Post- Vacation Monday's...

If there is one thing I can say about Monday's is they are terrible... especially when you are coming back after a few days of sun, relaxation and fun!

I got home last night from a little girls getaway and was instantly in a funk. I would love to be back sitting by the pool in the beautiful Florida sunshine, but for now I am going to have to get over it!

In the spirit of looking on he positive side here are three things that made coming home better:

1. Seeing Oliver & Clo! I sure did miss these boys while I was gone. I can't imagine how much harder being away will get once our little one arrives!

2. I was SO happy to come home to see that Oliver had moved all of the furniture out of our once spare room, into what will be the new spare room & got a jump start on the nursery! ( I may have subtly mentioned this would be a good idea while I was away- holy type A!) 

I am loving the wall color & the way the furniture looks in there, way more spacious than I envisioned! I will be on the hunt for the smaller pieces now like a rug, wall art & bedding. Here's a sneak peek of the color palette we are using to get an idea of what her room will be like- I am substituting the brass for a gold tone of course!

3. Lastly, getting my Warby Parker home try on kit in the mail.  I was hoping it would come before I left so I could style it up in FL, especially these Jennings Beach Glass shades. Stay tuned for how I #SeeSummerBetter with some new specs from WP! 

How was your weekend? What do you do to recover from the Monday Blues?

Holiday Decor- Gold & Creme

 Over the last few months I have been acquiring items for my Thanksgiving table as well as some of the smaller touches which I feel really make the experience. Some of the items I've purchased have been featured on the blog before, the champagne flutes & charger plates both from Target, as well as the Kate Spade table runner. I also had some great luck at Joann's where I found a tree wedge and some branches which I am using to add some height and texture to the table. I have also worked with some amazing Etsy vendors to create custom napkins, coaster, & edible gold sugar!
 

The napkins I had made are beautiful- I absolutely love them! They are from Sincerely Yours Lauren's esty shop. I went with the ivory napkin with gold monogram, I really loved this particular font, Sonnet, I felt it was very elegant but not over the top. I decided to go with the single monogram in place of our couple's monogram because I wanted these to represent our family for many years to come if we do add to it one day! :) Lauren was absolutely fantastic to work with, she was very prompt and patient with her responses to my many questions, and there is no denying the quality of the napkins! Thank you, Lauren! :)

Next were the coasters, I went to Dinglewood Design for these beauties! I loved the scripted "cheers" as well as the polka dot ones. Christy has a great variety in her shop, from wedding invitations to stationary she really makes it all! I will be revisiting soon for some personalized stationary! 

Ruffled Paper made these adorable gold stripped straws! I had similar ones I had purchased from Target last year but they no longer make this color so I was on a hunt that Jessica helped me solve! She also has some great confetti, and decor that I will be purchasing for my next party! I especially love this I love you dearly print!

 Then there was Dell Cove Spices which helped me to fulfill a longtime lust for gold sugar rimmed champagne cocktails! I saw this on Pinterest a while a go and pinned it for the future, and then I found this shop. They have literally every color you could imagine, and they now have flavored sugars, I have a "Christmas Cosmo" I only make after Thanksgiving so I will certainly be ordered the Christmas cocktail sugar! :)

I did a little practice run for some girlfriends the other night! They photograph very differently the photo in the tin was impossible to get good lighting so I wanted to include how great it looks on the glass! 

I am so grateful to all of these vendors for their help in making our first Thanksgiving a memorable & beautiful day! :) Hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

Making Our House a Home

It has been about three months since we've moved from DC to our new home. When we first moved in we marveled at the space, three bedrooms, with an actual dining room AND kitchen that were two separate rooms, it was like I died and went to real estate heaven. As far as style goes I gravitate toward soft colors, romantic ambiance and more vintage with a splash of french country kitchen- quite a style huh? I just really enjoy finding pieces to bring a room together that you wouldn't normally expect. See what your decor style is with this quiz on Ethan Allen!  

 As soon as we moved in I had all these grand ideas to decorate each room and what I thought would look great. Certainly no shortage of ideas, however trying to make all of that work after just moving and try to get settled was tough. Luckily we have awesome friends and family who donated things they were looking to get rid of. It was super generous of everyone and we are so grateful!

 We ended up furnishing our entire spare bedroom with things we were given (a huge thank you to our family!!) A few of the pieces we did a little "updating" to. This is the before photo of the dresser. I really liked the raised parts to it and saw this as a great opportunity to paint it a contrasting color. Off to Home Depot I went (which is pet friendly FYI!) I poured over different color palettes and decided to go with a navy and white. My thought was it is a great color scheme for an adult bedroom, but could also transition to a room for a little one someday! Also navy & white is such a classic combination that you can incorporate lots of pops of color to add another dimension to the room. 





Here is the finished product! I will start by saying after 2 days of sanding and painting this piece I decided I did not like the color. So back to sanding I went this time with a little help from my husband :) When I went back to Home Depot they were awesome, they changed the color for me free of charge! They did mention that if you go with the "high gloss" finish it has a tendency to change the color- something to note for future DIY projects! In my case it was pretty drastic- the color was definitely more of a cobalt than navy. 

 Here is a detail shot of how it turned out. Personally I love the higher gloss finish, I know that isn't for everyone but it is definitely an option to skip just go with a matte finish.





Here is my bigger project of the room, a tufted headboard! I got a lot of the inspiration for things I saw on Pinterest that I loved, but wasn't willing to spend hundreds on. If anyone is interested in the tutorial of how I did the headboard feel free to email me for details. I used the headboard that came with this bedroom set thanks to my Aunt! :) I didn't take a before shot- sorry about that. However it was the same color as the dresser, and fits a full sized bed. 


I did a lot of research about the different ways to do a DIY headboard, most of which use plywood and hang on the wall versus being on the actual frame. I actually think this might have been a little easier as the headboard was already really sturdy so I just added a three inch foam from Home Depot and premeasured all of the places I wanted the tufts to appear, make sure to space them out evenly otherwise they won't appear correctly on the headboard, then added the foam and did the tufts.
Getting the tension even on all the tufts wasn't very
easy but I did the best I could. I also hand covered all
the buttons with matching fabric. I can definitely see
myself redoing this sometime in the future hopefully
to get better tension on the tufts. Overall I was happy
with the results, and was very appreciative of all the
help I got from Oliver! I owe that guy :)

My very first blogpost!

 

      I have been wanting to start this blog for quite some time now, however there was always something holding me back. Would anyone read it? Would it be something I could maintain with a job, family and other life demands? I had so many reservations however the desire to start never wavered, so here I am writing my first post. I've decided to embark on this with no expectations for what it will be- just enjoy the ride and see where it takes me. This is something that will be a personal challenge as I tend to have incredibly high expectations for just about everything!

      A little bit about me: I was born and raised in the burbs of Boston with an enormous Italian family, everyone lives here, no one leaves, and Sunday's are sacred family days. I loved every minute of growing up with more cousins than I can count on both my hands and feet. There was always someone to play with and adventure to be had. Despite having an amazing childhood I looked to challenge myself and decided to head out of state for college. I studied to become a nurse, and graduated in 2010, but during all that studying I still found time to meet a guy who definitely was not from Boston! After college I traveled, got married, and moved to DC.  Our first two years of marriage there were amazing! We have recently moved back to Boston, and expanded our little family with the cutest Barbet puppy named Clovis! :)

      This blog is about all of the things I love about life; family, entertaining, fashion, decorating, and love...oh and of course my favorite beverage of all time, Bubbly!

I hope you enjoy reading about all of our adventures!

Kate
XO