Toile is an excellent way to add beauty to your home. Toile can give a soft touch to a room using theme colors for bedding, lampshades and curtains. I found a website which offers some good advice about using Toile in decor as well a little history on the fabric. Here is an example of information from the website: “Pronounced twäl, this historic design has been making a comeback in recent years. In the past toile was usually applied to curtains or upholstery, now the focus is bedding. Toile bedding has one color of background, usually white or off-white, and a repeating themed (typically pastoral) pattern that is represented in a single color such as blue or red.”

I posted before about my bedroom redesign, and now I’ve got pictures of my new gameroom.

I just wanted to share some photos of my Christmas decorations for this year. They’re simple, but I really enjoyed putting up the tree. I hope everyone here is having fun getting ready for the holidays.

With the upgrade to a new and larger (yay!) condo came the requisite new furniture purchases. My favorite so far is the black glass desk I picked up from Office Depot. But this post isn’t about that little gem of a desk. It’s about the horrendously large styrofoam packaging that came inside the flat-packed box.

I’m a collager, and have been moving to sculpural collage, so I figured I’d turn the heavily textured and geometric 3′x6′ piece of packing material into a great wall piece.  First step was to paint it, but here is the important part… You must use water based craft paint for this. NO spray paint, NO oil based paints, NO latex. The chemicals will eat the styrofoam and it will melt before your eyes.

Mine is painted ruby red, with black accents, and each little indentation in the styrofoam adds the perfect opportunity for texture.

Ideally, I would have it all finished, but alas, it is currently hanging on the wall waiting for the art inspiration to do the collage work on top of it.

Throughout the piece will be quotes, small little trinkets placed to give it a shadow-box feel in areas, and texture images for contrast. My favorite place to find texture images is furniture magazines, which frequently have ads with bold color and shapes, as opposed to easily recognizable images. I will post pics when I get home to show the “work in progress”.

I figure since we’re all filling our lives up with beautiful furniture, lighting, etc, there will be more packing material than perhaps you’re used to, and since decorating well distinctly requires the ability to “think outside the box”, why not be thrifty and eco-conscious as well, while ending up with large(r) scale art from your own hands?

 Just a thought.

Accolade lighting is now even a better value. New lower prices are now in effect November 4, 2007.

I have finished decorating the living and dining rooms in my home, so I thought it was time to move on to the bedroom. It’s not complete, but I have freshened it up with new artwork and bedding.

I bought the coverlet set at Target for $89.  The sheet set that went with the coverlet set was pale green and pink with a floral print.  I decided to go with solid chocolate brown sheets instead to give the coverlet a modern look rather than a country one.  I also bought a complete sheet set at Target for $49.

I purchased the framed wall art from Kirkland’s for $59.  I also purchased some asian floral prints from Hobby Lobby for $7 each  and a print of a koi pond from Kirkland’s for $10 on sale, which aren’t pictured.  The throw blanket at the end of the bed was also a clearance purchase from Kirkland’s for $6.  I added an accent pillow I’d been using in another room in the house, and overall I’m pleased with the look so far.

I’m planning to tackle the guest bedroom next, so I will post with updates.

My husband and I moved into our new house at the beginning of May, and the first thing I wanted to was the front garden.

I wish I had taken before pictures, but the garden was overgrown and full of weeds. It only extended to about two feet from the house and was lined with brick.

We pulled up all of the bricks so that we could expand the garden area, then we pulled all of the weeds and tilled, leaving only the original rose bush and a peony that was planted in the shadow of the rose bush.

I created a new border for the garden with sandstone rock and created a curved outline rather than the straight border that had existed before. I also added a large landscape rock to the middle of the widest part of the garden.

The garden is positioned so that it is in the shade during the morning and midday and receives some sunlight for a few hours in the afternoon, so I looked for shade-tolerant perennials. Everything I planted was a perennial with the exception of some red bogonias that I placed along the front of the garden.

The beginning of our summer was fairly cool with lots of rain. It was perfect weather for the new garden. As the summer progressed it suddenly became very hot and dry. The weather shift was pretty drastic and took a toll on parts of my garden. Overall, everything faired well, but the rose bush died and my hydrangeas struggled to hang on through the whole summer.

This was my first attempt at a garden, and I did make a couple of mistakes that I will not make next time. First, I planted everything a little too close to each other. Now that everything has grown it has become very crowded. Second, I planted fescue sod around the garden too late in the summer, and it was too hot outside to maintain the sod. We will probably have to plant new sod or lay seed next spring.

There were also several decisions with which I was pleased. First, I chose fescue sod because I was told that I could plant that around the garden without edging and it wouldn’t grow into the garden. I didn’t have any trouble with grass growing up in the garden. I was also pleased with the perennials that I chose. They were all fairly low-maintenance. Below I highlighted some of the plants I chose.

I planted endless summer hydrangeas in the back of the garden. At first I was worried about their positioning because they were right next to the drip line, but it seems nearly impossible to overwater them in the summer. A unique feature that I liked about them is that the blooms are either pink or blue depending on the pH of your soil. It’s a good way to keep track of your soil’s pH and make adjustments accordingly. Pecan mulch is a good solution if your soil tends to be basic. I did have some trouble with these in the heat. They had to be watered everyday or even twice a day when the temperature was high. They are supposed to bloom all summer, but because they didn’t do well they have only bloomed twice.

I also planted three veragated hostas. They are perennials which are somewhat tolerant of shade. The two that I planted in the middle of the garden did great. I planted one that is in the shade from the porch and it has not done so well. I had a slug problem at the beginning of the summer, and the plants that were most affected were the hostas. These were low-maintenance and tolerated the heat well. They also have beautiful white blossoms and bloomed twice during the summer.

The small leafy plants that I lined the border of the garden with are called chocolate chip ajugas. I was told at the nursery that they only need to be watered once a week and that overwatering can kill them. However, even through the torrential rain at the beginning of the summer, I never had any trouble with them. They seem to be tolerant of everything and are extremely low maintenance. They’ve also tripled in diameter since I planted them.

The Kira Series Ceiling Fan

* 52″ span 12° pitch Kira Fan Blades
* 3-speed reversible
* Standard 153 x 15mm motor
* 2 and 6″ down rods included
* 30 Year Limited Warranty
* Integrated Light Kit with Linen Glass
* TCS Standard

The Medina Series Ceiling Fan

* 52″ span 14° pitch Blades (will accept 56″)
* 3-speed reversible heavy duty 188 x 15 mm motor
* 2 and 6″ down rods included
* Lifetime Limited Warranty
* Integrated Light Kit
* TCS Standard

I don’t think you can go wrong with a crystal chandelier in a formal dining room.

The pressure treated timbers we had edging the garden began to rot so it was time to replace them. We went with metal edging this time. The ability to create sweeping layouts was a big plus.
Here is next years gardening project.