Hey there!

Whoops! Just realized that some people are still checking/landing on this blog which clearly has been defunct for awhile now.

Please check out my new blog Curry Kay Designs... something lovely for your life and my Etsy shop Curry Kay Designs... something lovely

Something Lovely For My Craft Closet...

I was reading Country Living the other day and these beautiful millinery flowers caught my eye. If you remember from my earlier posts that I'm a sucker for flower hair pieces so I had to look up the source. Low and behold I found my new favorite store (apparently it's Martha's too....) the Tinsel Trading Company. First off you have to read their About Us because I'm also a sucker for a good family story...

Then you have to peruse all their amazing eclectic mix of vintage and new crafting stuff. They have a whole category dedicated to Fringe! At the moment I'm not in the market for guinea fowl feather fringe (I already have a bag of individual guinea feathers that I'm trying to find a use for), but I really wish I was....

Velvet 7" Flowers, Tinsel Trading Company, $10.00
Glass Glitter Sampler, Tinsel Trading Company, $20.00
Feather Fringe, Tinsel Trading Company, $15.00/yd (love the guinea feathers!)
Dresden Paper, Green Dots, Tinsel Trading Company, $11.25/sheet

Something Fun for My Table...

Here's the promised Cowboy Themed napkin set. Even better yet, as you can see in the bottom corner... I found a fabric pattern of a Hoe Down! It probably make me way too happy... And while you may look at this and think that I missed the mark, imagine them all on a long wood table (preferably of reclaimed barn planks like my Dad makes) with bright white plates and some sort of fun napking ring like a bow made from leather (preferably fake leather of course). The beauty isn't in all of them stacked together but how they will work together spread out over a table! (Have I pleaded my case enough so that you like it too?)

(Left to Right)

Gibson Pimento, Tonicliving $8.95 per yard
Buckaroos, ReproDepot $4.95 per half yard
At the Park Pindot Blue, Fabric.com $7.98 per yard
HoeDown Fabric, ReproDepot $4.75 per half yard
Mod Large Swirl- Mustard, ReproDepot $9.95 per half yard
Pretty Please, Purl Soho $9.00 per yard

First I Rant Then I Rave...

I'm home sick, bleh. Could it be that it's raining and 65 degrees in the middle of JULY? Or that the Ear, Nose and Throat doctor shot decongestant up my nose yesterday just to tell me that I have a severely deviated septum and that's why I have never breathed through my nose? I did not need to pay $25 to find that out and the decongestant spray has made me feel like I'm underwater ever since.

Now the rave... I had a fabulous wedding shower last weekend which resulted in many wonderful things. First, two of my favorite ladies gave me "Visions in White" by Nora Roberts (one is a big Nora fan). It set me off into dream land about the wedding planning company I keep planning on starting (before I realize that my current event planning job prevents it due to scheduling) but it was a lovely dream land.

Second, I was reminded of the rockin' ladies I have in my life that would give up a gorgeous Saturday afternoon to celebrate with me. Including one incredible chica who drove from Syracuse to Connecticut for a 3 hour shower and then back to Syracuse all in one day. Not to mention my girls from NYC who came up the night before to thoroughly make this a "bridal weekend".

Third, my sister made a beautiful video of photos of A. and I throughout our lives that was absolutely perfect and unexpected.

Fourth, A. and I were literally showered with amazing gifts. For the record, I like to think that we are fairly immaterial people, which sounds kind of funny since most of this blog is things I like and want to own, but that aside. We very much go with the idea of your "presence is the best present" especially with our wedding. Nobody has the cash in this economic climate to shell out for gifts and we love nothing more than to spend time with our faves. Ok, now that that's out of the way... the gifts were super cool!

The shower had a baking theme since I do love to bake and everyone brought baking/kitchen items and recipes. Love it! I have new fabulous pots and pans, and baking supplies, and cake decorating supplies, and aprons, and a new 1930's mini cookbook about Jello (I do love my 30s cookbooks and plan to excerpt soon).

