Summer is coming to an end and hopefully it was a good season for all of my friends. If you are a gardener you are probably up to your neck in tomatoes cucumbers, beans etc. Gardens are a wonderful thing and a great way to reconnect with nature. When I was young with a house full of kids this was a passion of mine. Now I am into up cycling beautiful treasures that still have value and simply need a new home for a second life.

The Little Curiosity Shop has a big evnet the 8th of September with the Vintage Barnhouse group. This year It is being held at the Camarillo Airport. We will be in space 47. We have been stocking up and have a plethora of treasures. Come and see us. We will be looking for you!! Happy September!!!

In todays obsession with black white and gray, don’t forget to add a little color. This beautiful dark waxed and hand buffed demilune table is painted in Annie Sloan Amsterdam Green. The rich warm color brings strength and interest to the room. Thank you to one of The Little Curiosity Shops patrons for sharing. Another home for one of our upcycled pieces.

It is so important to be able to think outside the box when it comes to good decorating and good design. The juxtoposition of the old quilt with the midcentury contemporary chair is just what one of our friends of The Little Curiosity Shop did with this beautiful old quilt she recently purchased from us. Her ablilty to have great design is evident from the picture. The lightness of the plexiglass chair the contrasting texture of the pillow, and the strength of the strong colors and pattern in the quilt all play wonderfully to present great style and deign. It is framed by the light streaming through the window and the simple white walls. The dark wood floor grounds everything.

Working in my garden is my mental therapy. From this I get things like these beautiful roses, but I find the garden too as an analogy on life. To get these wondrous blooms it takes such diligence and hard work. I water, I feed I dead head, I watch for criters and bugs. I weed, and cut back. Not an easy task but so fulfilling as this is proof of the beauty I end up with. Sometimes no matter how hard I work at a plant I just can’t get it to do well. Usually it is because it is not happy where I have planted it. Sometimes if I hover over a plant and it almost seems to rebel and refuses to flourish. I think of it as how my life has been. It takes so much work and love to make ones life and family flourish. Constant love and nurturing. Constant acceptance that things might not go the way you planned and you must just roll with it. But all so worth the effort!

I thought I would share one of the pretty pieces ready for sale at The Little Curiosity Shop. It came to us very bumped and bruised with pealing veneer. Bob worked hard to glue sand patch and paint. I think it turned out to be so pretty. Hopefully it will last another lifetime and is saved from the landfill. If you are wanting to see more friend me on FB at The Little Curiosity Shop. Painted treasures and home accoutrements for very good prices are our business. Lots of treasures to be had.

The older I get the faster time whizzes by. I know it is all relative but still how has 69 years passed through my fingers like grains of sand? Sometimes when I was in the middle of it, changing diapers cooking cleaning and trying to make ends meet, I thought there was no end to time. Retirement and old age seemed a world away. When celebrating my birthday this month I was suddenly slapped in the face with the absence of time left for me. Thus I really must make every moment, every day count. Carpe Diem means so much more to me. So many things to do and so little time. Still loving life and all it gives, so lucky to have lived it and have so much more to look forward to. Wonder where the path will lead.

Happy May to all! Hope you take the time to smell the roses and have a wonderful happy month!

Found this beauty discarded on the side of a street.  The owner even helped us load it in the back of our car.  Now granted it didn't look quite like this when we found it , but with some paint and work and a wonderful husband, this is what we ended up with.  Painted with Annie Sloan French Linen and lots of scrubbing and cleaning this chest has been given a new life.  One more piece kept from going to a land fill.  

As an interior designer I often here "I need a huge something to put on my big wall".  It can be a perplexing problem when you have a really large wall and don't have any idea as to how to decorate it.  You don't need to buy a huge picture or giant mirror.  You also don't have to hang a ton of small pictures that move all around on you.  You do have to fill the space in an appropriate size or grouping for the wall.  Remember if you put things together in a grouping they will become a unit, but they need to be hung close enough together and have a relating factor.  I had a wonderful family picture that wasn't  large enough for where I wanted to display it, so I hung it over the old window.  They became a unit and filled the space appropriately.  The black frames on the pictures and window are the unifying factor.  The sharp edges of everything rectangular is softened by the wreath and the wreath adds a refreshing texture to the hard surfaces.  Finally do not hang things too high.  If it is a room where it will be seen from a sitting position hang it so you don't have to look up to view it.  Things should be hung only 3 to 5 Inches above the piece of furniture that is its anchor.    Just some ideas to decorating the walls in your home!!!  

Spring is almost here.  Daylight savings time starts this weekend and our evenings will suddenly become a lot longer.  I am looking so forward to these wonderful sun filled longer evenings.  We have a wonderful spring show coming on April 21 at the Thousand Oaks Soccer fields at Janss Road and the 23 Freeway.  This a wonderful local event that lasts only one day and brings together about 100 local vendors that have great upcycled recycled and repurposed  creative goods for the public to purchase at great prices.  Hope all of you come out to visit us at this event.  The Little Curiosity Shop will be there with some great products you will want to take home with you.  So mark your calendars for April 21 and meet us at the Barnhouse Market.  The Little Curiosity Shop will be there with bells on.  Looking forward to seeing you there!!

It took me two trips to a garage sale to buy grandma's little old hutch.  Of course it didn't look like this when we bought it at that garage sale.  Thanks to my sweet and talented husband it was transformed to this lovely little piece.  The top is separate so it isn't to hard to move.  I posted it on the many buy sell and trade market places and had it sold with in an hour.  Now I know it isn't to everyones taste but it did go to a person who knows just how to place things in her home.  it's not too cluttered and on just the right sized wall.  She came back to show me a picture.  So thanks to some elbow grease on my husbands part, a couple coats of paint and a little advertising on social media, this piece was saved from the land fill at least for a few more years.  When we buy these kinds of pieces I often dream about what their story is.  What lady prized this and dusted and decorated it.  When and why was it banished probably to the garage as it was dusty and dirty.  How wonderful to see it refreshed and servicing again in the beautiful way it was meant to.

