christian belief in eternal life through Christ. Red symbolizes the blood that Jesus shed at his crucifixion.

As time progressed people put wreaths on their doors to identify their home. In early Europe each house would have a different wreath made of quite exotic flowers, most likely grown by the home owner right on their own land. Today, wreaths are a common custom in New England, with a different wreath for each season.

I have a small collection of wreaths that adorn my front door and represent the changing of the season and the cycle of life.  
 

Home Decorating: Beetle Art

Anyone who has ever been to my home knows that I have an eclectic sense of décor. While most items have been accumulated while traveling and represent some memory of a fantastic vacation to some far away place some items just strike my fancy. Today I added three new pieces to my eccentric collection. Their names are Chip, Chaz, and Charlie and they are three ceramic and metal beetles.

I first saw these unusual beetles hanging in a grid-like pattern at Arhaus Furniture in the spring. While I admired their quirky appearance their $49 a piece price tag left me less eager to have them join my collection. On an off chance I visited recently with a friend and found that they were marking down floor samples and clearance items in preparation for their annual warehouse sale. As luck would have it these ceramic and metal beetles were included in that sale and marked down to a more modest and reasonable $12 each. 

At that price it was worth a gamble to see if they might fit a spot on my wall I have long found challenging to fill. I hung them vertically and am happy with how they fill the space. It also added another unusual element in keeping with my eclectic personality. 

While I am enjoying the new pieces I have to stop purchasing things since I am out of room both on the walls or packed away in storage for a later date when I have more walls to hang things in a bigger home.

Home Decorating: Lamps, Flowers, Sailboats & Foo Dogs

During my time off at the end of 2014 I did a good deal of purging, cleaning and reorganizing around the house. I eliminated many unnecessary, outdated, or too small/big clothes as well as many household items. It felt good to empty the closets and make room for new things. Another big push was eliminating paper unless imperative to keep originals leading to a lot of scanning and shredding. With all that going on I had piles of trash bags and donations to Savers to take away.

Once done I was able to finally look around my place and notice a few things that I either didn’t like or was missing. I figured I’d make a trip to Homegoods and see what might strike my fancy and make the return trip home with me.

The first section of the store was occasional furniture. They have some of the most unique and unusual items but I don’t have any room for any furniture so I tried to pass by. One item that caught my attention and drew me in was an office desk made of aluminum and looked like a vintage airplane wing. It wasn’t functional with all the rivets and would require a piece of glass cut but as cool as it was I didn’t need it so I pushed forward.

As I explored the abyss of home decor products the lighting section caught my eye. They had a pair of really cool Drexel Heritage desk lamps in the same George Kovacs Arc style as the lamp I had purchased to go next to my Eames Lounge Chair. One thing that has always annoyed me was the lack of light on my desk and this pair would certainly add light. At $49.99 a piece into the cart they went.

Next I set my sights on the center of the store where they have everything from floral arrangements to small decorative items. Some of the floral arrangements looked so believably real I just had to pick one up. I settled on two different arrangements. The first a small vase with 5 white roses and I thought it would be a perfect fit for the bathroom. At $24.99 why not do it and be able to claim my bathroom always smells like roses. I also set my sights on a large bouquet of peonies, roses and other flowers that I thought  

 
would be a perfect fit for the coffee table. Big enough to be seen but not too big that the table is lost. I was in luck here since it had two price tags on it. One tag said $99.99 stuffed inside it and the other stuck on the outside very visible was $29.99. Not sure why it had two but I definitely wanted it at the $29.99 price and so into the cart it went.

I decided that it was time to check out and started making my way to the registers but not without one final stop by the clearance section. Strangely they had a pretty fantastic boat model of a vintage single mast sailboat with its stand. It was an imposing model and was easily 3 feet in length. Its front bowsprit was loose but looked like it just needed its screws tightened and was marked down from $99.99 to $29.99. I wasn’t going to pass on this model and into the cart it went alongside the lights and flowers.

