Bicycle of Flowers

bicycle of flowers

I was shocked to find this little scene at the end of my block.  Isn't it gorgeous when life is surprising.  On the tags of the bike is a poem that can be ripped off, the sign reads.  We free the beauty.

we free the beauty

"Forget your personal tragedy.  We are all bitched from the start and you especially have to be hurt like hell before you can write seriously.  But when you get the damned hurt, use it-don't cheat with it.  Be as faithful to it as a scientist- but don't think anything is of any importance because it happens to you or anyone belonging to you."

Ernest Hemingway, writer

A less known book of Ernest that I highly recommend is A Moveable Feast, it is not fiction but more of a journal written when he was just starting out writing.

On the first page below the title is written.

"If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast."

-Ernest Hemingway to a friend, 1950

With affection,

Natalie

I'm linking with:

Between Naps on the Porch
Mod Vintage Life
A Stroll Thru Life

Flower Arch

flower arch

For some very cool reason we have a flower fairy in our house.  She arrives dark in the night on the eve of a birthday and makes an arch of flowers in the entrance of the birthday girl’s room.

beauty in impermanence 

Today Lucia turns 14.  That is pretty shocking for this Mama, because that means there is no way I am 25 any more, even if my heart and soul tell me differently.

Lucia reads no joke 50 books a year in italian and english, she has legs a mile long and can be surprising with her one line jokes, but best of all she loves to be with her family.

love how the rose vines moves

People are always saying to me enjoy it now because it is fleeting.  I believe if you give the right amount of freedom and trust the sense of family and desire to be close continues.

the geranium is so brilliant it is shocking

Buon Compleanno Lucia

Natalie

I'm Linking to these pretty parties:

French Country Cottage

Romantic Home

The Shabby Creek Cottage

Savvy Southern Style

Painting A Shutter

outside my balcony is a river the flows to Rome

I wanted to change the space by my balcony now that it is spring.  It has been a long rainy winter here in Umbria and the humidity was too much in the space.  I had to take everything away from the wall.  I live in a Gothic Palazzo with two feet thick stone walls, many of which are facing north and get little direct sun.  Plus there was no sun!

I had a lot of fun these days, because I cut loose and painted a woman in vines on this inner shutter.  Recently I am really caught up in vines.  Anyone out there feel like they are interlaced in vines?  It isn’t a good feeling, but I will spare you the difficulties of my life.  I wanted to make my woman in vines seem like she was hidden behind an old Venetian stucco wall.

here' my girl in vines

Here is the space before and also the shutter before.

the space before

the inner shutter before

Now I can use the space, have a cup of tea and write in my diary, breath in the smell of the spring flowers and rest assured that I will work my way out of the vines and into the garden of my future.

I love the roses with the mixed motif

detail

Cheers.

Natalie

I am linking to:

Between Naps on the Porch
Mod Vintage Life
Sumos Sweet Stuff
Cozy Little House

Peace

My heart is deeply saddened by the events at the Boston Marathon.  Although I am a California girl living in Umbria, my mother lived in that neighborhood and even married my father there.  I have family and friends there, who are safe and sound and certainly distraught.

Today I send a message of peace and love out to the world and ask that you in turn, spread it around where ever you can.

With affection Natalie

Advice from Thomas Jefferson

Spring is finally here in Umbria

Hello lovely readers,  this post doesn't much have to do with design but if you look between the lines it is clearly the nature of design for living. I personally believe in delegating and the team effort.  I at times find myself on a job site painting for 10 hours and repenting I hadn't eaten more, yet old Thomas has some simple good advice.

1. Never put off until tomorrow what you can do today.

2. Never trouble another for what you can do yourself.

3. Never spend your money before you have it.

4. Never buy what you do not want because it is cheap.

5. Pride costs us more than hunger, thirst and cold.

6. We never repent of having eaten too little.

7.  Nothing is troublesome that we do willingly.

8.  How much pain has cost us the evils which never have happened.

9.  Take things always by their smooth handle.

10. When angry, count ten, before you speak; if very angry, a hundred.

-Thomas Jefferson, U.S. president

happy monday

Natalie

How To: Faded Pattern On Shabby Chic Furniture

shabby chic furniture ideas

I had so much fun doing this project because I love pattern and it scares me a bit also.  I guess I’m afraid I’ll mess it up.  I believe with pattern in an interior it is more difficult to make the space look pretty and simple, which is an aesthetic that I desire.  Yet I also believe that our brains and souls want the stimulation and repetition of pattern.  It makes us happy, we think owwwh che bello!

