living room inspiration

After we finish cleaning up the exterior of the house, the next big project in my sights is a huge DIY bookshelf in the living room.  We've got a sort of awkward wall that I haven't been able to figure out what to do with, but after seeing these images of Mattson Creative's studio space, I knew that I wanted to make a shelving unit out of pipes and wood shelves to hold art, books, and cool knick knacks.  Not only will it function as a great way to make that space beautiful and interesting, but it'll also be an awesome way to display prints!  I've got a few prints of my own, and some prints from other artists that I love, and I think a cool shelf like this would be the perfect way to show them off.  I love how the shelving at Mattson Creative has that perfect balance of art, books, and interesting, eclectic pieces to fill the space just right.  

ampersand light // sunshine print // camera print // teepee print

the earth laughs in flowers print + winnebago print are my work

I've been slowly acquiring prints and artwork, and a few of the pieces I know I'll want to display are the ones above.  I just got the "I love my family" print for Christmas, and got the camera print a few years ago.  I just got the ampersand lamp and sunshine print the other day and I'm excited to see them in action.  I love big letters saved from old signage, and while the ampersand is new, not salvaged, I think it still has that vibe.  I definitely want to find some more big letters/numbers as I absolutely love the graphic, bold look that they have.  The Winne print is one I made a couple years ago during my Brave trip, and I made the "earth laughs in flowers" print back in college.

We're planning on doing a small test run version of this in our bedroom that looks more like the smaller version below.  I want to thrift a little dresser as the base and start the shelves on top of that, and then go for the bigger, living-room version after we've figured out all the kinks!  

inspiration images via Mattson Creative + Hindsvik at Home

a peek into our new home

So far we don't have any room in the house completed, but things are looking better than the boxes everywhere after moving in.  We had our housewarming party on Friday night so I cleaned up the house (read: shove piles of stuff into cabinets), and it looked pretty sharp, so I took some photos.  I still have tons of painting and decorating to do.  I only have one piece of art hung so far, and I'm in serious need of some drapes in the living room to really pull things together.  But we've got more pressing, non-decor house stuff to do in this coming month, so finishing up my decor ambitions will probably go on pause for a little bit.  I'm super happy with how things are coming along, though, and it's so fun to see things come together!  We put up the bunting from our wedding in the living room for the party and it just looks so festive I don't want to take it down!  We get so much more light in this house than our last place, and I'm totally in love with it.
  
quilt/urban outfittters :: iPhone dock + lamp/modcloth :: sidetable/target :: basket + rug/ikea
  
rug + pillows/ikea :: teepee print/beauchamping :: camera print/christine berrie chair/thrifted :: couch/ikea (craigslist) :: mt. mckinley print/ranger doug

from the bar: diy ginger liqueur

Last Christmas I made some peppermint liqueur, and at the time I wanted to make more fun tinctures, but the time flew by and here we are a year later.  Maybe I'll make it a holiday tradition.  But anyway, I love the flavor of ginger (whisky gingers are one of my favorite drinks!), and I've made some easy homemade ginger beer before to make whisky gingers with.  Ginger liqueur seemed like the perfect holiday spirit to make this year.  Bonus?  It's totally easy to make and only requires a few days to sit and steep!

For my peppermint liqueur recipe I used vodka, but for this one, I wanted a bit more flavor from the alcohol I included, so I used dark rum (I thought spiced rum would add too many other flavors), though you could try brandy too!


What you'll need:
2 oz ginger, peeled & diced
1.5 cups water
3/4 cup sugar
6 cloves
zest of half a lemon
1 1/2 cups dark rum (or brandy)

1. Peel the ginger and dice it into small pieces.

2. Bring the ginger, sugar, cloves, and water to a boil. Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer until ginger is soft—about 20 minutes. Let this syrup cool, and don't strain it yet!

3. While you've got the ginger syrup on the stove, zest the lemon and place the zest in a sealable glass container (I used a mason jar).  Once your syrup is cool, add it (ginger chunks, cloves and all) to the container along with the rum.  Seal and shake, and then let this mixture steep for two days.

4. Strain mixture through a coffee filter or cheesecloth into your bottle or jar for storage. Let it sit for one more day before using to let flavors mellow.

Want an awesome recipe where you can use this tasty tincture?  Head over to Making Nice in the Midwest, where I'm sharing a fun holiday riff on a Cosmopolitan today!

we're homeowners!

So, if you guys follow me over on instagram and twitter, you probably already know this, but... we're homeowners!  Hooray!  It's been a long, arduous, exciting, exhausting, frustrating process the past 6 months, but we feel like we ended up with our dream home and all the hassle was totally worth it.  It's pretty bizarre to be sitting inside our home.  Like, these our our walls, we can do whatever we want to them!  I can knock that one down if I want.  I can paint it, I can tear up the floors, I can do... anything!  I'm almost paralyzed with the freedom, I'm not sure what I want to do now!  For now, we need a few items that will require an Ikea run.  We went on a thrift adventure yesterday to look for a few things and got some necessities.  I have my very own studio space that have absolutely no furniture for, so I'll have to design that space from scratch, which is pretty thrilling, actually.  The Winne has it's own special parking spot, too, which is so much better than having to park it in the backyard with a nasty tree right over it, making it all gross and dirty.  The poor girl need some cosmetic TLC, as she got a bit grimy, but there's a faucet right next to her, so I can give her a bath and a good scrub now!

I feel like we're still in that "new parent" stage where we're afraid that if we leave the house for more than an hour we'll come back and it'll be burnt to the ground or something.  Oh, the heavy weight of responsibility.  I'm excited to get to know this house, though.  I'm certain we'll have to fix many things, and we already know that we need to replace the siding as it's in pretty rough shape, but there's something about fixing up your own house that just feels so rewarding, even if it's hard work.  I can't wait to show you guys some peeks at the house.  It's a total wreck right now, with all the empty boxes still laying around, but things are coming along.  Oh!  And we have a living room that has a perfect spot for a Christmas tree!  Christmas tree farm, here I come!