pink Target lamps

The pink Target lamps arrived today. Here they are in my poorly lit bedroom last night:

Even though I knew they were only 23.75 inches, I was kind of hoping they'd look bigger. (I like big lamps and I cannot lie, you other brothers can't deny...)

There's a line of furniture across the top there. The lamp and the painting are at the same height as the headboard, and it just looks....not right.

I like the lamps.  They are cute and dainty.  The color is perfect, I like the brass and glass, they are fabulous.  But I don't think they are right for this room. Perhaps in Princess's room?  Or back at the store. 

pillow shams and peacock mirror

I'm rolling along on the pink bedroom refresh.  I ordered two lamps from Target that a reader kindly brought to my attention.  I also bought two standard floral pillowcases that were on sale for 20% off and I had a $25 off coupon...and then realized I did this ALL WRONG.

I should have gotten three of the floral in euro shams, and then gotten two monogrammed standard pillows (in pink).

Now the pillows are no longer on sale and I wasted my coupon.  If I get three monogrammed euro shams you won't be able to see the monogram since the standard pillows will be in front of them.  ARG.

I saw this mirror this morning and though OH HEY NOW, that would look fabulous hanging over my headboard. I love peacock mirrors, and we have one in the dining room.

Princess saw me looking at it and said "we already have that mirror, why don't you just paint it white?"  (DIY: start 'em young.)  I said, great idea, but I really like the mirror we have the way it is, and I like it so much I'd like a second one in white, and can you imagine the taping off involved?

Sunday afternoon I got an email from Pottery Barn with a 20% coupon in it. Huzzah! My unnecessary redecorating is saved! Before I finished typing the coupon code into my cart, I fumbled my phone and the email disappeared into the ether.  Gone forever.  I somehow accidentally managed to permanently delete a coupon code.

Perhaps the universe is telling me I don't need new pillows. I think I'm going to return the standard shams and see how I feel about the amount of pink when I get the lamps in.

Master bedroom in pink, in progress

My master bedroom has been orange and navy for about a year; that's pretty long in Lisa Land.

When we moved into this rental, I found the rust-colored 10x13 rug on craigslist.  It was the right price and the right size, and I knew I could make it work with stuff I already owned.

Flash forward a year, and I am ready to be done with orange in my bedroom.  I don't hate it (it has a new life in the guest bedroom), but....I want pink.  And that rusty rug isn't matching anything pink.

Large rugs are not in my budget.  How can I rearrange something I already own?

Princess has an 8x10 pink and navy rug...and now it is in my bedroom.  (I moved a 5x8 rug into her room as a replacement.)

Here's the rug in the room, and all the orange pulled out.  It is somewhat boring. Lots of blue. My plan is to add in some pink accents, like lamps and some pillows.

Here is where we get into trouble, as apparently no one sells pink lamps, and I like Really Expensive Pillows.

I've mocked up a mood board with some pink lamps and pillows.

I love love love that stripe fabric. It is a Designer's Guild fabric called Cordellina in Ocean colorway.  You might have seen this fabric in this very popular studio apartment by designer Elizabeth Bauer:

I would love to do a sofa like that. Next house.

I have contacted some etsy sellers about getting a pillow made in the Cordellina fabric.  None of them will do it.  Why? It is to the trade fabric, which is not only expensive (think $200 to $400 a yard, most likely), but also has a 3 yard minimum order (so think $600 to $1200 for a minimum order of fabric, and I only want one bolster pillow. The etsy sellers have told me they cannot move the rest of the fabric, and thus it doesn't make sense for them to order it.)  I've also had my eye on ebay for remnants, but so far no remnant has been big enough for a pillow.

I think I will probably do these pink linen euro shams, and then this floral Pottery Barn standard sham.  And maybe, just maybe, if I can find someone on etsy to make a bolster out of the Cordellina, we shall see.

Every pink lamp that looks nice is either Christopher Spitzmiller or Robert Abbey and extremely expensive.   My current favorite place to look at lamps (which I do on a regular basis) is to shop the Safavieh line at Target, as they come in pairs for a reasonable price.  Unfortunately, Safavieh doesn't put out a pink lamp at all, sadly.