As I made my way to the door the overflowing isles of goods kept me moving at a slow pace and one final item on an end cap had to be taken home. To be fair it was a pair of items. I have long has a fascination with Foo Dogs and they had a matched pair of Foo Dogs in a bluish green glaze with pretty awesome detail. Sadly they were $49.99 each. So another $100 if they were to make the trip home. I hesitated and looked at them for a good long time before deciding I would be angry at myself if I didn’t buy them. I wasn’t sure where they would go but I could always return them if I decided they just weren’t the right fit for my home.

 

While checking out I watched as the register total climbed to a final total of $284.93. That’s a lot of items for the cost. When I got home I immediately did some research on the items I bought. The Sailboat is from Authentic Models and retails for $269.99 so at $29.99 I saved 89%. The Foo Dogs I discovered retail for $195 each at a local furniture store so a savings of 75% off. The lights were another great deal retailing for $350 a piece saving 86%. The floral arrangements had no definitive marking or maker so I wasn’t able to locate an exact match but a smaller arrangement of peonies on overstock.com was $189.00 so I can only assume at $29.99 I saves at least 84%. The roses I found another similar arrangement for $69.99 of similar quality for a 65% savings. Total retail cost of my purchases $1,618.98 for 284.93 for a savings of roughly 83%

Task 75 - Buy An Eames Lounge Chair & Other New Home Items

The most painful part of ordering something is the time it takes for it to finally be delivered. After years of salivating every time I saw or sat in an Eames lounge chair I finally bought one of my very own. After a week of daily checking of the tracking number and confirmation calls from the delivery company the chair has finally arrived.

The process wasn't perfectly seamless however. The delivery window came and went and no chair appeared but after a call to the freight company they apologized that it hadn't been put on the final delivery truck and sent a special truck to bring it the last few miles to my living room.

When it arrived it was like peeling an onion as I took all the packaging materials off the chair exposing the beautiful and vibrant 7-ply santos palisander veneer. The black vincenza leather is soft, supple, inviting and so very comfortable to sit on. Its aluminum braces and stainless steel glides are perfect compliment  to the molded plywood.

It isn't a surprise that this chair designed by Charles and Ray Eames in 1956 has become an icon of mid century modern furniture. It was designed to be "warm and receptive and look like a well used first baseman's mitt" and I'm pleased to say it fits me perfectly. I'd say it is a homerun.

The chair is just the icing on the cake of a recent spat of new things I have picked up for the house. My retail splurge on all things home started on a pair of lamps I've been eyeing for sometime. The table lamps in my bedroom I have loved but it felt like it was time to make a change. This time I opted to go for a different look all together and choose a pair of very heavy crystal lamps with linen white silk shades.

I also picked up a bargain priced bench that was just the right depth to fit the tight space at the end of my bed and just the right material to match the distressed hickory chair bedroom set I have. The burlappy type material has a great geometric pattern that compliments the angular geometric patterns of the carpet.



The only thing's left now to find are a pair of crystal accent lamps to compliment the two new ones in the bedroom for the top of the gentlemen's chest and a modeline floor lamp to pair with the Eames lounge chair.

DIY: Pot Rack

Kitchens are one of the most important rooms in any house and people often argue that they are not big enough and that is definitely the case for me. It's not that my kitchen isn't a perfectly acceptable size given the total living space of my condo but I have a unique opportunity to purchase high quality kitchen tools at a significantly reduced price from my part time job. It is a result of that circumstance that I have filled my kitchen with all sorts of great kitchen tools. My large half round hanging pot rack quickly filled to capacity with Ceramic Titanium Non-Stick Scanpan CTX Cookware.

That pot rack however wasn't large enough to hang all my new cookware. I ended up with a few large pieces that just didn't fit neatly and were too nice to be hidden away in a cabinet. It left me wondering if I should replace my current pot rack with something larger or add an additional one.

This Old House Concept

I decided after researching that I really didn't have the room for a larger version of the one I already had and I didn't have the space to add additional rack. I decided instead that my only option was a bar style rack mounted to the kitchen side of my breakfast bar wall. I searched high and low but found nothing that I thought would work for me at a reasonable price point. While looking I did come across an interesting DIY pot rack project on thisoldhouse.com. The scale was too large for me but the idea was perfect.

