a sweet surprise

have you heard of the baby gender reveal cake idea? admittedly, i should probably have come up with a catchier name for it, but listen: when it's time to find out the gender of your baby, your ultrasound technician writes down "boy" or "girl" on a piece of paper and you bring that paper to your favorite bakery. then when you're ready to celebrate whatever that gender is, you pick up the cake and cut into it to reveal either pink or blue cake. some people even make whole parties for the reveal! HOW CUTE!!!

i know that i, for one, will DEFINITELY want to know the gender of my baby, though i am struck by the simplicity of the response i got when i recently asked an expectant father why he and his momma-to-be chose to wait. "there are so few good surprises in life" was what he said. i love that thought, and i love the idea of celebrating that good surprise with colorful cake and then having months and months to plan knowing exactly what gender my baby will be :)

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smart salvage

i think we all have at least one eyeshadow or blush that has dropped or just generally degraded to where what was once a solid is now not so solid anymore. it gets messy, dusty and doesn't go on right anymore. so i love this glamour mag recession-friendly beauty tip on salvaging those downtrodden faves. for containers for this project, i love these.

so easy that it's kind of like, why have we not been doing this since the beginning of time? or at least since the beginning of middle school...

flower power

 

have you ever seen flowering tea? it's the prettiest thing! though i think i've seen pictures, i first saw it in person at a business lunch here, and it was a sight to behold...simple, whimsical and other-worldly. i bought a pouch of the magical little balls at this tea shop in woodstock over the weekend. 

the instructions say to let each ball steep in hot water for 5 minutes and then watch the beauty take shape. i can't wait to try them!

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another great martha idea

love this! here's the how-to.

salty and sweet

are you being hosted this weekend? hostess gifts can be both easy to shop for and hard...on one hand, there are several quick, easy wins. a bottle of wine, a bunch of beautiful flowers, or a nicely presented plant can't go wrong and i'm a big fan of all those options. but then there are the times you want to go a little different. for times like that, i love the idea i saw on my baking addiction of giving homemade vanilla sea salt. 

first, i think it's beyond lovely to give something you made, and what's different about this is that it's not a batch of brownies or a cake that's eaten and then over that day, one and done. this is more of a slow burn - something that can be kept in the pantry of the recipient and used many different ways over many weeks and months, and each time they taste it and discover a new use for the salty and sweet treat, they'll think of you and the lovely hosts they were on the night they got it from you. i love that! 

 

if you're not fancy with a crafting tool that makes perfect labels, which is like a different language to me, i think a plain paper tag (even one neatly cut from a grocery bag) with a hand-scrawled "vanilla sea salt" is kind of more charming. and this way, there's no mistaking who made it...from your kitchen to theirs.

special sips

 

i'm always a big fan of having a special drink when people arrive at a wedding or another special event. at my sister's wedding, sparkling water with fresh raspberries punctuated the rosy, blushy hues of the day. at my own wedding, we offered guests water and sparkling apple and pear ciders to signify the fall season. 

at a bridal shower i planned at work a couple years ago, chocolate was the theme so i did cups of chocolate and plain milk but made them look more special with bright pink straws, all tilted matchingly to the side. yeah, matchingly. made it up.

so...these wildflower ice cubes are begging to be tried, particularly at a spring party like a bridal shower or wedding, don't you think? they actually seem pretty doable based on martha's instructions, and you could employ the same method with any number of things...fresh herbs like mint to put in a mojito or a long island iced tea, or berries to put in a fruitier cocktail. love. this. idea.

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favorite

do you own an item that you just love so much you irrationally want another one? that's how i feel about the ikat scarf i got from h&m last year. i just DIE for it, over and over again, every time i look at it. when i'm not wearing it, i have it draped on my desk chair or over the side of the couch in my living room. the color story in it - blues, orange, pink, mustard...oh my god. i just can't. 

what good would having a second one do me? none. it doesn't even make sense. i just love it that much. although....now that i'm giving it some thought, if i had an extra one, i could use it to reupholster the antique bench i rescued from a junk pile...

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kitchen whites

i'm all aflutter with dreams of a white kitchen (with touches of blue). these dreams aren't new to me, just renewed because we're talking about moving so possibility is in the air. i'm already set on white dishes, but here are some of the white kitchen accents i think would be cheerful, even on a frozen day like today. 

i love all the stoneware and ceramic egg crates i've seen so often recently, but my personal favorite is the one from anthropologie since it holds a full dozen. if i got this one or this one, though they're pretty, i'd still have a half empty carton of eggs each time i bought them until i got through the first six. not pretty.

i also really love the berry boxes because they're sweet looking and they just look so much like the real thing, even with the little puckers and dents and bends in the basket. even though i prefer them in white for my fantasy kitchen, you can see all the lovely little details in the green one here. aren't they lovely?

jayson home and garden has three different ones in white that's a nice mix and crate and barrel's are basic and inexpensive.

i'd also love a really simple set of white mixing bowls like these...

