weekend fun...

My mom flew up from Southern California this weekend to visit my sister and me so we had a wonderful girls weekend. We did a little cooking, decorating, shopping and baking. The weather was nice and cool here in San Francisco so it was the perfect fall weekend!

I think my mom and sister bring be good luck because I always seem to find the perfect things when I'm shopping with them! It definitely held true this weekend when we walked outside my house and saw a great garage sale on my street, where I picked up these two little gems...

As soon as I saw these beautiful vintage gilt sconces I had to have them!

How great are they? I can't wait to see how the mirrored one reflects candle light!

The jar and two decorative mossy balls were thrown in with the sconces, very cute!

We also did a little pumpkin carving, though, it might be a little early and I'm hoping the pumpkins won't go rotten before Halloween. I might keep them inside for a couple of weeks.

While carving, we learned that the white pumpkins are probably better un-carved....we didn't realize that the shell is about 3 inches thick!

Still made for a cute pumpkin, I think it looks like a puppy, or a panda. That is my sister, very proud of her pumpkin, which I have to say is the perfect classic jack-o-lantern!

Their cuteness again.

(my sister had to flip the cake upside down on the cloth covered in powdered sugar, you can't see it as well in the picture, but the sugar when everywhere, all over her pants and my floor!)

And now for the baking! I found this recipe for a pumpkin roulade in the September issue of House Beautiful and I had been wanting to make it. I thought this would be the perfect weekend to bake, because baking is always more fun with other people!

This is the finished Pumpkin Roulade, you can just slice and eat. Very yummy, and easy to make!

I love Halloween decorations, and of course I had to be totally cheesy and put up my fake cob-webs!--there's more in the living room and hallway :)

Mother and daughter!

We had such a great weekend!

things i like today....

I was looking through my "inspiration folder" on my computer and decided to post some of my favorites today. Enjoy....

First up, a pretty vignette. I love how simple this photo is, but I love the colors and the layering with the drapes behind the dressing table.

The two photos below are from Tobi Fairley Interior Design. She has such a great sense of style, I am always amazed by her use of bold colors and strong patterns!

The next three photos are of Erin Gates' house (Element Interiors, and Elements of Style blog)...

This living room is fantastic. The neutral theme with pops of orange and blue makes this room feel so warm and cozy, yet simple at the same time. I know sunburst mirrors are very "in" right now and slightly overused, but I still love it over the mantle. The puppy is pretty cute too!

Great picture arrangement, and I love the fact that all the frames are white because even though there's so many of them, I would still say this look is simple and not cluttered. Because of the color neutral wall and frames, the black credenza really pops. I hope that is a Tiffany blue painted on the inside of the credenzas, but it might just be the glass, whatever it is, I LOVE it!

This is such a classic dining room look with some modern and unexpected details that I love. The zebra print on the chairs is a very clever idea, along with the contemporary pendant. Once again, this room is simple, but it has just the right amount of details that it is a very warm space.

The next two rooms are from DecorPad...but I'm almost positive the second picture was from a summer issue of Elle Decor.

Both rooms have a similar color theme, neutrals with accents in black, orange and blue (blue-gray in the second one). The rooms feel very "fall" to me with their warm earth tones.

I love the big leather ottoman in the picture below, very masculine, but I like how the patterns of the pillows still make the room feel very comfortable.

I am obsessed with clear lamps right now! Especially when they're oversized like the ones below. I actually just put one in my sister's bedroom over the summer when I re-decorated it. I am also a huge fan of orange and pink accents, those colors complement each other so well when used sparingly. There are so many things that I like about this room now that I think of it, but I think I will stop talking--or writing--and let you enjoy it!

*source: elle decor

just because it's almost october...

I took these pictures last December for an architecture project where we were asked by a member of Preservation Napa Valley to figure out some clever ways to restore these barns to make them usable for the new owner of the property. The owner wanted to build some fairly large homes and was originally going to tear down these barns, unless we could convince him other wise. Along with out professor, our group took a little field trip up to Napa to view the site. The site has 2 barns--actually they were winery's--and one of the barns had this very strange addition in the back that was once an apartment. Since I'm in the spirit of fall and Halloween, I wanted to share some of my pictures from the creepy abandoned addition....

In the picture above you can see the addition peeking out from the back of the barn.

This is a better picture after we had climbed up the hill a little to find the front door, which was in the back?

You can kind of see the door in this picture on the left side of the picture, just a simple wooden door.

Taken from the inside in the "foyer". I can't imagine this door kept any heat in!