With the concept in mind I set off to Home Depot/Lowes to gather the materials necessary to make the simple bar of galvanized pipe. I picked up a 36" galvanized pipe, 2 Street-90 elbows and 2 flanges. I also picked up a small box of heavy duty stainless steel screws I would need to secure it safely to the wall and 4 heavy duty s-hooks to hang my cookware from. I learned quickly that it wasn't an inexpensive project. When I made it to the self checkout I realized quickly that I had over $70 worth of parts.

I got home and assembled my planed configuration. When I held it up to the wall I couldn't have been more pleased with the size, scale and look of my DIY pot rack. After some quick measurements I marked the wall and screwed the flanges to the wall. I hung my extra cookware and was very pleased with the final result. What do you all think?



Task 75 - Buy an Eames Lounge Chair

I remember the first time I first sat in an Eames lounge chair, I was about 16 and in the home of a family friend. I can’t say I appreciated it for its iconic design or its perfect proportions but rather I remember how comfortable it was. Immediately I was hooked and knew someday I would have one.

When I finally bought my own place it was one of the first things I decided I wanted to buy. I researched it and it was then I discovered that they were a tad expensive. OK not a tad but very very expensive. That crushed my immediate dreams of it being my first furniture purchase.

I didn’t give up hope and kept my eyes out for one on craigslist or at an auction. There are many reproductions and other knock offs listed and I decided that if I was going to do it I would get the real thing.

Even when I refurnished my whole place I couldn’t bring myself to pay the fee for one and a spot has always been left for where one might eventually go. As luck would have it two became available at an auction in Nahant, MA in an amazing home overlooking the water and Bass Rock. My dad and I went for the ride and the house and all its contents were being sold to the highest bidder. Apparently the house belonged to some fashion designer who got in over his head and lost everything.

I waited eagerly for them to come up and when they finally did my hopes were again dashed by reserve bids exceeding what I was able to or at least willing to spend for one. I wasn’t too terribly upset since they weren’t exactly what I wanted. One was white leather with ash and the other was red leather with cherry. I really had my heart set on the black leather and the palisander wood combination.

Years have gone by and every time I see one a little bit of me yearns for one. A few months ago while in Boston Dan and I stopped into Design within Reach who were having a floor sample sale but even then it was more money they I wanted to spend.

Anyways enough with the poor me and my expensive chair since I finally did it. I finally put my money where my mouth was and ordered it. Well not really. I put my credit where my wallet was and got a 0% for 12 months option. At least it wasn’t a onetime hit to the wallet. Now everytime I sit in the chair for the next 12 months I can calculate what it costs me. I am going to enjoy sitting back and relaxing in it for the first time. My parents also contributed towards it as my birthday present. Thanks Mom & Dad. Last night I spent the whole evening cleaning and reorganizing my living room so when it arrives next week I can have it unpackaged and in place immediately. 

 

Task 83 - Decorating for the Holiday's

Christmas is one of my most favorite times of the year. I love Christmas not because of the presents but because of the decorations and the twinkling lights. There is something about the effort people put in to decorating their homes that makes me smile. People picking out their trees as a family and loading them on the roofs of their car just puts me in a joyous mood. Admittedly I avoid the craziness of holiday shopping and try to get all that done long before the holiday rush descends on the malls. Shopping for gifts I think brings out the worst in people especially with strangers.

While I haven’t always put up decorations this year I started early. I hung my pair of 48” wreaths on my balcony but added garland and some supersized ornaments to appease the older folks in the building who told me that in years past they looked a tad provocative from the street. One of the more honest told me they looked like a pair of breasts.

I also set up my 4.5’ tree and covered it in ornaments my mom and dad got for me from the place where I work part time. They know how much I like them since I have mentioned them several times. I don’t want to know what they spent on all those handmade ornaments but it looks amazing. I added the bunch I picked up a last year on sale to make the tree look perfect. I will have to get some more this year when they go on clearance after the holidays so I can fill in the back of the tree since right now I only have ornaments on the 2 exposed sides.