... and canisters, even with one special one like this thrown in (note: in this fantasy, i make cookies). 

and even white can have whimsy with little pieces of art like these owl measuring cups. 

i guess the nicest thing about these moments of white is that i might not be able to (read: will definitely not) have a dream white kitchen like this or this, but i can get some of these little accents and feel like i'm living a little piece of that wonderfully white dream.

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all aglow

i love the incredibly simple idea of lining a walkway or staircase with candles when having people over in the evening. it's perfect for a holiday soiree or even just a casual dinner with loved ones. i've thought about the homes of several people i know -- from big suburban houses to tiny city apartments -- and there isn't one of them that i don't think could execute this in a clean, hauntingly beautiful way. you could do in outside as your guests enter the home, or you could line an indoor hallway or set of stairs. or both.

i always know i really love an idea when i continually rediscover it in different iterations and seasons...when i was looking for beautiful images of this idea, i stumbled upon my own post from early spring about this same notion, but with a decidedly springy, summery feel.

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a green table

are you at your limit with holiday plans and clever ideas? i have such an easy centerpiece or general decor idea for you. wherever you're shopping for your last minute chestnuts or cheesecloth or cider, look out for the cute little rosemary trees that seem to be everywhere these days (definitely at trader joe's and whole foods, i know for sure). if you can't find those, just go for mini pine trees. if they come in cute pots or bowls, perfect. if not, wrap them in a pretty tissue paper and secure with a raffia ribbon or any old ribbon you have leftover in your junk drawer. 

to take the idea in a slightly different direction, but a few bunches of herbs at the grocery store, snip the bottoms like fresh cut flowers and stick them in glasses filled with water. how bountiful and harvesty and earthy.

either option would look perfect dotting a long table or adorning different surfaces around the house, wouldn't they?

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falling for fall

are you enjoying the beautiful fall colors and relishing the coziness that is true fall? the colors  seem to be at their peak over the last few days where i am, and i'm trying to savor every single moment. 

i'm off from work this week, and inside the house i'm burning harvesty scented candles for their scent and their glow,  and i'm boiling whole cinnamon sticks on the stove to squeeze out every drop of their aroma. how do you take your fall? are you loving it?

bird is the word

 

let's all take a few moments (between planning your menu, dreaming up table settings and designing thanksgiving day decor) to think about pretty ways to display the turkey (or tofurkey or turducken) itself next thursday...most of us have some version of this enormous turkey platter and if you don't, make a quick stop at bed bath and beyond and use this coupon or one of the many you probably have in your glove compartment to save 20%...

but aside from the platter, what will you put on it? last year, i set our platter with thyme sprigs and whole cranberries...simple, but pretty. here are some other thoughts, courtesy of ms. martha...i love the idea of sliced or whole fruits, sprigs of all kinds of herbs, nuts, berries...anything emblematic of the season. also, though, i like the idea of using items whose flavors appear in your feast...there's something nice about people being able to visually identify the flavors they're experiencing...so if you're using walnuts or figs in your stuffing, slap some of those babies on the platter and call it a day.

decorating the platter that bears a delicious meal is an almost effortless way of elevating the meal to something more than that. at least i think so. what do you think?

on display

yes, this is in fact the second time in a week i've made reference to melissa gorga's song. awkward. 

well, moving right along, i wanted to share some pictures from last thanksgiving. i was responsible for the decor, and decided that rather than the average flowers and gourds, i wanted to go more literal on the cornucopia idea. i visited the farmers market near my office the day before and picked up lots of kale, carrots, leeks, potatoes, onions, brussel sprouts and whatever else looked good. i corralled them in casserole dishes, vases, and on trays and placed them around the house. at the end of the night, i sent thanksgiving guests home with their own little cornucopia of fresh produce to cook throughout the weekend. i taught ina everything she knows about sending guests home with leftovers, didn't you know? me and ina, we're like two peas in a pod. or two brussel sprouts in a vase in this case.

i was really happy with the way it all came out, and i felt like it was worth the approximate $50 i spent on the produce itself, especially considering that the remains went home with people and continued to be used and used up. for a lot less money, i think you could easily make an abundant display with just a few, really cheap varieties. at the grocery store, you could buy 5 lb bags of potatoes in varying colors and pile them high in bowls placed around. i feel like the more purposeful they look, the less cheap they look. so you might buy two or three different color potatoes and i would display them monochromatically, so maybe on one surface, you'd do all the red skin ones and on the other, the brown or tan ones. you could do the same with the large bags of onions in shades of white, yellow and purple, and that would look gorg as well.