Inspiration book. Do you have one?

I started this book years ago. It has changed, been added to, been cleaned out. Ideas and needs change over the years, I have all my paint colors and room sizes in it. Fabric samples and mostly ideas. This book has helped so much over the years and it has all my favorite magazine pictures. Now that we have blogs I haven't used it as much. I have a second one that is just for gardens and landscaping. Sometimes the pictures, like the cover ones, are just pictures that make me happy~

I am still thinking about my Living room........Pottery Barn does decorate the best rooms. I flip through their issues all the time and when I get time the nearest store is about 40 minutes away. I have a whole series of their books I never tire of. I love the bird pillows. I tried to order the Nest pillow above (Pottery Barn) last week and they are not taking orders SOLD OUT! NO LONGER AVAILABLE! Darn~ I also like the pillows below and the ottoman would be nice as a coffee table.

This chair would look so good with the sofa below or in my bedroom.

These are the current colors on my walls and trim, The Sag Harbor Gray has a nice green tint to it. That is the wall color. Both are Benjamin Moore colors. I really loved their paint. Most of my inspiration comes from Country Living, but I still miss my Country Home....it was the best, wish they would start publishing it again~sigh~

This is my dream sofa, it is called English roll arm. I just love the lines of it and the linen fabric. I have gone to Restoration Hardware and sat on it, touched it. My other sofa is not that old and I don't think I should get rid of it just yet and it is really comfy.

Don't you just love how this looks? I can picture curling up here to read a good book with a warm cup of ginger tea......My living room is 13x28. We watch TV in here most evenings, have coffee and watch the news here in the mornings. There are seven windows and it faces south. I can see the bird feeders and the gardens from here. I love the room and would like to rearrange things a bit, but we are limited because one wall is all bookcase and windows, the other has the fireplace and we need to be able to see the all mighty TV. Thanks to Jan at Bobbypins Boardwalk I am starting to gather ideas. I have always had a 5" 3 ring binder with plastic sheet protectors. I save pictures I love. This helped so much when we redid the kitchen. When I went to look I realized I had lots of kitchens, baths and bedrooms, along with seasonal decorations. No Living Rooms! Maybe this is part of the problem? So I have started to look for ideas and will add to it as I go, but for now this is a start.

Help!!! Any suggestions?

It all started with a little paint........always a bigger job than I planned.

The old curtains have been up for a while and I wanted to make the windows look bigger and to open it up a bit. There is a great view and the room is on the south side of the house, always bright and sunny. I get lost here...the room stays the same because I don't know what else to do with it. TV is in large cupboard and this front corner is where I read.


The fireplace is used a lot on winter nights. I have used everything on the bricks to get soot off. Magic eraser got the most. Krud Cutter, soap and water etc....

These are my new window treatments.

The end result, for now.

My living room has been the same for a while now and really needs some updating and freshening up. I repainted it the same color it was, but with the new affinity paint by Benjamen Moore. What a great finish it has. I put an accent color behind the bookshelves to give a little contrast. Then I changed out the curtains and rods. Now I still need new pillows...I am stuck in a rut here, so any suggestions are welcome.

Hearts

This is my heart of glass. My hubby gave it to me for Valentines day.....years ago. It came with a little card that read something like here is a heart of glass, it holds my heart for you. It was such a wonderful gift and I love to look at it as it catches the sunlight in the morning. I see it as I sit at my dressing table. I wish I could find the card that came with it...I know I kept it. It was so pretty and what it said was more elaborate than my abbreviated words. This was one of the most thoughtful and loving gifts ever~

Who said hearts are for Valentines? I realize I enjoy them year round. I was surprised at how many I could find in my home. These old wood hearts have been here forever.

How many hearts do I have.....this is just some of them. There is a heart shaped twig wreath over my kitchen hearth, a heart shaped Bennington pottery dish, the Rowe pottery dish these fabric hearts nest in. A heart shaped candy dish filled with heart candy, Crabtree and Evelyn, heart shaped soap, the list goes on. Here are some of my favorites.

Red glitter heart made by a grandchild last year.

Little tin hearts

~More glitter~

I love this wooden heart !

We use these napkins for the month of February.

Don't you just love hearts? How many do you have in your house?

Happy Valentines Day!

~Fixed~

OK, OK, I am not a whiz at this stuff,ok, I am challenged, I do try and I found out I must have hit the edit Html button next to compose. At least I figured it out, it was driving me crazy. Now I can go cook dinner~

Time to relax...maybe NOT

Ok, I am flying blind here, my pictures are not showing, just HTML text...I do not know how to fix this. SO much for relaxing. I had gone into settings and wanted to try updated editor, until I realized there was no spell check and now I can't get it back to where I was...HELP ANYONE???

At least the pictures show when I hit preview, but I can't comment on each one.
I was going to do a little post on a couple of Christmas gifts I received. Do you think my family was trying to tell me something? I put the CD's on my i pod and the Escape one is so beautiful and relaxing. I played it while I took a nice long soak in the tub.

I am really lost here as to how to fix my problem, when I am in new post mode I only see text, not pictures. Has anyone else had this?

Saying Goodbye....

It is with mixed emotions that I share with you what I did on Sunday....with storm warnings up and down the east coast we gathered our family and drove to Boston, TD Bank Garden, home of the Bruins and Celtics.

My family and the families of 650 soldiers.

The overhead was showing pictures of training and other missions. Not to mention the images of Old Glory.

What an impressive group. These are soldiers defending our country and all the rights we all have. My son is part of the 101 st Field Artillery Battalion. It is the oldest field artillery regiment in the United States Army dating back to Dec. 13, 1636 when it was organized as the South Regiment by Massachusetts General Court.

My son served in Iraq and has been home for 18 months only to head to Afghanistan for a year. He also went to Somalia as a Marine. See the mixed emotions, pride and great sadness.

This is our son and his daughter, my sad sack, she knows how long a year is! My daughter and her two sons and daughter. My family. The people who hold my heart. I know my son is doing something he believes in and loves, but damn, I hate to see him go.

Ben and Kaylee

I am so proud of our son. What Mom would not be proud of her handsome, brave son?

I know God will keep him safe and bring him back to us....and I have always believed in fate.

Now he leaves home on Wednesday, his orders started on Sunday, but we have Monday and Tuesday together...now you see why I wanted to just savor my holiday time this year?

Stay safe my son!

Happy New Year

I just wanted to wish you all a very happy and prosperous new year. My hubby and I will enjoy a quiet dinner at home and snuggle in to watch a movie...we were going to go out, but the weather here is frightful~

What will you be doing?