Lamps Plus has a line of lamps that are colormatched to Sherwin Williams colors.  I can't decide on which pink--perhaps I will order the pillow shams and see how they look in person and then order the lamps?\

Next house, ALL PINK EVERYWHERE.  

on being creative

My blog friend Rita just wrote a thought-provoking post on being creative. (Actually, she wrote it a week ago, but this house has been full of Pestilence and Disease for the past ten days, so I'm just now getting around to writing this.)

I've given a lot of thought lately to what "being creative" means, because it is something I greatly enjoy and yet do not do enough of. I have a lot of the same reasons Rita has.

1) I fear that what I make won't be good enough.

Good enough for who?

I'm not painting in my garage during the ten minutes between dinner and bedtime so I can submit something to the Whitney, or even to sell on Etsy.  I'm painting because I enjoy doing so.

Most of what I create is hanging on the walls of my house.  Not one person has ever walked into my house and said "wow, you hang that crap on your walls?" A few people on the internet have given less than kind feedback, but one could easily avoid this by not posting work on the internet.

Ninety-nine point nine percent of the world can create stuff without other people mocking it.  George W. Bush does have creative talent.  He's no Michaelangelo, but he turns out a decent painting.  Then his mom goes on the Today Show critiquing his portrait of his dad and says "that's my husband?"

Since more than likely you are not a former leader of the free world, you are free to create whatever you like without your mom disparaging it on national television.

2) Making something might take one try, or one hundred and forty-seven tries.

You have to respect the process.

Just like Hemingway's supposed quote on writing, the first draft of anything is shit.  This applies to just about everything I've ever painted.

For years, I would try and do something, and I would hate it, then I would paint over it, and then I would do it again, and it would still suck.  I would put it away, and then maybe a few weeks or months later I'd drag it out and try again.  And then I'd start to feel like I was getting somewhere.  Sometimes I'd finish, be ok with the finished product, and then decide a month later that it wasn't quite done. In fact, I think everything I've ever painted has been "finished" and then redone a month later.

The problem was that I used to look at that process as being evidence of not being good at something.  Now, I'm starting to look at it as part of the process. It takes me weeks or months and eleventymillion tries before I make something I'm proud of.  Some people can turn out something awesome in ten minutes.

I can't make anything quickly. But I can make something I like in a couple of weeks. Respect the process.

3) The more you do, the better you get.

Even if "better" isn't "awesome."

I have been painting on and off for a few years.  But only in the last year do I feel a certain freedom in making bad stuff.  In fact, I'm starting to expect crap on the first go round. Its sort of like Thomas Alva Edison--I've discovered 10,000 ways that don't work.  And, I've discovered a few ways that DO work.  And if I keep going, maybe I'll find something else that works.

Sometimes I get discouraged and think "this is terrible" and I put it away for a while.

The Ira Glass piece is true---you actually have to DO something in order to get better at it. And you will make a ton of terrible stuff before eventually turning out good stuff.

I've been working on painting flowers for a year. I suck at them. They look terrible. I'm not sure why, as flowers are basically circles, but still, I keep plugging onward.  Someday I'll turn out a decent flower.

4) Make it easy to get started.

I don't have a nice art studio.  I don't even have a spot with good light.  I do have a little spot right inside the garage door where I leave everything out, in case inspiration hits.

Something else that keeps me from painting on a consistent basis:  I'm not wearing painting clothes.

Painting occasionally lends itself to the time confetti that is motherhood. I can put a touch here, a touch there in between loading the dishwasher and waiting for the kids.  In fact, most paintings actually require doing a little of this and a little of that and then waiting for it to dry before adding another layer.  But I have managed to get paint on just about all of my nice clothes, so I stopped doing that.

I'm not doing something I really enjoy because I  might ruin my clothes. Clearly I need to get a painting coverall (painting bathrobe? Really big shirt?) and hang it right next to my painting area. (This starts to morph into a "not enough time" problem--changing my clothes acknowledges that I am about to use a large chunk of time doing something creative. Sometimes it is just easier to think, eh, not enough time to do anything today.)

5) Dana at House Tweaking wrote a good review of Elizabeth Gilbert's book Big Magic, which is about being creative.  It sounds like a great read.

How do you push yourself to be creative?