decorating | kimberly ah

Mar 21 2013

home is a 1970s apartment, homemaking

Slow Productivity

We are having a little party on Saturday night (Fondue Fun Night!!!), so naturally I’m busy hanging stuff on the wall, checking out Jell-O molds and planning menus instead of doing what I’m supposed to do (finish cleaning, finish the spare room, finish painting the bathroom door…)

I’ve had the square Ikea frames for almost a year now. I originally had another idea for them (I actually own four), but that didn’t work out. I’m not sure this worked out either. I’m not in love with it. It’s fine, but not great, but I can’t decide if it’s the placement, the papers, the colors or just the whole thing that’s bothering me. (If you’d like a closer look at the papers–you know, without the camera glare– the left one is similar to this Lokta paper, the middle on is this Japanese paper, and the right one is this Lokta paper.) I love the papers…I took the colors from my chevron pillows…I love the gold, I’m just not sure if it all looks a little too matchy matchy..maybe it would look better with only one paper design in all three frames? Maybe I need a new lamp? (I definitely need a new lamp shade!) Also, this whole set-up doesn’t help with that awkward hold between the side table and the television…

In addition to hanging some lame frames, I finally got up the nerve to hang the bathroom mirror yesterday! I was very nerve-wracking, lots of measuring and leveling and math (the math part I can handle…it’s the stress of holding the measuring tape and the level and the drill and the screw that is the hard part! Home improvement is not a solo gig!) So, the mirror isn’t hung perfectly, but it is centered and level, so that’s perfect enough! You should have seen all of the hang-wringing and sweating that was going on in there as I held my breath and prayed for a straight outcome!

Hopefully next week, I can be back with some pictures of the finally finished bathroom. I am still searching for an elusive frame for my artwork (and I have to paint the door still…can’t forget that.)

In the meantime, any ideas for the living room?

Tagged decorating, diy, home, home improvement, homemaking

Mar 05 2013

3 Comments

home is a 1970s apartment, homemaking

Another SNOW Post

It’s SNOWING again! And it’s a downright snow day for many people–schools are closed, church BINGOs are cancelled, people are going home from work early (or not going at all)…I, on the other hand, will be heading out to work later. But until then, I’m happy to curl up on the couch and watch the snowfall.

Yesterday I spent a good part of my day digging around in the guest room. It’s gotten to the point where I need to take another trip to drop off a carload of donations (yay!) and I really need to get rid of a chair and three desks before I consider things DONE, but as far as getting the stuff organized, I’m almost there.

I also have this little plan going on in the living room. I have three handmade papers all ready to go in frames on the wall.

Yay for progress…no matter how slow it is!

Tagged decorating, home, home improvement, homemaking

Mar 01 2013

1 Comment

homemaking

March-ing On

Usually February drags on slowly for me. The brutal cold, the dirty snow that won’t melt away, holidays a distant memory, the fresh start of the new year wearing off…February might only be 28 days, but usually it feels like two months rolled into one.

Not this year. February flew! I think it had something to do with the Week of Indulgence, Naoto’s surgery and the fact that it hasn’t been overly cold or snowy this winter (so far!) The charm of the chill and the snow hasn’t worn off quite yet. (But take note, Spring…I’d love to see you soon!) Whatever the reason, I cannot believe March is already here!

In March, I’d like to…

…get back into our gym routine (We broke our habit while Naoto was recovering–I have no excuse–and now we need to work back into a good routine.)

…try out some new recipes (since every stand-by in our repertoire is off-limits until Naoto heals completely)

…finish an embroidery project (because it’s been too long)

…finish the bathroom & share it here on the blog (again, it’s been too long)

…finish clearing out the guest room (oh, how this project has dragged!)

…finish my framing & hanging projects (are you sensing a theme here?)

…plan a little birthday celebration (that includes something sparkly, like champagne!)

How about you…any plans for March?

Calendars: Rifle, Heather Lins Home and K is for Calligraphy

Tagged celebrations, decorating, home, home improvement, homemaking

Feb 27 2013

A Thankful Update

One week post-surgery and Naoto is feeling ready to go back to work. He had a follow-up appointment with his surgeon today and he gave Naoto the go-ahead to return to his office job and to Trader Joe’s (which makes me nervous because “light duty” means nothing to Naoto!) While he’s been home, Naoto has been showered with love on Facebook and Twitter, through phone calls and texts, in the mailbox and in soups from our neighbor friends and my book club friend, Peggy. We are truly so thankful to have so many kind friends and coworkers (seriously, Naoto works with the nicest people!).

