New Year New Blog!

I am on a new road now, I am headed down a short straight path to graduation in May!

This new years brings much thought about the future. What will I want to do with my degree? I have some plans in mind, I want to focus on color and fabric. These two things are what started me on my journey in design and it is logical that I would now want to devote more time to them specifically.

I have been color consulting professionally for the past three years. I have been a life long stalker of color and texture which includes  painting, sewing, embroidery, faux finishing and even my own line of purses and lamps and really so much more.

Jean Queen Purses sold in local boutiques

original designs embroidered onto sweet bassinet ensembles

vintage hats and bases, so charming in person

I have designed, created, marketed and sold much of what I love. And now I plan do the same with other products of color and texture. I have only a science and math course this semester and I will cross the finish line in just a short four months. I have decided to start a new blog called LANGUAGE OF COLOR AND TEXTURE!
Here is to the next chapter in my design life!

Feeling Good!

 Isn't this wall awesome looking! It is three dimensional and looks like a plaster. Is located behind those partitions on the left side of picture below. It is what greets you when you walk in the door.

I had to go for my annual mammogram and it was made a lot more comfortable by the beautiful design. The Breast Health Center design  felt like it high end hotel or spa.  It wasn't clinical or cold. I asked who the designer was and the girls working did not know. Shame, I would love to see their web page.

The colors were mainly brown and pink of course with a touch of green. The pink tones went front light to bright and represent the international breast cancer symbol.

The lighting was moody and fun, this picture makes this look a bit funky but it was innovative and pretty in person. The whole acrylic block looked glowing.

This is the changing room that was small but beautiful and had everything a girl would need.

                                                   Wall paper that was used throughout.

The little dressing rooms are down this hall and then you wait in your spa robe to be called for your state of the art digital mammogram. This pretty cabinet houses extra spa robes. Couldn't you just see buying a plain cabinet like this at IKEA and then stenciling it in an oversize damask pattern and then add white paint! Great IKEA hacker idea! Notice the carpet transitions from stripe to a free form damask interpretation. In the way back they have another pretty crystal chandelier in the ultrasound  waiting room.

you can see the wall paper here

One last detail, the brown silk like taffeta fabric was is attached to a copper rod that is simply strapped to the wall with plastic anchors, so simple. They used an elbow piece and then just bent the copper rod around the small sink and attached the other side in the same fashion. The little bit of copper that shows is a small detail that does make a difference. That little box is a self contained water heater. I Highly recommend the JOHN C LINCOLN BREAST HEALTH CENTER.

It's My Year

Dear Year 2011,

First I want to say welcome, I'm so glad you made it. I have been waiting for you to get here. It is going to be a great relief to see your month of May. You see that is when I will finally graduate with a degree in interior design! You are a welcome relief and at times I thought you would not ever get here. I really didn't know that 2011 was the year I was waiting for. Back in 2006, I got whey laid with my plans to finish school because I had a horrible infection in my hand that put me so behind on my plans for the future. 06 was a  real stinker, glad it is a goner for sure. 07 improved but I was slow to shake what had turned my life upside down. I regrouped and had a pep talk with myself in 2008 and then finally, I really gained steam for finishing school in 2009. 2010 was filled with classes and projects and an end in sight to the completion of the goal I started back in spring 05. So year 2011,............my goal is near,graduation is really just so close I can see it. Don't even think about throwing a road block my way. I am so happy that I will complete what I started,and thankful for all the support I've had from my kids and husband. I missed many- many things including but not limited to; band concerts, young authors night, science fairs and more. I sacrificed and they sacrificed and now it's just about in the can! You know 2011, I have high hopes for sweet endings and new beginnings and you better not let me down,you have the potential to be one of the best years ever. I'm counting on you to be the best you can be. I will write again and let you know how it is going. Until then take care and go out and make it a great year.

Warm Regards,

NEW YEAR- NEW OPPORTUNITIES!

For last year's words belong to last year's language

And next year's words await another voice.
And to make an end is to make a beginning.
~T.S. Eliot, "Little Gidding"

OIL ON CANVAS -http://www.jackfischergallery.com/lora_fosberg/

A happy New Year! Grant that I
May bring no tear to any eye
When this New Year in time shall end
Let it be said I've played the friend,
Have lived and loved and labored here,
And made of it a happy year.
~Edgar Guest

2011 IS A WINDOW OF OPPORTUNITY

We will open the book.  Its pages are blank.  We are going to put words on them ourselves.  The book is called Opportunity and its first chapter is New Year's Day.  ~Edith Lovejoy Pierce

How cunningly nature hides every wrinkle of her inconceivable antiquity under roses and violets and morning dew!~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

                    Happy New Year & new beginnings 
                   with lots of opportunity for 2011!

   

Making it Homey with box full of Empowerment

"Remember, no one can make you feel inferior without your consent." - Eleanor Roosevelt

I have a lot of stuff. I love painted walls, no builder white for me, although I do like muted cream walls with a hint of an undertone that picks up color from the fabrics in the room. There are so many ways to make a room your own.  

 

Art of course makes a room and is absolutely essential in my décor. I am not talking high brow like you would find at the Musée du Louvre 
in Paris, France. I like pop art you may find on Etsy or old inexpensive portraits you pick up at the flea market or garage sale. Watercolors are a favorite too. 

http://www.bromstad.com/

I am not past getting an ugly canvas at the goodwill and knocking off a copy of something modern a la David Bromstad style with his squirt bottle in one hand and paint brush in the other.

You need tools to hang the art which will make things look homey. I impatiently want to put a new piece up right away as soon as I get home with something. 

The first time I had an apartment of my own I had no tools and the art was stacked in neat piles in all three of the tiny rooms for weeks maybe even a few months before I found the most amazing pink box of DO IT HERSELF tools. 

 I wasn’t looking for a box tools when I found it but it spoke volumes to me. The hammer and needle nose pliers had cute pink rubber grips and the tape measure I needed to get columns and rows just right was so pink too! This premier box of goodies was neatly packed in a self contained pink plastic case of goodness for $20. What really went into the cart was a box full of pink empowerment. You see this loaded tool box in all its pink regalia said you can do anything you want. It was telling me that I did not need help and that I could achieve and reign supreme! And achieve I did. Specifically, I gained a deeper sense of self worth when I bought myself and used tools with the color that celebrates femininity. I know! who would think such a little thing would mean so much.

I have a confession………I covet my pink tools. I delight that they are mine and we have a history.

Pretty tools anyone for the holidays?!!!!!!!!!

Napkin Floor Plan

sometimes inspiration can strike when you least suspect. this was the case at lunch today. while sipping thai ice tea and visiting with a fellow design school student, we brain stormed our "team" final kitchen project. the results are on the napkin. i am not usually a fan of the team style project and i have had to do team projects every semester. i plan to post some of my kitchen and bath drawings soon.

kitchen drawing NTS!

Strangers- no danger and Random stuff

the helping hand of kindness

i have recently been touched by kindness through the acts of total strangers. I find it surprising and wonderful. I have come to know that I will most always talk to strangers. My Grandpa was talker, I am a talker and so is my brother.

i just want to say thank you to those who have been kind enough to take the time to be such generous friends and family and strangers to share yourselves, your time, your input. It means a lot!

the rug reminds of a Frank Lloyd Wright design seen at the Arizona Biltmore Hotel, of course the colors are different and the scale is much larger here.

a nod to pink for the month of October's Breast Cancer awareness. Sue I am so happy you are healthy!