Digital Life of an Avid Reader

I've always been an avid reader - I love to absorb information. It took me a while to migrate from books to an e-reader - my parents generously gave me a Nook for Christmas last year and I haven't looked back since. I love the feel of books and magazines as well as the smell of printed paper, but the Nook converted me with its ease of use and portability. There is still something romantic and intoxicating to me about books and magazines in hand, though.

That being said, since it took me so long to adopt the technology of an e-reader, owning an iPad had never been anything I was really interested in. Yes, they're neat, but I didn't really want more technology in my life, until recently that is.

I've now come to the conclusion that I really DO want an iPad, sheerly for my magazine addiction. So many of my favorite magazines have gone defunct (I'm looking at you, Domino) or have just moved platforms from traditional print magazines, to digital only (Paste, that's you!). Also in the past year and a half, there have been several new magazines that have come into publication that are only available digitally and it gets cumbersome to read on the computer... maybe that's the first sign that I'm getting old - not wanting to read on the computer. Who knows. Plus, the technology of Issuu is pretty rad - it's just a nice easy reading experience.

Either way, I really want an iPad now. Time to start saving.

What are your favorite digital magazines?

Here are mine:

Lonny Magazine

Leaf (which just made its debut a few days ago)

Matchbook

Rue

Est

High Gloss

Design in My Home: House Tour, Part 4 - The Bathroom

We're now onto the bathroom in part 4 of the house tour.

I really like the bathroom - it's the first time in a while I've had a more modernized bathroom with regard to fixtures and tile, so I wanted to take advantage of that fact and use a more modern color scheme. The color the walls were painted were a bland dark tan, which just blended in with the tile and made the room look very dim and dirty.

Before:

To remedy the bland color on the walls and to give the room a more modern feel, we went with a dark, charcoal grey - Behr's Nature Retreat (430F-5). It made all of the features of the bathroom stand out and overall just cleaned up the entire appearance of the room. We are considering a new shower curtain, but since I still love our Lenox Chirp one from our previous apartment, which can be seen here in its former setting, I figured I'd stick with it till I found something I love more.

After:

Photograph of a traditional japanese tattoo by Jayme Thornton.

They say its your birthday...

To my sweet hubs...

Happy Birthday to the most amazing man I've ever met.

I'm so glad you were born - and your mom did a pretty excellent job with you.

You just get better each year - more wise, more handsome (if that's even possible?!) and more kind.

You truly are the most amazing man I've ever met and I'm so thankful you're mine.

Happy 31st Birthday, Babe. You're the best.

Design in My Home: House Tour, Part 3 - The Kitchen

The kitchen, while not the most impressive room in the house by far, has improved a lot with an intense cleaning, swapping out the outlet and light switch plates and just a few coats of paint. The dingy tan color definitely had to go. There isn't a whole lot to say about it, except that it does need renovations, so we're pretty limited on what we can do to improve it.

Before:

I picked a very bold green for the walls - Pesto by Behr (color number 440D-5), which happens to be one shade darker than the dining room (seen here). I really like to use shades of a few colors rather than a multitude of different colors. It makes the rooms work together rather than just be a kaleidoscope of color, which I find tends to make people feel uneasy.

The bold green made the contrast between the white trim and the walls a lot more dramatic so you didn't focus on the things we can't do much about (namely the floors and that the cabinets need repairs / replacing). We have a few more improvements that we're going to do, such as replacing the light fixture and possibly changing out the cabinet hardware, but it's pretty much where it's going to stay.

I can't complain too much - it's the largest kitchen I've ever had in my years of renting, so I can live with the less than perfect aesthetics. It does have some features I really like though, such as the original small rounded corner shelves that flank the sides of the upper cabinetry over the sink, which allow me to display my awesome set of original 1964 New York World's Fair drinking glasses.

Design in My Home: House Tour, Part 2 - The Dining Room

Happy October, everyone! I've been so happy to be able to comfortably have the windows open in the house lately - it has such a wonderful cross breeze! Lots of stuff coming up to do for October - sweet hubs 31st birthday, a trip to South Carolina for the state fair, a trip to the mountains, some pumpkin picking, hopefully lots of baking! I love fall - it's absolutely my favorite time of year.

Anyhow, now that I've professed my love of fall, let's move onto part 2 of the house tour - the dining room! You've already seen a sneak peek of it here in our how-to post on recovering our dining room chairs, but here it is, in full effect.