I was completely inspired to start "creating" things again. Baking, cooking, interior designing, card making, letter pressing, you name it. I want to do it... right now. Part of my love for the creating is the conceptualize stage, that excitement before you actually bring it into reality. I'm neck deep in wedding crafting, but it's all been planned for so long I'm looking forward to non-wedding crafting in the future.

My next post will be photo happy I promise!

Something Lovely for My Table...

I've love the look of a mix matched dining table. There's definitely a time and place for refined elegance or true simplicity, but I appreciate a table set with some whimsy and fun. Enter my Napkin Collections. My Napkin Collections don't exactly exist yet due to (a) lack of time, (b) lack of funds, (c) lack of convincing A. that having a napkin with a Cowboy motif is necessary (sometimes it just is).

But someday it will be a reality. I want to have a huge pile of napkins made from random, fabulous fabric. So random that you can dress your table with endless combinations of napkins to fit any type of soiree. For example, when I invite my ladies over for some cupcakes and tea-- who am I kidding? Cupcakes and champagne-- I will serve it wearing the apron mentioned here and set the table with these fantastic napkins. In case you can't tell, the bottom left has frogs on it which I find wonderful. Chances are I will be serving aforementioned champagne out of my multi-colored Depression Glassware tea cups. ... Because I feel like it.

(Top Row L- R)
1. Drawing Room Sketchbook from ReproDepot $14.95/yd (see what I mean about not having the moolah for this project?)
2. Michael Miller Ginger Blossom Vintage Dots Breeze $8.98/yd
3. Sweet Mod Floral in butter at Repot Depot $8.50/yd
4. Yellow Frog Prince at purl soho $18.00/yd
5. Vintage Cherries, Spring at tonic living $8.95/yd
6. Vintage Stripe Blush at tonic living $8.95

Up next... more Napkin Collection fun, including the promised Cowboy motif!

APOLOGIES!!!

I'm sorry for not blogging in just about forever. When I got Welshie's comment requesting my return, I couldn't believe I hadn't blogged since the end of April! Shame on me... In my defense life has been ridiculously crazy, as I'm sure it has for everyone. I worked every day from May 11th to June 4th. Partially in Chicago, partially in CT and partially in White Plains, NY. Most days had me coming home around between 9 and midnight, if not working overnight. Plus working on wedding plans (holy cow 114 days!?!?!?!) and getting ready for my friends wedding last weekend.

Okay, that was a pretty good "woe is me, I have no time to do fun things anymore" rant. But things should be calming down somewhat now. I'm off to Anaheim next week so hopefully I'll have time to catch up. I'm flying out on my birthday (booo) so I think I'll have to buy myself an airline cocktail. Though, truth be told, I fly so much I have coupons galore for free cocktails.

Now with my rant and my promise to be better complete, I will spend my lunch hour looking for something fun to post about!

Something Lovely For My Yard

I love this weather!! Love, love, love it. It's hot but not with the humid and bugs that summer brings. More than anything it makes me want an Outdoor Living Area or at least windows that do more than open 5 inches!

Inspired by the weather I started scouring Country Living's website for this article in last month's issue. (A note on Country Living: My mom gave me a subscription for Christmas and I was very hesitant about it, but it's turned out to be fantastic! There's always 4 or 5 articles that I love.) There was a fabulous OLA space created from an old green-house. It may be a little more Indoor than a true Outdoor Living Area, but that just expands it's possibilities for other seasons! Run electricity out there and it would be easy enough to hook up a space heater for chilly nights or imagine curling up with a book during a rainstorm!!!

{via Country Living Greenhouse Makeover}

I'd make a couple of changes if it was mine of course. I'd have to nix the flowery shabby chic. Shabby Chic works well for this space but floral prints aren't really my thing. The chandeliers would DEFINITELY stay though! I'd also make the window walls so that they could all open up. like restaurants that open up to sidewalks. As always the couch would really need to be a pull out or a futon for all the naps I plan on taking and I would include a flip top table in the corner for impromptu fun: dinner parties, board games, puzzles, and the like!

