I will freely admit that the beauty of a hyacinth combined with its heady scent is wonderful.  Yet after years of quietly repeating that quote to myself, I must say I’ve found that many different flowers feed my soul.

This week it was tulips.  They were a $5 splurge at the grocery store.

I love the way tulips are both bold and delicate at the same time.  Strong but fragile.  Graceful yet dramatic.

They’re so tall and straight and pretty when they’re all closed up, but then they begin to open…

and the drama and beauty merely increase.

People are like that.  Most of the time what’s on the inside is even better than what’s outside.

I like the way these two ended up leaning on each other.

This week my tulips reminded me to have an open heart, to accept each day for what it offered, to find beauty in what I have.  Sometimes we need beauty as much as food to remain truly alive.  Flowers really are food for my soul.

Which flowers feed your soul?  Please share!

Have a beautiful weekend!
Hopeful Homemaker

Posted at The Inspired Room

These are the things I’ve been drawn to:

What colors have been calling your name lately?

I’m linking this post to Melissa’s Inspired Room.  Check out what others are inspired by and add your own!
Have a great day!

Hopeful Homemaker

Made of metal, it is painted a yummy pink and has a rose decal on it.  The handle, amazingly,  is wood.  The little lever for releasing and securing the lid still works, and except for a dent, it is in perfect condition!

It’s the perfect thing for holding pink cupcakes….

And wishing you a great day!

Jennifer

My vintage cement swan planter stands at the edge of the room.  I spotted this a couple of years ago in a local shop and just loved the graceful lines of it.  I haunted the store, hoping it wouldn’t sell, until I’d saved enough money to buy it.

The couch is my old living room couch which is now 8 years old.  When we moved into our house, I took a deep breath and some scissors and made a white slipcover for it.  I put the cushions that were made for the back of the couch in the basement and instead used three large down pillows covered with vintage white shams.  Doing that gave it new life.  This week I also gave it new accent pillows.

The flowered pillows I made, and the pink ruffle pillow I added because I decided I wanted a dash of bright pink to go along with the robin’s egg blue and white scheme of the room.  I also added a flowered fabric from my stash to the coffee table.

To the right of the couch, I used to have a small white table.  It was a little too short, so I swapped it out and moved these two antique tables in.  They truly are gorgeous.  I LOVE the paint and the detail on them.  I think they’re one of my top three favorite vintage pieces I own.

I would really like to use these tables in some amazing spot, but the fact of the matter is that they don’t stand a chance around my kids.  I’d give them less than 24 hours to be broken.  They’re not poorly built, just fragile in design.   Therefore, they must stay in a corner for a while longer.

They actually look nice in this corner.  Their height is better than what I previously had, and their color matches the theme of the room.  I added a stack of some favorite books (which just happened to also be blue), a couple of my favorite vintage childrens picture books  and a pitcher of flowers.  I like that corner much better now.

This room also houses my favorite piece of furniture, an old dresser that has been refinished and had mirrors added.

Above it sits one of my favorite metal pieces, a huge urn filled with artificial flowers.  I love the drama and formality it adds to the room.

Next to it, and above the antique blue tables I have framed some of my favorite Marghab linens.  First, the cord and tassel pattern which takes my breath away when I consider that someone did every one of the stitches by hand.  This same design is one of the three Vera Marghab designs that is in the Smithsonian.  I also have the hydrangea pattern hanging below it.

On the adjacent wall I hung a small vintage blue silk purse which has hand embroidered flowers on it.

On the rocking chair I tossed a white vintage coverlet, my favorite pillow which I made from vintage turquoise and white fabric, and a fabulous old coverlet embroidered with huge flowers on it.  I’ve had the coverlet for years and wondered where to use it.  It just found it’s home, I think.

Next to the chair is an enormous basket I picked up at the thrift store for $1.00.  I spray painted it aqua for fun and filled it with vintage quilts.

On a whim, I sewed a little cover for the piano bench, just to bring the blue into that corner of the room.  I chose stripes because they would make that corner less formal.  I also swapped out a white mirror for a large blue frame holding a photo of two of my girls years ago at the beach.  Two more Marghab pieces, both Jacaranda tree patterns,  hang above the piano.

Lastly, I hung the mirror that I painted a bright pink.  It might be my favorite piece in the room because it makes me want to laugh when I see it.  So formal and yet poking fun at its formality through its color.

The entire wall now looks like this.  I really like it.  Symmetrical but not stiff.