Above is the kitchen, that window looks out to the back of the house, or I guess since the door is in the back, that makes this the front? Walking in here was like a 1920s time warp, it looked like the last time anyone lived here was maybe in the 40s and for some reason dropped everything and left one day. The picture is kind of dark, but you can kind of see the cute wood burning stove on the left.

This is the other side of the kitchen, that window looks out to the front (you could see this window in the first picture of the red barn). This room was definitely creepy, and yes that is a doctor's bag on the coffee table, close-up below...

I wish I would have opened the bag to see what was inside, but then again I might have had an allergy attack from the half inch layer of dust on top...

Someone left their cup of tea in the cabinet!

Ahh the parlor....and what a parlor it is! Is it weird that part of me wanted to take that table and re-stain it? And those things hanging from the ceiling are old tin ceiling tiles, more detailed pictures below.

Same room as the tables, not sure what happened with the wallpaper only covering half the room. The mattress looks comfortable though...

The picture above and the ones below were taken in the room that was built as a second floor to the barn, but the only entrance to it was from the apartment/addition. In the background you can see the hallway that goes to the front door and the entrances to the "parlor" and kitchen. You can faintly see that, yes, the entire hallway, walls and ceilings were covered in the old tin decorative tiles.

It looked like someone had been using this room as "temporary" storage that ended up being permanent. To be honest, I didn't even know that this corner looked like this. The room was so dark, I could only see what it actually looked like after I had taken a picture with a flash and looked at it on my camera.

Would it be worth it to reupholster? just kidding...

Cool drawings? I don't know the artist who drew these, but they were randomly around the house. Creepy.

More detailed look at the old decorative tiles. There were a few piles leaning against the walls, I should have taken one!

Hope you enjoyed my creepy house tour!

If you're wondering what happened to the project, the project was put on hold for a while--I'm pretty sure nothing has been built yet, and nothing has been torn down--and we ended up working on another restoration project in St. Helena, I posted this project back in May, but you can take a look at it again here.

*source: my own photos

fall decor close-ups...

I couldn't help it, I needed to update some of my decor to become more "fall-like". I won't let the Halloween stuff come out until October 1st though :)

Dining room table--I don't really use my dining room table very often so I can keep a pretty table-scape on it without it being impractical. I wanted to update the look for fall by using more neutral colors, I really like the combination of the orange candle with the grayish-lavender flowers. The retro gilded glasses also add a nice warmth to the table, I put candles in them so they cast a really nice glow at night. Oh, and yes, that is a pumpkin in the back! My mom gave it to me for Christmas last year and I've been waiting all year to put it on my table! I think it adds a subtle "this is my fall decor" statement to the table, without being too themed for Halloween.
It is actually very convenient that my window is a golden topaz color, makes my fall decorating easy! Anyways, the reason I posted this picture isn't because it's extremely fall-like, but because I've been seeing a lot of designers using groupings of branches in a vase on console tables or buffets. I know this is nothing new, but I think it is very appropriate for fall, not to mention I seem to kill flowers and branches require zero upkeep. While I could have found my own branches outside I actually bought these. I went to this really cool store called Scraps in SF and bought 4 architectural prints, some small bottles and these branches all for $2! My friend bought like 5 frames and some other little things for only $7. Pretty awesome.
I also updated my mantle a little bit. Not the greatest picture, especially because you can't see the rest of the fireplace, but I have a friend staying in my living room so there is an air mattress in front of the fireplace right now. I have a small collection of little creamers and bottle from my grandma and I wanted to show them on the mantle instead of keeping them in a cabinet. The artwork in the middle was actually made by my mom in the 70s when she lived in Japan, it's needlepoint, and it just happened to match the colors in my living room--30 years later--with the lavender and green.
These glasses, I LOVE them. Definitely from the 60s! I bought them at a garage sale as a set of 7 for $1. Pretty good deal!
Last but not least, not related to fall decor at all, my suzani came! This is the suzani that I bought in Istanbul last year. I love the bold embroidery on the yellow background, I'm thinking about putting it on my bed, when the walls are gray instead of yellow (I think I would be overwhelmed by the brightness of yellow walls with a bright yellow suzani).
Close up of the writing in the center of the suzani. I think the date when it was made is on the right side, 21/11/82. Very ironic because I never even noticed the date until today, and it just happens to be 4 days under 4 years before my birthday. I'm not sure what the date inside the purple-blue flower means, but it says 1922. I really don't think the suzani was made then so the date will be a mystery.