Something Lovely... that I do NOT need!!!! (Part II)

On the other side of the spectrum is the absolutely beautiful fun baking supplies from Bake It Pretty (again the name says it all!). The site is divided into: bake, decorate, packaging and celebrate. I'm not sure what else you could really want to make gorgeous baked goods!!
1.Fluted Flower Cups. Love, love, love these. When I make cupcakes I spend a decent amount of time deciding the flavors, the filling, the colors and the decorations that it seems like a cop-out to put them in the traditional pastel wrappers you get from the grocery store. Bake It Pretty has so many gorgeous wrappers that it would be hard to choose from!
2.Magic Forest Cookie Cutter Set. You have to enjoy a cookie cutter set that involves a Gnome, Mushroom and Squirrel. Bake It Pretty has such a nice selection of Squirrel inspired baking supplies that I had to keep myself from posting all of them (I must be on a squirrel kick today!). But luckily, you can still see the goods here: lollipop mold, nut bags, and mini chocolate molds. (Someday I will share the story of the mentally disabled squirrel that my siblings and I befriended. Ever have a squirrel take a nap in the hood of your sweatshirt? It's weird).
3. Eat Me Tags. These are just fantastic. They also have "drink me" cards, all inspired by "Alice In Wonderland". Once I get my Gocco I hope to be whipping up some tags of my own!
4. Animal Cracker Chocolate Mold. I love this idea! Who doesn't love Animal Crackers? Just remember that this is for chocolate, not for baking. I once started making Peanut-Butter-Chocolate-Cookie candies in my mini chocolate molds before I remembered I couldn't bake the plastic mold!

Something Lovely... that I do NOT need!!!!

I thought today I would post on some absolutely fantastic baking sites that I've found recently. Some of them are fun in the sense that everything is so pretty and would make my sub-par baking seem fabulous. Some are fun in the sense that I want all of the tools so that I can use them once and then look at them lovingly in my random kitchen tool drawer...

First up: Www.PastryItems.com. Doesn't get much more straightforward than that!
1. Matfer Lattice Dough Cutter. One look at that beautiful lattice crust and I was sold. This is a necessity for the 2, maybe 3, pies I make a year!
2. Matfer Adjustable Dough Cutter. Once again I will need this for making lattice strips for those times that I don't want to use the above mentioned cutter. OR I can use it to cut my ravioli and tortellini. Granted I only make these 2 or 3 times a year too, but spending $122 must be well worth saving the time to cut out individual squares!
3. Culinary Templates for Pastry. I know that you're thinking that this looks bizarre and pointless. I thought so too until I saw what they were doing with it here. Now I'm not sure how I ever had a dinner party without it!
4. Buche. I think this is so freakin awesome. Every Christmas in High School I elected to make a Yule Log for French class using a recipe from Mademoiselle. Every year this seemed like a great idea until I spent an hour wrestling a thin sheet of chocolate cake into a log shape. The recipe is still stuffed in my Joy of Cooking if anyone wants it!

Something Lovely For Somewhere...

Image Via Flickr: MOLO - Opening Paper Softwall 02

One of our projects at work is trying to turn a conference room in a gorgeous old hotel in New York City into a more modern, hip meeting/museum space. Enter MOLO. This stuff is awesome, even if it doesn't have any practical uses in my personal life (as of yet). The structures (softwall, softblock and soft lighting) are a honeycomb of kraft paper or non-woven textiles that can be expanded to form whatever you like. We are using the walls to make an organic, free form white backdrop for colorblaze LED lights which should have an awesome effect.

I'd love to try out the soft seating (photo below) especially since the textile version is approved for indoor and outdoor use. It looks like they fold up pretty small, so if you had the storage space (and the bank to buy a bunch of them), wouldn't these be awesome to pull out for a summer party? Comfy, round lounges set up under trees for your guests relaxation?

Image Via Inventor Spot

Something Lovely For My Table...