My favorite ornament has to be my honu (green sea turtle) with his santa’s hat. I picked him up while in Hawaii and knew he would be a great addition to the tree. I always keep an eye out for unusual ornaments that will evoke memories from trips taken or people gone so that that they grace my tree and be part of the holidays with me.

The hardest part about decorating my smaller scaled tree was finding a tree topper that wasn’t too big for it. Apparently they don’t make tree toppers for smaller trees. I got lucky and came across a perfect star at the temporary Christmas store at the mall. I grossly overpaid since a friend of mine bought the same star except 3 times the size at Christmas Tree Shop for 1/10th the price.

While there I also found a great tree skirt to cover the driftwood stool I used to elevate the tree to make it a tad taller allowing me more room to stack up all the Christmas presents that will surely surround it this year. Most of them are already purchased and I just need to wrap , label and put a bow on them.\

I also set up two smaller trees to go on each side of my breakfast bar. I scored these trees for $5 each last year. They were display trees at the store and after the holidays’ they just wanted them gone. I used some of the small ornaments my grandmother’s gave to me to bring a little bit of her back into the season.

For my door I found the perfect wreath. My door has a dark wood veneer and most green wreaths just fad away and don't show very well but I found a white and gold wreath I thought would look perfect. After hanging it the lady across the hall from me commented on how beautiful she thought it was and asked where I got it. Ill take that as affirmation that he looked good.

I also pulled out my two stockings and hung them up. It will take some time to fill them up with goodies but no house is complete without a stocking or two.

Safari Papier Mâché

I don't usually pick up tchotchke's except when traveling to far away places I couldn't help but buy these two papier mâché busts of a zebra and a elephant I discovered while in Home Goods. Having traveled to Africa I have many things I brought back with me that I love and as a result I have a slight African theme to my place.

These particular treasures were not made in Africa however but they instead they were made in Haiti . having also visited Haiti as a youth with my grandmother I figured they too would blend well with my very eclectic decor.

I discovered after buying them that they are called Savannah Busts and can be purchased from Anthropologie for $68 bucks each. Picking them up for less then $50 for the pair then wasn't a bad deal. Sadly I did discover they also sell a Giraffe that I might just have to purchase and add to the collection.

** Update: November 3, 2013. While out and about I came across a black rhino made of papier mâché that I just couldn't resist adding to my collection. I had orignally planned to pick up the Giraffe but I think I am pleased with the three I now have and don't plan on adding anymore.

Hawaiian Quilt

The last company I worked for one of the people who I worked closely with was a Hawaiian born and raised. She had moved here shortly after getting married and as such still had many Hawaiian habits and her office was decorated in Hawaiian motif. One thing that she had that really caught my eye was a Hawaiian quilt she had handmade.  She had told me that it was a labor of love and that it had taken her nearly 3 months to complete it.

After commenting on it and admiring it many times she asked if I would be interested in learning how it’s done and making my own. I said I was interested and the next day she had brought in a variety of patterns for me to choose from.  I selected one and she gave me a book on Hawaiian quilting and helped me get everything lined up, cut out and even started.

It wasn’t an easy process and it really put in perspective how much work it really took to create one of these. I spent many hours on it and worked hard to sow the top piece of fabric with the body layer. It honestly took too much time and has ever since been sitting in a container waiting to be finished.

While in Hawaii I was again struck by the beauty of the quilts and decided rather than finishing mine I would buy one made by someone who knew what they were doing. The colors I had also selected at the time no longer work with my décor and the variety that was available gave me more options.

They were not inexpensive and at roughly $55 for a pillow cover I had decided I would bite the bullet and find one I like and buy it. I had looked around a few shops and nothing really hit me exactly but while at the Dole Plantation I score a major find and located one that was almost a perfect color and include the traditional Honu or green sea turtle in its motif.

While paying I discovered an added bonus because it was on clearance since they were expecting a whole new shipment soon and needed to clear out some older inventory.  When I got home I went to Home Goods and bought an ugly piece of art whose frame I liked and which would fit the pillow cover perfectly. After a quick DIY project it was framed and hung on the wall.