Naoto has really embraced this liquid diet like a champ–getting excited about microwaving another bowl of pureed soup and spooning into a new flavor of Jello (my specialty) cannot be as easy as he makes it look! Next week, if all goes well, his diet expands like crazy–we can even add fish, pasta, rice and (meatless) casseroles! What a huge difference that will make!

In other news, it snowed again yesterday…this picture is from my walk home from work last night. It’s the kind of wet, heavy snow that leaves everything a mess. There are deep puddles at every street corner, which have pushed the “waterproof” standards of my cheap snow boots! It’s still snowing tonight, so I’m lucky I can stay home tomorrow and Friday to FOCUS on finishing the guest room…yes…I’m still working on the guest room. Actually, I stopped working on the guest room because I felt it was a lost cause, but now I’m ready to be DONE with the guest room, so I am going to work until it’s done. I’ve already donated ten bags of things (both from the guest room and our clothes closets) and there is plenty more that needs to go. It will be nice to begin March with a nice clean guest room so I can focus on other things around here…like framing more things…and making more Jello.

Tagged decorating, food, home, home improvement, homemaking, snail mail, Trader Joe's

Feb 25 2013

1 Comment

home is a 1970s apartment, homemaking

Another Procrastination Project

The spare room is still a disaster. The bathroom still has no mirror or towel hooks. The floors need to be swept. Am I taking care of those things? No. I’m hanging up kitchen art.

I spent Saturday framing a bunch of old family pictures. My plan (eventually) is to make a family photo wall on the open wall in the dining room. (You can see a bit of the wall in this post.) I would have hung everything up on Saturday (I’m feeling very hammer happy these days.) except I realized I have zero pictures of myself. Grandparents, parents, and a young Naoto, yes…but no young Kimberly. I’m going to have to see if I can come up with some good choices (hint, hint, Mom!) before I start making holes. I’d love to do something like this by Young House Love, mixing my photographs with other sentimental things but, let’s be honest…at the rate I’m going it would take a lifetime to fill our wall!

Since I couldn’t hang up the stuff I’d framed (and the bathroom details are on hold until Naoto can help me lift things), I decided to finally hang two more doughnut pictures in the kitchen. The top one is a letterpressed greeting card that I found while cleaning and the bottom one is the picture (the sprinkles are police officers) that has been sitting on my kitchen counter for a long while. It took two minutes–no templates, no measuring, no level…I just eyeballed it this time. It’s a small improvement, but it feels good to get two more things on the wall (instead of on the floor!)

And while we are talking about the kitchen…when the weather got colder, we brought in our wicker loveseat from the balcony. It just happened to fit on the little wall in the kitchen. (We kept Presley’s food and water bowls along this wall, but she moves them around so much that pretty much the whole kitchen floor is her food and water bowl.) It turns out that the loveseat has been a useful little addition to the kitchen. We hang out there when we’re cooking and Presley takes naps on it every day. It’s kind of the perfect place for her. She can get her snooze on and be aware of what is coming out of the refrigerator. She can hear the sound of the cheese drawer opening and yogurt containers opening from anywhere in the apartment…being close gives her the advantage of seeing if the food choice is worth the effort of getting up to beg for it.

So, that’s what’s going on around here in the recovery house. Naoto is probably going back to his day job soon…Presley and I are going to miss him as we’ve gotten quite used to him hanging around with us during the day!

Tagged decorating, home, home improvement, homemaking, letterpress

Feb 15 2013

Over the Moon

I like to send silly greeting cards to Naoto at his office (the translation office, not Trader Joe’s). I do it because he mostly gets the boring mail at home and because I have a compulsive habit of falling in love with the perfect greeting cards for him and buying them too often. I love going to visit Naoto and seeing them all displayed on the ledge behind his desk.

When I saw this card with “Presley” flying over the moon, I fell in love (as I do with all Rifle cards!). I decided to send it to Naoto as a little pre-Valentine. I also made him a special blue washi tape bunting (because blue is his favorite and all of the pink ones just seemed too girly!) and tucked in inside the envelope.