I usually try to stay away from the Anthropologie website, if only because I'll love everything on there and be able to afford nothing! But, in trying to kill some time this morning (I'm back in Vegas and still waking up really early like I was back home) I allowed myself a sneak peek. And I am in LOVE with these serving dishes!!! I can't figure out how to post a photo of them so here are the links: Inside Out Serving Bowl, Fern, Atom Art Serving Bowl Green, and Inside Out Serving Bowl Daisy. Even better, they really aren't that expensive at $24.00 each! A. and I chose to go with really simple table settings (currently rocking grey Ikea plates and have registered for white Crate and Barrel plates) so that we could decorate the table other ways: linens, placemats.... and now I'm thinking Serving Bowls!!

And while I've given in to the Anthropologie temptation... I am a total sucker for their retro looking aprons like this fantastic Stockholm Floral Apron. Yellow, Blue or Green? Yes please! How could you not be inspired to whip up baking delights if you were wearing this beauty?

What are you favorite Anthropologie finds?

Something Lovely For My Craft Room...

After I invested time and money in my failed Lettepress contraption (which I still haven't given up on) I found all sorts of testimonials online saying "Thank god I didn't go with letterpress, Gocco is so much better!". Gocco? What was this magical word? It's a tabletop screen printer/rubber stamp made by the Japanese company Riso. You can print on anything including paper, glass, wood, tin and fabric (swoon!). Apparently they are REALLY REALLY hard to find, so if anyone has a lead on one please let me know! Though I did promise myself I wouldn't buy one until after the wedding. I really do not need another project right now!

But how does it work, you ask? Check out this fabulous video at GoccoPress.com. It reminds me of videos that you used to watch at school when you were in Elementary School. I love how proud she is after her first print!

Here are some Flickr photos that really show the amazingness of this machine!1. Little Birds Gocco print, 2. gocco notes, 3. True Love -- Gocco Printed Moleskine Cahier Notebook, 4. Gocco Xmas coloured cards, 5. Gocco print on kraft paper, 6. Trees - Gocco Card , 7. Gocco as appears in Moo, 8. New Poppy Gocco Print, 9. 66 Motel Gocco Screenprint

Elizabeth Anne Designs Blog also features some drop dead gorgeous, drool worthy, make-you-rethink-your-invitation beautiful invitations and wedding related Gocco projects here and here.

Another thing to add to my dream craft room!

Something Lovely for a Wedding...

I saw this Save the Date and gasped out loud (which was really awkward because I was at work and there were a bunch of coworkers around). The combination of letterpress, silhouette, a hot air balloon and an old-fashioned romantic couple is fantastic. Click the link to the original site because the envelope and return sticker are just as cute. Makes me wish that I could go back to the drawing board (and that I had talent even close to this!)

Found via Oh So Beautiful Paper. Originally posted at The Scribbles Vermont (which you should check out because they have a ridiculous fun online shop!)

Something Lovely to Light the Way...

This past Friday marked the 6 month countdown to our wedding so I spent the weekend doing fun wedding related activities including picking up my gown, meeting with the rental company and working on my invitations!

Meeting with the Rental Company was far too much fun. I got to play with linens, candles and centerpieces for nearly 3 hours! I love talking wedding decor with other people who are in to wedding decor. She also reminded me that I should look into luminaries to line the porch, the steps and the patio for the cocktail hour and reception. For budgetary reasons these will probably be the classic white lunch bag with kitty litter and votives, but I want to do something different with the design. Wedding bells and hearts aren't really my and A.'s style but pieces of lace or damask could be elegant and graphic enough for the job.

Here are some beauties I found. In my dream world I would use the hanging candles in the bottom right photo EVERYWHERE!!!:Feinedenge
Martha Stewart
DC Nearly Weds
Martha Stewart

Outdoor Living

Last week I was telling A the changes I was going to make to our Outdoor Living Area. It's true, until we move out of our apartment this OLA does not exist, but it's important I keep fine-tuning my vision so that when we do get that house I can make my dream a reality!