I changed the knob to green glass

Here’s what I did, it really did not take me long at all, just a few hours.  Granted the piece is small, but there is waiting time involved.

before shot

I painted this piece pale blue gray, leaving the ochre color underneath.

sometimes I use heavy books to glue veneer down

Where the tapped veneered edge of the door was coming apart.  I took a tiny brush and added some glue in the gap. I tapped it with masking tape to ahead it together. This is a simple trick if you don’t have clamps or the angle is strange.

off-white motif

I free form painted a scroll type, leafy design in off white.  Here is a Big Secret for those of you who are new to painting, go buy yourself a liner brush.  They make everything look magic and you can touch up your own designs afterward by lining in on the edges.  You could also do this process with a stencil.  With a liner brush you want to pull the brush, never push it.  Then the brush does the work for you.

easy to add in the finesse after

my best friends

I painted in metallic silver on part of the molding.  This gives the piece a slight glow.

you can leave it sanded off to your preference

When my white design dried I sanded it a bit on the edges of the cabinet and over the motif to fade it down, part of the original ochre shows through.  Then I took a small brush and painted over some of the motif with the original blue-gray base color.  Let that dry.

I paint over the design to fade it out

I tinted some clear wax in a dark kiwi green color with Universal Tints.  I like to cut up old wool sweaters to use to apply the wax (use a light color).  First I apply a lot of wax, then I wipe it off right away.  After about a half hour I get a new clean piece of wool and buff the waxed finish, a light shine comes up.

tinted wax in kiwi green

buff the wax in and off

keep life simple

so pretty and faded

Do you think it’s pretty?  What do you think about pattern in your home?  I like the idea of fading the pattern to tone down the force of the motif and make it aged looking.

Happy Weekend dear readers.

Natalie

I'm sharing with these fun Link Parties:

Miss Mustard Seed
Between Naps on the Porch

Romantic Home

French Country Cottage

Contrast

yellow and white field with fruit trees

we all have an orange ladder and a yellow path in our grasp

I had to go to Spello today.  I took the bike, it didn't rain (since it did last night) and there were sure signs of spring.  I felt a little like I was in heaven.

Umbria and a flash of color

this guy is doing something cool with the fruit trees as vines

the rosemary is blooming

I do love this little bridge, I already crossed over

We have had a long rainy. cold, gray winter here in Italy.  For a while we had no Pope and we still have what you might call "not a government".  I'll just say they fight a lot.

I don't want you to get any romantic ideas about Foligno, Italy.  So I'm going to burst the bubble, I want to show you some of our reality.

Then maybe I'll go back to being a good girl.

One friend says can't you write a blog on Foligno because then maybe you could make it pretty.  They are working on the sewer system and the streets for YEARS.  You literally can't get through it, or you thought you could get through because you did an hour ago, and I'm talking on foot, forget the car.  It is hard not to go completely insane.  The only thing they can do fast in this country is down an espresso in 2.5 seconds, that is after stirring in the sugar for 1 minute and then thinking about it and caressing the cup for another half a minute then boom it's down.   I know, I know you are thinking about the Lamborghini's and Ferrari's and maybe other events I did not mention.

here's our main piazza.  how did they even get the trucks there? not by crain as usual

I guess I won't go to the market this way.

don't think about going to church to pray 

oh and here' behind my house, they are very good at moving dirt for months

On a design level Contrast is just lovely.

It is important to have a plan that works and functions.  If it isn't functioning then, guess what you can change the plan.  It's called Plan B.

You know what is so funny.  In my own life I often forget about Plan B.  I get so concentrated on making Plan A work, forcing it to work.  Then I remember I can twist my brain a little and it is such a splendid surprise to realize that Plan B is better.

Natalie

Do a Good Action

Today you might…

have a cup of tea,

smell the roses (even metaphorically).

Do a good action by stealth.

All the best,

Natalie 

I'm linking to:

Soule Mama

Way Cool

spring sky

Everyone, in some small sacred sanctuary of the self, is nuts.

- Leo Rosten Author (1908-1997)

This is a quote I found on Word Smith.

Word Smith is way cool.

If you already know about it and then this must mean that you are way cool.

www.Wordsmith.org

You can go to their site and sign up and then they will send you a word a day (in English) for free.  They will give you the etymology of the word, there is even a microphone that you can click on and a voice will tell you how to pronounce the word.  Then the part I love the most is they have a thought a day.

It will make you feel intellectual and good about yourself.  Even when some days go by and you can’t remember any of the new words and you start to feel stupid, then you can just go to the bottom of the page and read the thought of the day, pause for a profound moment and then feel all kick-ass again.

Natalie