A few before shots:

And now the after:

Painting by Ashley Love

TCB Cross Stitch by the amazing Kristy Kizzee (aka Bombastitch)

Coney Island poster by Michael Michael Motorcycle

I actually quite liked the color of the dining room before, but unfortunately, it didn't go with the color palette I had in mind, so it had to go. We replaced it with a nicely pigmented, but light shade of green called Desert Cactus by Behr (color number 440D-4), which is a few shades lighter than our kitchen that you'll see in part 3 of the house tour, next week.

Design in My Home: House Tour, Part 1 - The Living Room

Sweet hubs and I have finally gotten to the point with the living room that we feel comfortable sharing photos of it. There's still work to be done, but we're pretty happy with the progress we've made.

Here's a before shot of what we were working with:

To those who love red, I apologize in advance, but I truly hated the color of the living room before. It was not quite brick red, and not quite burnt orange, but this grotesque hybrid of the two. It repulsed me and therefore had to go immediately after moving in.

We chose to go the total opposite of what was there previously and cool that baby down with a nice dark teal, specifically Mirage Lake by Behr (color number 500D-6). It did everything we hoped it would - made the white trim pop and made the floors stand out so much more.

See my favorite lamp by Grenkol? It was a perfect fit for the bookshelf.

Aside from painting, the house overall was in pretty great shape - we did also end up swapping out all of the outlet and light switch covers in the house. The ones originally in there ran the gamut of almond, white, and my favorite - painted over to match the wall and cement the plate in place. I can't really complain though, like I said, it was in good shape.

Now, as for things we still need to do - we definitely need a curtain solution. I hate mini-blinds, especially cheap plastic ones. Our cats apparently hate them too - our sweet little Abigail has a mission to break every one of them. We're doing pretty well so far. (Insert sarcasm here.) We're thinking of either going for roman shades with a textured fabric or a natural wood roll down - we shall see.

Another little project I'd like to tackle is putting in new window hardware. The hardware that is currently in all of the windows in the house as well as the knobs and pulls on the drawers in the kitchen are all very old and very worn down. Aside from that though, we're in good shape for having been here two months now.

One of the challenges we ran across with this room is the awkward layout. We hadn't initially noticed it when we viewed the house (not that it would have deterred us from renting it - the neighborhood and the price were too fabulous to pass up on), but it did cause us to think more than we wanted to with regard to our furniture layout. I must say, I'm really glad we decided to keep our "apartment sized" furniture. Had we purchased a larger couch, we would have had to eliminate some furniture and we just aren't quite ready to do that - we love our mid-century hand me downs!

We're quite pleased with it. I'm sure as time goes on, we'll play around with it and maybe find something that works better, but for now, it definitely feels like home.

The Shady Dell

I think I've found a vacation destination for Jesse and I in Bisbee, Arizona.

Welcome to The Shady Dell.

Image courtesy of Fine Art America.

Courtesy of The Shady Dell website:

Experience the 50's in Full Technicolor!

Nine lovely, fully restored vintage aluminum travel trailers  await you at the Shady Dell in Bisbee, Arizona. Whether it is the 33 foot Royal Mansion built in 1951 and restored with leopard carpet, martini glasses, Diner-style breakfast booth and phonograph with a collection of 78rpm records, or the 1947 Tiki Bus Polynesian Palace, complete with hand-carved outrigger bar and your own Tiki God, the Shady Dell’s individual trailers will surely send you back to a time when freedom was just another word for jumping in your aluminum house on wheels, finding the Rat Pack on the radio and navigating the open road in search of your own slice of the American Dream.

Our sleek collection of vintage travel trailers are all perfectly restored to combine mid-century Americana kitsch with the comforts of home in a way that only the 1950s were capable of.  Each trailer, such as the 1949 Airstream, or the 1950 Spartan Manor, are  available for overnight or weekly rental. For once, experience the 1950s in full Technicolor.

Interiors are the rich blonde woods or highly polished aluminum of the original and authentic décor. Outside each trailer is a grassy yard with lounge chairs so you can enjoy the beautiful evening weather of southern Arizona. In the various trailers, vintage radios play era-appropriate radio programs, televisions only broadcast in two colors, period books and magazines allow for even more mental time travel and big band, early rhythm and blues and original rock and roll are available for your listening entertainment. The trailers are also equipped with original working kitchens, refrigerators and vintage electric percolators. Dishes and linens are also furnished.

Image courtesy of  Arizona Highways.

Nestled perfectly among the aluminum trailers and within walking distance from each front door, is Dot’s Diner. Built in the 1950s by the pride of Wichita Kansas, The Valentine Manufacturing Company, this authentic diner was originally purchased by John Hart in 1957 and delivered to the corner of Ventura and Topanga Canyon Boulevard in Los Angeles. It was run by Dot Bozeman, chief cook and bottle washer until 1999.

