Philanthropy

My cousin works for a clothing and accessories store in Franklin, Tennessee called Philanthropy. I think the idea of this store is so beautiful!

The reason they do what they do is Zechariah 1:9-10- administer true justice by taking care of the widows and the orphans, and show mercy and compassion to the poor and oppressed. They have determined ahead of time what the take-home is each month (how much they’ll make in order to live and pay their employees), and any profit the store brings in on top of that all goes to a few specific charities, and a village they support and take care of in Haiti. There’s been months where they clear major profit, and they’ll just know that meant those charities and village really needed support that month. Philanthropy has continued to flourish and do very well in a time when many stores and businesses are struggling.

Check it out!

Jeni I’ve Got Your Number

Did I mention I ate my way through Nashville?  Um, yeah I did. One of the best things I ate was some crazy ice cream at Jeni’s.

It’s one of those places that has unique, special made, decadent ice cream in flavors that sometime sound kinda gross but are really delicious. Like the goat cheese fig. Sounds like one weird tastin’ ice cream but it was SO GOOD. I got the Pistachio Honey and Wildberry Lavender.

As you can see there are some amazing flavors up there. I’ll bet your town has something like Jeni’s. My town, Santa Cruz California, has the Penny Ice Creamery, which I’ve never actually been too, but you bet your figs I’m gonna go now.

Oh yeah. And last night Obama slow jammed the news with Jimmy. Ahhh Yeaahhh.

Jewelry, Music, and Charity

I’m back from Nashville with a fuller belly, some new friends, a ton of inspiration, an eye full of more hipsters than I’ve ever seen in one town, and a bigger love for my Tennessee family. I’m gonna hit’cha with some of our Nashville gallivanting, starting with the night we spent at my cousins friends pop-up jewelry store, Red Earth Trading Co. Oh yeah, and that’s my foxy cousin on the home page.

They had a series of in store shows with local musicians, and the night we were there it was a dude named Phil Keaggy. I didn’t actually know who this guy was (my dad probably does. He knows everybody), but the first song he played was Here Comes The Sun by the Beatles, and every time I hear that song it reminds me of my friends memorial. So I loved it and it made me cry. It was the most beautiful version of that song I’ve heard in a long time. Their jewelry was beautiful too.

The whole display and design of this store was beautiful…nice and bright and clean, but still warm and organic. I loved these semi-floating shelves-

But in my opinion the coolest things were these light fixtures-

These things were really big, and each cluster had about ten bulbs in it. We for sure have been seeing a light of rope light fixtures lately all around the blogs and internet, but this is one of my favorites. Check out Red Earth’s site and read about their mission….and buy stuff!

Nashville Skyline

Miss pomp and I are headed out for a good ol’ fashioned sister trip. Pickin parties and dancing will be our portion. We’ll keep you posted. Get it. Posted! Waca waca

Feet To Feet

I came across this super fun idea from The Handmade Home–

It’s a double-long bunk loft bed! Two Mattresses, two kids, one long loft….what kid wouldn’t think that is awesome?

Inspiring Spring Brights

Just wanted to share some things that are bringing me inspiration for Spring…

(Photos 1-4 via Kelly Wearstler, Photo 5 via Hanneli)

Happy holy-brightness!  You guys. I have been waiting for Spring for months, I am SO excited to wear fun and bright springy hues!

Crying Out To Be DIYed

I saved these images from Rue Magazine because they had one thing in common….they all are begging to be DIYed.

This rope twisty addition to the cord of this pendant is pretty suave. Love the texture and how it’s not just wrapped around the cord, but knotted and twisted and then wrapped around again. The person who did probably needed a massage when they were done, cause that’s gonna take some hours, but totally worth it.

This stunner could be recreated with stumps of wood or driftwood with a plywood top, all lacquered and glossied up.

This is pretty amazing also. I think the size would be what would make it extraordinary. Just like a basket of french fries, bigger is better.

How To Style A Shelf Like Pro(fessional Shelf Styler…If that were a job…Wait, is it?)