I have always enjoyed studying interior design.  I feel like I did pretty well in this space, using formal pieces alongside simple ones, mixing old with new, and using color and pattern in a way that pleases me.  I love the added pops of color that the pink offers.  I also love that this room is really just “me.”  It holds so many of my favorite pieces, from the tables to the linens to the swan.  And because I’ve always bristled at the idea of my house looking like it came from any particular store, I love this room because it’s completely original.

A super fun exercise in creativity, and it yielded a lovely room.  Now for a good book and a bit of quiet.

Have a lovely day!

Jennifer

A close up of some of the detail.

Go ahead and say it:  totally gaudy and overdone.  But I always pictured it painted in a deep pink.  Enter this pillow:

I ran to Ace Hardware and picked up one of their little sample sized paints, called Paint Pods, in a color to match the pillow.  The one I chose was called cupid.  I’d always intended to spray paint this mirror for better coverage, but I couldn’t find a pink in the right shade.  So I settled for the headache of painting it by hand and having the coverage not be as good.

Anyway, 3 coats of paint later, here’s the final product:

I must say, I’m thrilled with the result!  I really love it.  Now it’s a formal sort of mirror, but the pink makes it fun and happy, not to be taken too seriously.  Perfect!

The roses go in one wide border around the entire cloth.  It  measures 68 by 51 inches.

It has a small tag on it, which reads California Hand Prints, which I’m thinking might mean that it was hand printed when it was made.  The cloth has a few stains on it but it is just so lovely, and such a yummy shade of pink.

One of my favorite details about it is the white pattern that goes around the outer edge of the roses.  Very subtle, but adds a lot of beauty in my opinion.  When I purchased this tablecloth online years ago, I didn’t realize it had this white pattern until I received it.  I was so pleased!

When I walk into a room where I’m using this tablecloth, it’s always the first thing I see.  It’s the perfect touch of happiness on a winter’s day.

So, since Valentines day is approaching, I’ll start with a pink one.

This is one of my favorites (but I say that about every one of them).  I love the way it resembles vintage ticking, but on a larger scale.

The inner section has a scalloped border that is  so cute!

The pattern continues around the outer border.

This tablecloth measures 41 inches wide by 52 inches long.  It has a few flaws and tiny stains, but nothing that detracts from it or makes in any less lovely to me.   It has no markings on it, and if anyone knows anything about it, I’d love to hear!

This is a fun cloth to use at a baby shower for a little girl.  What would you use it for?

I like how it turned out.  It was one of those projects that sort of evolved as I went along.

I couldn’t find a pattern that I wanted to cut the background fabric for, so I decided to just make a quilt with it alone, and added some borders.

Then I decided to use a little free pattern I’d photocopied at a local quilt shop for a branch, two birds and some leaves.

Once I got going on that path, I remembered the quote I’d put on my Christmas cards for 2008, and decided to embroider it onto the quilt.  I lengthened the branch so there would be room, and embroidered it in brown.

I love, love, love this quote.  “Faith is the bird that feels the light and sings when the dawn is still dark.”
It was sort of my quote for 2009.  Many times the dawn felt dark, but we tried to sing.  I didn’t sing as much as I should have, but we pressed forward.

At the bottom corner, I embroidered this:

Okay, so I realize that it should have been finished in 2009.  I tried, I really tried.  It just didn’t happen, so instead it’s the first completed quilt of 2010.  And I still love the quote, so it’s fine with me.

Originally I thought this quilt would be for my baby, but with once the embroidery was done I decided it’s mine instead.  If I’d planned for it to be mine, it probably wouldn’t be pink and green, but I like it anyway.

I used a soft minky stripe on the back.  YUM!

Hooray!  One project done, countless to go!  (Could you imagine how bleak life would be without lots of projects to look forward to?)

Hope that you’re feeling the light and singing, even if the dawn still feels dark!  Have a great day.

Jennifer

We visited them this week, and she is adorable!  She looks just like her mommy, and is smaller than any of my 8 babies were.  I loved holding her, even though it made me feel like my baby is huge.

We took Brinley her baby gift, a rag quilt that I designed and named “Brinley’s Blossoms” in honor of my niece.
I managed to get a little tag on it before we wrapped it up:

I used the same fabrics in this quilt that I used in the one I made for my baby a few months ago.  I really loved this line!
(Forgive the poor pictures; we were in a hurry and it was night and I couldn’t take any decent ones.)

It’s a simple strip quilt with some flowers appliqued on top and in a couple of block strips.