Image courtesy of whflood on Flickr.

The Shady Dell’s long and epic journey began in 1927 as a place to provide trailer and camping spaces to weary travelers along the famous Highway 80, which stretched from Savannah, Georgia to San Diego, California.  Like its more famous brother Route 66, Highway 80 was a center of travel, exploration and family getaways in the early portions of the 20th century.  Today, the park is a nice mix of practicality and vintage fun-seeking.  Part of the park is equipped with full RV hookups while the other part is a unique step back to the heyday of travel trailering in America.
Step off the premises and experience the beauty and charm of Bisbee, Arizona, a mile-high historic copper mining town nestled in the Mule Mountains and a stone’s throw from the Mexican border. Founded in 1880, Bisbee was a true hot spot around the turn of the century, known as one of the West’s most roaring towns on the route between St. Louis and San Francisco.

Today, Bisbee is captivating and full of historic buildings, museums, art galleries, antique shops, hidden walkways and plenty of ghosts. Its close proximity to the Chiricahua National Forest, Cochise Stronghold, and the Ramsey Canyon Nature Conservancy provides numerous opportunities for bird watching, rock hunting, biking, hiking or just leisurely explorations of the wonders of southern Arizona’s  high desert area.

Which is your favorite? Mine is the Tiki Bus.

Image courtesy of whflood on Flickr.

Hello 1950, I think I'll stay a while.

Design in My Home Project: Budget Friendly Landscaping

When sweet hubs and I found our darling little bungalo, we fell in love immediately. It was the perfect size for us (it's a small house and coming from NYC, we didn't need a cavernous space to fill with excess "stuff".) It's not a newly renovated place, but its got a lot of charm. That also meant it needed a little elbow grease, specifically on the outside, which Jesse was itching to get his hands on. It had been so long since we'd had our own outdoor space, that doing little bits of landscaping was one of the major appeals of the house. Keep in mind, this is also landscaping from a couple of novices... the most either of us has ever really done with regard to landscaping was raking or cutting the grass. 

Over the last month, we've become best friends with our local Lowe's store. We've done little bits here and there, and finally, the front is now starting to take some shape. We didn't have a huge budget, and to be honest, didn't really want to spend a lot of money on a rental property, so I wanted to share the little things we did, that made a big impact.

First off, this was what we started with:

Full frontal of the house. Note the overgrown landscape beds and unruly, unpruned trees and plants.

Close up of the overgrown and dead leaf filled landscape beds.

Close up of the walkway landscape bed and vine impressions left on the brick.

It wasn't terrible, by any means, but it could have looked better. A lot better. So here's what we've done...

- Raked out and mulched the landscape beds. (Cost: $2.50 x 10 bags of 2.2 cu ft brown mulch = $25.00

- Sprayed down all of the sidewalks and stairs with water (Cost: Free)

- Cut the grass (Cost: Free)

- Pruned the trees and pulled weeds from the landscape beds (Cost: Free)

- Planted five ornamental grass plants (Miscanthus sinensis 'Variegatus') in the small landscape bed by the front walk (Cost: $3.00 x 5 plants = $15.00)

- Placed three solar powered lights in the small landscape bed by the front walk (Cost: $2.50 x 3 lights - $7.50)

- Planted a geranium plant and a salvia plant in two planters that we found (Cost: $9.00 for the geranium, $1.50 for the salvia = $10.50)

- Planted a small container herb garden with mint, dill, rosemary and chives (Cost: $3.50 x 3 plants, $1.25 for packet of dill seeds, $4.77 for a small bag of potting soil, $6.96 for a black heavy duty plastic urn = $23.48)

- Threw down some grass seed in bare areas on the lawn (Cost: $10.14 x 2 bags of shady grass seed = $20.28)

GRAND TOTAL: $101.76

We still have a few things we want to do to the front - the main thing being that we need to put two pieces of landscape timber to finish the front bed (you can see this on the walkway shots). Once we buy the timber, we'll be right around $105. Not too shabby!

Another project for a little later on is that we want to scrub off the vine remains on the house, but we need to figure out a strategy for that (to power wash or to scrub brush).

Here's the final product (until we decide to do more):

I love the dark brown mulch - t adds some much needed contrast to the front of the house.

Close up of one of the landscape beds.

Close up of the brown mulch.

You can see where we need to lay the landscape timber on the left side. Also, I just love the ornamental grass!

Close up of the geranium and the salvia plants.

Ornamental Grass

My sweet little herb garden. (I'm very excited about this.)