After looking at me like I was a crazy person for a few seconds, A asked me where this obsession with an OLA came from. It took me a little while to realize that it stems from my love of porches and disappointment that not all houses have one. When A and I first looked at houses online a few years ago I was quick to dismiss them if they didn't have a Front Porch. About a year into our relationship we were taking a walk around Saratoga and he said "I finally understand why you need a front porch, every house in Saratoga has one". Only then did I realize that not every town was filled with houses featuring front porches and that I might have to alter my expectations some. So in the wake of this devestating observation came my dream of an OLA.

Still, if I had the choice it would be a nice big front porch. I love the front porch on my Mom's house where I grew up. It's always served as a place to watch the world unfold from the comfort of my home. When I was 4 I sat on my front porch and watched the new girl that moved in across the street play on her front porch - she later came over to my porch, asked me to go see Roger Rabbit with her and became one of my best friends. As kids my siblings and I watched the tourists come in every summer by reading their license plates from the safety of the front porch. The porch was a perfect place to watch thunderstorms at night and read the paper during summer mornings, sprawled out in the sun with the comics around me. Sitting out on the porch also made it easy to strike up a conversation with neighbors as they left their house or walked their dog. You can always count on a friendly wave from someone driving by if you're sitting on a porch.

There was even a wonderful summer when I was on "sabbatical" (aka, I was taking time off from working to figure out what I was doing with my life) and spent every day on the porch. I had the rare occasion to watch baby Robins hatch. I saw Mama Robin built the nest, I found the eggs the day after she laid them, and I watched her sit on them for weeks. I was there when the first one hatched (Mama Robin made a screeching sound that pierced my eardrums) and even more amazingly, I was there when the first one flew the nest. You need a porch to get that experience (and a lot of time to do nothing)!

So now that I've waxed poetic about my love for, and memories of, porches, here's some wonderful Saratoga porches to feast your eyes upon. I'm particularly partial to the Top Right photo of Union Gables Bed & Breakfast because A and I will married on that porch this October!

Greetings from Las Vegas Airport...

I'm getting really bad at this. I need to make an April 1st resolution to update my blog 3 times a week (if I make it on April 1st does it mean I can consider it a joke and break it?). Please forgive me any grammatical errors (or any that are more than usual), any incoherent sentences (again more than usual), any bad jokes (again...) and clearly an excessive use of parentheses. I am currently sitting in the Las Vegas airport waiting for my flight that takes off 3 hours from now (I've already killed an hour) so I can take the Red Eye home. Normally, this wouldn't be an issue but I tried very hard to stay on East Coast time for this trip and so I feel like it's midnight, not 9pm. My flight leaves at 11:50pmPST, which means 2:50amEST. Anyone who knows me knows that when I'm tired I just crash... so let's hope that I don't fall asleep and miss my flight!

I wanted to share this fabulous blog with all of you called Operation NICE. Melissa, the blogger fabulouso (yeah I make up words in foreign languages when I'm exhausted), believes that kindness can change the world and documents nice things all around her. What a freakin great idea. Who doesn't need to be reminded that we should focus on all the good things that happen? And with that... here are nice things that happened to me this trip...

- The flight attendant went out of her way to tell me she liked my outfit (now only if I could remember what I wearing so I could pull it off again!) on my flight out here.
- The check-in attendant at the airport let me check my bags early (like 4 hours early) so I didn't have to hang around with them.
- The Audio Visual Technician gave me a par can light free of charge on the show floor (unless you are familiar with tradeshows you probably don't understand the magnitude... but this is a REALLY nice thing to do!).
- My client left me a very nice phone call after the first day of the tradeshow was over to thank me. Ever notice how being thanked for the simplest thing (like doing your job) makes you feel so good?

I'm sure people did many more nice things that I was too busy to notice. So I'm going to try very hard to be aware of those who do nice things and try to do more nice things in return.

Trying hard to stay awake for the next 3 hours... Please let me know of any nice stories you have to share!!

Something Lovely for the Warmer Months...