I decorated the envelope with some blue washi tape and a vintage paper heart from this set by K is for Calligraphy and I used one of our leftover wedding invitation stamps for the postage (because who else wants to see that stamp!).

When I went to Naoto’s office on Wednesday night, he had the bunting all strung up by his desk. You can see his little card collection in the background (along with the all-business bulletin board information!)

For his “real” Valentine, I bought him a box of Choco Tacos (mentioned recently here)…I’m pretty sure he appreciated those more that the washi bunting!

Tagged celebrations, crafts, decorating, diy, holidays, mail art, snail mail, washi tape

Feb 07 2013

16 Comments

home is a 1970s apartment, homemaking

Project Distraction…

You know those little home improvement projects that you finish and then say, “What took me so long??” Yeah, this was one of those. The Great Clean-Out unearthed a whole lot of art gathering dust in the closets and on the floors of our bedrooms. This week I decided to tackle the desk art.

On a giant piece of kraft paper, I tested my layout on the floor first (with Presley’s “help” of course) and traced the frames onto the paper. Then I cut out each “frame” and hopped on my ladder and taped them all up, readjusting a few times until I got them all where I wanted them. Then I measured for the picture hangers and hammered and hung each picture one at a time. I readjusted things as I went, based on tiny mis-measurements. It wasn’t an exact science (for instance, I’m not sure how I feel about the tiny cat floating away from everything at the top) but I’m pretty happy with my little collection up there. Eventually I’d love to take down my twine-o-postcards and have art hanging up across the entire desk unit, but I’m okay with this for now.

Finishing this was a nice distraction from the Great Clean-Out (which is still sprawled across the dining room table and the living room floor). Now back to putting things away and plotting the rest of the art in the apartment. Right now, I’m loving the haphazard collage look and I’m thinking I might need to “build” another one with some old family pictures in my stash.

Clockwise from the top left: Cat–postcard purchased in Japan//Girl on a Swing papercut–Tina Tarnoff//photo strip–taken at Fitzgeralds a few summers ago//You Are My Sunshine–purchased at Renegade a few years ago, but I can’t remember the seller//Presley–one of my first Instagrams, developed by PostalPix//Iron Head collage–Vivienne Strauss//Lord Byron Letter Writing quote–Bison Bookbinding & Letterpress

Tagged decorating, home, home improvement, homemaking, letterpress

Jan 21 2013

5 Comments

crafty adventures, homemaking, Office Supplies

Mrs. Cox Would Be Proud

Last Monday I started the unplanned project of organizing my desk drawers. (This led to the opening of the paper storage trunk and several other cans of worms.) Between the two desks there are four (large, but shallow) drawers. Since we’ve built the desks, I’ve just been using the drawers as a safe-keeping-dumping-ground for when company came over and when I needed to use the desk top for actual work/craft stuff. Over time, each drawer kind of took on its own personality–there was the mail drawer (letters to be returned, bits of stationery, stamps, the good pens), the coupon drawer (sale ads, weekly inserts from the Sunday paper, store coupons, the random checkbook that I can never find because I use it once a year), the crafting drawer (recently used rubber stamps & inks, all of the other pens, recently purchased washi tapes, random bits of paper, photographs, fancy paperclips) and a relatively empty drawer (where I was keeping stuff for the Election party and Thanksgiving, but now that stuff is in our storage closet and miraculously the drawer hasn’t been overtaken by other stuff).

So on Friday (after procrastinating and getting the rest of the worms in order) I finally finished–the desktop is clear (except the fun stuff) and the drawers are organized. And, not only are the drawers organized, but they are beautiful–I lined them with large sheets of paper from my stash. Spending out=big win.

Meet the newly organized coupon drawer (which also holds some other things I use while I’m at the computer):

The mail drawer (I am so excited to get some of my favorite stationery out of the second bedroom and into the desk where it’s easy to see!):

The “extra” drawer after:

The craft drawer:

Next I want to hang up the art that is just sitting on the desk top (and in the closet). I’m hesitating because I’m not sure how the vintage time card holder is going to work up there. Any opinions?