Holla and happy Wednesday everyone!  Now that we are done with our rad shelf building how-to, we get to the fun part: Shelf Styling! Woot woot! Here’s some tips and thoughts on shelf styling to help you over your hump day blues…

Step 1: Gather items to style your shelves with, and remember: Books aren’t the only items that belong on a bookshelf people! Along with your books, gather accessories, art, keepsakes, vases, pictures, and if your name is Ross Geller, fossils.  Try to gather a mix of smaller and larger items. Too many itty-bitty knick-knacks is not a good thing! Here’s my little collection:

Step 2: Organize books by color. Sounds silly, but it makes a BIG difference visually.  Also, take pride in awesome books that you purchased for your husband as Christmas gifts and still laugh at 3 years later every time you lay eyes on the cover.

Step 3: Mix it up!  Place some books vertically, but also make stacks of books. Wow!  We’re getting wild and crazy now! Want to get even crazier?  Think about placing one of those stacks inside of a tray! Then adding an object on top!  Which brings me to….

Step 4: Add Layers. In addition to layering up, also layer items in front of one another to add depth.

Step 5: Balance visual weight throughout the shelves. That’s just fancy talk for “Don’t put all the big stuff (or eye catching stuff) in one area.”  Spread it out! Share the wealth! Don’t let one area hog all the goodies! (In my mind, that last part sounded like Nacho Libre)

Shelf numero uno complete! Now let’s move on to it’s sister shelf and see how we do….

Horizontal stacks of magazines….grouped like with like. Good start, good start.

Adding a larger scale piece of art…now we’re rollin….

Layering up and down and behind and in front!  By jove I think we’ve got it!  But dare I say it’s a tad bit…dull?  I think what we need is a colorful vase to brighten things up!  Don’t be afraid to dig deep into your garage, people! That’s where I found this beauty…

And here they are, folks!  Looking all styled and foxy and making my house feel like a home!

Wanna Make Your Own Roman Shade…You So Can

…well it’s sort of a roman shade. Besides the fabric itself, and the Bias tape I bought, I literally made this whole thing from stuff I had lying around. I felt sort of Gilligan-like. Like my curtain was the equivalent of making a phone out of a coconut. I wanted the shade to have one of those header box things. I don’t know what their called, but I know I like them, so I looked around the house for some clever idea of how to make my po’ person shade with a header-box thing. Here’s what I came up with-

• Foam Core Board
• Hot Glue
• Straight Pins
• Sticky Back Velcro Squares
• Store Bought White Linen Curtain Panels (Holla Ikea)
• Tie backs that come with the curtain panels
• Existing curtain rod

That’s it.

First I cut the foam core board to the size that I wanted (I need two pieces to make the length I needed), and attached them together by gluing an extra piece of foam core board on the back side over the seam. Hot glue baby…it’s the bomb. I was worried it might melt through, but it didn’t. Then I laid the fabric out, folded it around the corners, and hot glued it in place.

That’s its ba-dunk-a-dunk (aka backside).

I glued these strips on the backside also. Their sole purpose is to use as ties to attach this header thing to the curtain rod. You won’t end up seeing them at all.

 

I bought bias tape in GoldenRod to use as trim…

…because I loved the color and it was way cheaper than buying ribbon. I only needed two packs, and I think they are under 3 bucks a pack. You just have to iron it first (its folded in half so when you iron it flat it doubles in size. Wider trim= curtains that look more expensive. In my unsolicited opinion). So I just hot glued this stuff around the header box thing.

The curtain panel itself happened to be the perfect width for my window. Yippy Skippy! That means I didn’t even have to sew anything! I just cut off the excess fabric in length (and that’s what I used for the header box thing). And all I did was fold some fabric over the top of the rod and use straight pins to keep it in place-

The beauty is you won’t see any of this top part, so it doesn’t matter that it is geh-tto. I pinned the tie backs up there too, because we are going to use those as what will hold up the panel when you want to actually open the thing.

A closer look-

*Side note– I pinned it all first just to make sure it all fit ok, then took it down and glued on all the trim, then pinned it back up again. Then I used those strips of fabric I glued to the back of the header and tied them around the ends of the curtain rod.

I used sticky back velcro squares to put on the back of the tie back,and then on the backside of the curtain panel so you can do this-

Crummy pictures. Awesome curtain.