In case you haven't yet picked up on it, I'm in love with the idea of an "Outdoor Living Area". My ideal OLA would be where the living room (or kitchen or bedroom) open up into a beautiful flagstone veranda lined with lush foliage, oversized chairs, benches, cushions and the like for lounging, and a mismatched iron table for brunches and late night dinners and of course there would be a chandelier hanging over head (probably from a perfectly positioned 100 year old tree). You wouldn't know where the house ended and the OLA started... it would be heaven.

This works very well and is very plausible if you fulfill the following criteria:
1. It doesn't snow between the months of October and May (I live in New England, it does).
2. You do not have any mosquitos, black flies, gnats or any other undesirable arthropods. (We do. My quest to bring my OLA inside my apartment with potted plants led to an infestation of gnats).
3. You have plenty of room for OLA. (Currently I live in an apartment with windows that barely open... yet still the gnats found their way in).
4. You can curl up with a book and not realize the day has passed, you have friends who have no problem lounging around eating brunch for hours and those same friends can transition easily into rousing board/card games in the afternoon. (Finally this I have!)

So my dreams for an OLA will remain dreams until we find the perfect house (and I'll just have to make do with the climate!)

In the meantime, here are some OLAs to drool over (all from Dominomag.com)...
What would your dream outdoor living area be like?

Something Lovely to Read...

During my busy tradeshow season I spend a lot of time reading in airports, planes and hotels. I usually pack 3-4 books with me depending on the trip. I've read a couple good ones this year that I figured I'd share. I'm not great at writing about books, so forgive me if my entries or thoughts sound weak!

Also, let me know if you have any good suggestions. I'm an avid Amazon.com stalker and in desperate need of some new reads!

1. Angle of Repose by Wallace Stegner
I actually started this one in December and had a hard time getting into it. My mom said it was one of her favorite, so maybe I need to read it again all at once instead of in bits and pieces.

2. The Stranger by Albert Camus
This was a fun one to read. I (unknowingly) got an edition that was translated into American English instead of British English from French. The story line is simple enough that it was fun to read into the different nuances of the phrases and see how they could have been spun differently in a different translation.

3. American Wife by Curtis Sittenfeld
Definitely a fun and easy book to read. I had never really thought about what a person's life must be like if they are married to a politician but have no desire to be there. It's based loosely on Laura Bush, so I wonder how much of it is even remotely true!

4. Eva Luna by Isabelle Allende
I love love love her books and this one was no exception! That's all I have to say about that...

Something Lovely For My Eyes (Sunday Edition)...

Photos from the week that made me happy! The quote is hard to read but it says "Be happy for this moment. This moment is your life." - Omar Khayyam.

Enjoy your Sunday!1. Happiness is a warm puppy, 2. communal, 3. quote of the week, 4. for my sister...

So Sorry...

I've been slacking yet again! It's awful when work is so busy that you can't even blog during your lunch break!

I hope everyone had a wonderful week and enjoyed the first day of Spring (unless of course you were in NYC and then you had snow)!! My boss kindly let us out at 3:30p and I spent a fabulous afternoon shopping around at Craft stores with a friend.

I was hoping that by today I would have a wonderful letterpress and letterpress invitations to show you. At the end of January I got this idea that I was going to letterpress my own wedding invitations and found these instructions online. It took a couple of weeks, but we actually made it and I remembered to take very specific photos the entire time! We bought the ink, the plates with our invitation info and invitation paper. I was all set and had dreams of the fabulous invitations I was about to print..... and the press broke. The 2x4s on top split the moment I put any amount of pressure on the bottom plate. I tried some other options, but it kept cracking (along with dreams of my letterpress invitations!).

So if you want to give it a go, I'll send over the photos. But most unfortunately don't have anything pretty to show you! However it is Friday so enjoy this adorable Spring Cupcake!

1. aaron and angels wedding cake, spring cupcakes!

PS- I want to give a special "Rock On!" to my little bro Sammy (11 years old) who is in his first school talent show jamming to his own medley on the bass! (He doesn't read this, but I want everyone to know how awesome he is!)