I really think decor and art work should be fun and a little bit surprising.  I was looking for something large for my kitchen wall.  I have always been fascinated by the art work we see everyday in the things all around us.   The Morton Salt Girl has evolved through the years and the one that was used in the 60s was one of my favorites.  So here is my rather large painting of her.  I hadn't painted in years and found it to be a fun creative adventure  So always remember "WHEN IT RAINS IT POURS" 

Good design can start with something as simple as the texture on the walls.  To balance the darker warmth of the texture on the walls I used an bright off white for the upholstery.  The picture over the sofa is a great size for the wall and is hung not too high above the sofa, giving unity to the two pieces.   An element of surprise is on the floor as you can see the two mice and mouse trap.  This is not something you would like to see in your own house but a bit of whimsy for a doll house!

Thought it might be fun for you to see some of the rooms in the old doll house I redecorated for a Christmas present.  It was old an required a lot of scraping, scrubbing painting and repair.  This is the master bedroom.  The new bedding and chair are done to coordinate with the little draperies. The furniture is over 40 years old from the origional house decor, but I did paint the  four poster bed black to give it a little fresh look.  The floor I covered in a cute little craft paper to bring in some geometric pattern.  Every room needs a bit of geometric pattern.  The round rug is a doily I found at a garage sale.  The greenery adds some life to the room even though it is artificial .  I cut apart a small piece of artificial succulent and placed it in a thimble and then in the old wash basin.  The things I love the most are the pictures.  These are photographs my brother shrunk down.  The two of people are of my parents my grandchildren's great grandparents.  A bit of family history there for them to see.  The pictures over the bed are landscapes from my home state Minnesota.  The two plaques were hand painted by their great grandmother and hung in the original version of the doll house.  So this is the master bedroom.  Hope you like.

Dark waxing can be done after you have done one coat of clear wax.  I like to use Annie Sloan waxes as they bring the paints alive and provide a good strong  final finish.  They can also be painted over if you don't like the color.  I apply the dark wax with a round stiff bristle brush and usually dab off a bit befor applying to the piece I am working on.  When I have finished the dark waxing process I then take a reg and clear wax.  This does two things.  You can take off any excess dark wax you feel is too heavy and it provides another protective final finish.  It also seals the dark wax.  When you are satisfied with your finish it is time to buff the wax to give a beautiful lustrous finish.  Here is the final product of my purple rocker.  I think it turned out beautifully.  I do plan to add a cushion.

The next step is sanding off some of the paint layers to show a worn look to the finish.  This step is done before any wax is applied and is important to help show the depth of finish.  I try to choose places that would normally show wear and tear on the piece.  In this case the warmth of the wood finish shows through.  If the piece has layers of different paint you may get beautiful colors from each layer showing through.  When you are happy with the amount of sanded off finish you have done it is time to do a layer of clear wax.  After clearwaxing you can then dark wax.   

I have chosen to wash the sharpness of the purple with a very light blue.  This gives the purple a softer coloring and is the first step in my attempt to give depth and layers to the color.  Cross your fingers. Now, on to the next step!

It seems every time we paint something we end up with a white or gray or some other neutral color.  We are in the buisiness of selling our upcycled pieces, so a neutral color is always safe and usually sells in very short order.  Today's trend is gray and has been for the past several years.  I personally love color and so this time Bob and I decided since this beautiful little rocker has not sold in its natural wood color, it is the perfect piece to have some fun with.  Bob is putting on the first coat of a lovely purple hue called Emile from Annie Sloan.  It is a bit strong and purple has never been my favorite color, but it is time to step out.  I have plans for this little beauty and hopefully my ideas will develop into something fun and wonderful. I will show you how it progresses.  If it doesn't turn out, well nothing ventured nothing gained.  Time to step out of the gray box. Stay tuned!!!!

Today's popularity of the open floor plan presents all kinds of questions.  The function of everyday living is now colliding with form.  What happens when Chip and JoJo leave and the mess of cooking and toys takes over?  When I was raising my brood of four, I enjoyed a bit of seperation.  The element of a messy kitchen was not always what I wanted in view.  

I wonder if it doesn't make it just too easy for us to mindlessly snack.  We no longer have to even leave the room to raid the fridge.   Is it promoting fewer steps and more calories?.  

Just questions to the "open floor plan" 

What goes into upcycling a good, old piece of furniture into a great beautiful piece.  The lines of a piece are the first thing I look at when picking a piece to be upcycled.  They can be traditional or contemporary but they need to be classic.  Is the piece usable or has it gone beyond the ability to be structurally reinvented.  If we are painting the piece, veneer can be patched and often times glued back down.  Often times dents, bruises and bumps are part of the charm and patina one wants in a piece.  These scars give the pieces their charm and history.  Loving the piece makes you want it and dream about the history the piece may hold.  Sometimes I wish they could talk and tell us by whom and where it was made.  Who first owned the piece and how and where was it used. 

There is a love that one develops for the upcycled pieces and that love is hard to describe.  You have saved this piece from going off to fill another landfill.  You won't find the identical piece again, unlike the furniture you might buy at Home Goods.  If the piece's use is no longer applicable in this day and age, what can it be repurposed to do.  A headboard repurposed into a bench, or a bench repurposed to a coffee table.  Thinking outside the box is what it is all about.