Tagged crafts, decorating, homemaking, snail mail

Jan 17 2013

4 Comments

crafty adventures, homemaking, some stuff about me

Tiny Plastic Pig

I had the nicest teacher ever in third grade. Mrs. Cox was so patient and caring, but she was also firm. One morning when I walked into the classroom, I found the entire contents of my desk tossed on the floor and on my desktop sat a tiny plastic pig. I was a very sensitive child–a bit of a goody, goody–so at first I was stunned, then I was saddened by this “mean” act. But when I looked at Mrs. Cox, she was smiling and she said that when desks got this messy it was best to start over. That just made everything better (well, a little bit…to this day I still feel slightly mortified by that moment, even though other students–mostly boys–had pigs on their desks, too). I got to work putting my desk back together and throwing out a ton of old papers and other stuff (I was apparently a hoarder back then, too!). My third grade desk never got that messy again…but I hardly learned my lesson–I am still very messy today.

So on Monday, I pulled out the tiny plastic pig (unfortunately, this is only a metaphor…I really do need a plastic pig) and started dumping everything out of my desk drawers. What you see in the picture above is some of my desktop clutter mixed with the contents of one of the drawers. All week I’ve been working on getting my desk to “perfection” status (all while trying to remember not to let perfect be the enemy of the good!) It’s quite a challenge. Since most of my crafting happens on the desks but most of my craft supplies are in the second bedroom, the process involves a lot of walking around and deciding what should go where…and what should go into the donation pile. In other words, organizing the desk has opened a whole other can of worms that involves the spare room (and somehow the junk drawer in the kitchen). I’m trying to keep my eye on the prize: a neat & tidy & functional work surface.

Tagged crafts, decorating, homemaking, memories

Jan 16 2013

27 Comments

crafty adventures, in my library, Office Supplies, snail mail, thoughts, Words to Live By

Spend Out

When I read The Happiness Project, one thing that stayed with me most was the part where Gretchen Rubin talks about “spending out”. She confesses to having a hard time using brand new things for the first time (not wanting to ruin their “pristine glory”) and tells a personal story about a bottle of perfume that sat on her grandmother’s dresser for as long as she remembered. The bottle was full when her grandmother died, most likely because her grandmother was saving it for a special occasion.

I’m a total saver. In some ways, it’s a good thing. My savings paid for our wedding and the down payment on our apartment. But in many other ways, my saving is just crazy. I save my “good outfits” (just in case some fun, unexpected plans come up) instead of wearing them to work or to run errands. I save gift cards for the perfect purchase. (We still have three gift cards from our wedding almost seven years ago.) I save the snacks I bring home from Japan. I save the “good” pens for the “right” use, as if I don’t deserve to enjoy writing out my to-do list. I save the good stationery for special occasions (which, for the record, never happen). I save scrapbook supplies because I never think I’m good enough or creative enough to use them the “right” way. I save good art in the closet because I’m afraid to mess up where/how I hang it. I save (as pictured above) fancy paper for juuuust the right project. (Full disclosure: this is just a small portion of my paper collection…the rest is in bins in the closet. Shall I take a break while you call the Hoarders people now?)

I don’t think I’m alone in my saving (hoarding). I often hear to other crafters lament that it’s hard use up their “best” supplies. I know other letter-writing lovers who talk about “hoarding” their vintage postage. I know people who have a hard time making the first pen mark in a brand new journal. I have a set of teacups that my mother received as a wedding gift that sat in its original box in her attic for thirty-nine years before she gave them to me. (A year later, I have yet to use these teacups.)

One of my goals for 2013 (and beyond) is to spend out–to use up or wear out everything I’ve been hoarding. I am going to break out the new dishcloths that my mom gave us for Christmas in 2011. (See how crazy I am?) I am going to use up my fancy papers, even if it means dreaming up reasons to use them. I am going to spend the gift card stash and wear the good clothes until they cannot be worn anymore. I am going to hang up all the art, even if it means patching a few mistakes in the walls. I am going to crack open the journal I made five years ago and fill it up with messy handwriting. I am going to use up ALL of my stationery (I’ve actually been doing well using up this lovely stuff Naoto bought me!) I am going to fearlessly use my typewriter, knowing I can easily buy more ribbon for it, and use my vintage Dymo label-maker knowing I can buy more tape for it. And…I’m going to use up my washi tape–which is by far my most-hoarded supply. I don’t want my craft stash to become the perfume bottle of my existence.

Are you a saver? Is there something you would like to use up this year? Are you a spender? Any words of wisdom for the savers?

Tagged books, crafts, decorating, washi tape