It was a lot of fun to make, and gratefully it was a quick project (or I might never have finished it!)
I always love the way the backs of rag quilts look:

There’s no plain side with quilts like these!

And, finally, here is a close up of a new idea I tried, and I must say I’m really excited about it both because it turned out so cute and because it’s truly my very own idea!  I’ve never seen anyone do anything like this before:

A scalloped border!  I love the way it turned out, and I think that I’m going to try another quilt using this idea.
I’ve got something in mind….

I started with some pretty paper garlands that I picked up a while ago on clearance.  They’re a Martha Stewart kit.
I had my husband hang cup hooks from the ceiling in four different places.  I hung a garland on each and had them all join at the top of the light fixture which hangs over our kitchen table.  Then, to the fixture I added a glass vase in a metal basket with pink flowers in it, tied with lots of pink and white ribbons.

Next I got a handful of pink and white ribbons, all at least a yard long, and tied them to the light fixture as well.
I also hung a glass vase in a metal basket, which I put some pink flowers in.

Also dangling from different spots on the light fixture are 8 little picture frame ornaments.  Each one holds a picture of one of my children as an infant.   All 8 of them are up there.  (I got the picture frame ornaments a couple of years ago during the after Christmas clearance at Exposures.)

This is the view from the other side of my kitchen.  I really like it.

Next I moved to the counter, where we were serving all the food.
I got out my baby letters, which are covered in coarse German glitter.  They look very vintage.  I hung my little vintage crown from the first “B”.

Behind and next to the “baby” letters I put a picture of my baby, another vase of pink flowers, and a little frame holding a pink set of her footprints, which I had done a few days before.  I tied more ribbons around the frames.

Over the rest of the counter I placed one of my favorite vintage tablecloths, a lovely pink one covered with roses.
Then I got out all my vintage silver, mixed in a few new pieces as well, and started arranging.  The menu was very simple:  a cupcake bar.  We baked several dozen cupcakes in different flavors, and set those out on various tiered platters.

We had some bowls of buttercream frosting for people to frost their cupcakes, and last came my very favorite part:

These are my vintage silver plated sugar scuttles.  I have a small collection of them which I display in my kitchen.  I put a different kind of candy for each of them in an alternating pink and white scheme.  They have tiny little scoops that came with them.  I’ve been wanting to do this for a long time, and I was so happy with how pretty it looked.  I found some fun sprinkles, sugar crystals and sugar pearls.  I also added some pink and pearlized white sixlets along with some pink chocolate covered sunflower seeds.

Another vintage silver bowl filled with miniature mints.

All of the cupcakes in pink wrappers with white polka dots.

I also found a really cute cupcake holder a few days before the blessing.  We filled this with some decorated cupcakes and used it as the centerpiece on my table, along with another vintage tablecloth.

The final picture:

To the cupcake bar I simply added a simple but beautiful punch.  I served it in a large flower shaped metal bowl.

The evening turned out perfectly.  I was very pleased with how it went.  In fact, afterwards I had a hard time cleaning it all up.  I really love the after-party atmosphere in my house.  I love the crumbs on the tablecloth, the mostly empty dishes, a few straggling paper cups around the house.  I love looking around at the evidence of a party, when the house is quiet but the echo of everyone’s voices still seems to linger in the rooms.  I love knowing that my efforts allowed it all to happen.  It feels really good.

The next day when everyone had left town and life was back to normal, I looked around and couldn’t bear to take most of it down.  I had received a phone call in the middle of the preparations on Sunday about a baby shower for a friend.  They were doing it at a restaurant to keep things simple for everyone.  All of a sudden it dawned on me that my house was perfectly ready for another party!  So, we made some phone calls and the location was changed.  All I had to do was change the pink ribbons for blue ones.

I also swapped in some white flowers instead of the pink ones.

With the blue walls in my kitchen, the effect was really very pretty.  Kind of charming and elegant at the same time.

I frosted the leftover cupcakes in alternating colors of blue and white, and added some white sprinkles and sixlets.

I filled the cupcake holder with blue and white cupcakes, got out some vintage blue tablecloths, and borrowed my daughter’s white wicker framed mirror.  I laid this on the table and set the cupcake holder in the center.  It was really fun.

The menu was created from foods I had on hand after entertaining guests for a few days.  Not too shabby to be able to throw a lovely baby shower with lots of food, and all without leaving your house or spending a penny!

We had a large number of guests come and linger.  It was fun for me to be able to visit with some women I haven’t seen in a while and to catch up on their lives and their families.   Aren’t parties great!?

Jennifer