Loving this picnic from the Parker Palm Springs (found via Alkemie).

I just bought this rad Italian ribbon from Etsy seller angelaliguori ($8 each!).

Tim is busy working on my birthday present (the big day (I’m turning 29) is tomorrow!) and has sequestered me in the living room where I have nothing to do but blog (and wonder — what can he possibly be giving me?). I just saw this collection of portraits posted by Anna at Absolutely Beautiful Things (which is Leigh of Found, Now Home’s creation) and it reminded me 1) of how much I like photo/print/painting walls and 2) how much I’d like a portrait of myself, now, when I’m still young!

I’ve always loved this portrait of Jordan and her husband Paul painted around their wedding. Such a romantic idea!

Check out this lovely antique treasure chest on ebay (currently $189).

(Image of Met’s Period Rooms via Diana: Muse )

Today I headed to the Metropolitan Museum’s symposium of the “Past, Present and Future” of the Period Room, which was an amazing day of lectures. I enjoy period rooms for their romance and human scale — they are often a respite from museum fatigue. However, I’ve also wondered how museums will handle the continuing addition of “period” rooms. I mean, in a hundred years, what rooms will people want to see? Uber modernist rooms? 1950s playrooms? Bomb shelters? Ina Garten’s kitchen? The last lecture of the day was the best in many ways as it addressed this very question of the future of the period room. The lecture was given by Julius Bryant who has the delicious title of “Keeper of Word and Image” at the Victoria and Albert Museum. He mentioned the artist Mark Dion, whose work, focused on the processes of collecting and discovery is fascinating. I did a little google research and found that Dion is playing with the aesthetic and fantastic qualities that attract us to these displays. Here are two samples:

(image via nature network )

(image via )

One quote from Dion that I loved (since I’m a student of the decorative arts) is this: “I am very excited by the decorative arts. To study the history of the decorative arts, one must follow developments in science and technology, political economy and aesthetics and iconography.” Yes! Yes! Yes!

Full text of the interview here.

My sweet husband gave me the most beautiful red bouquet for Valentine’s Day from one of my favorite flower shops, UTOWA! They have a funky, non traditional way of flower arranging — see the paper mache vase below. Valentine’s Day seems a little awkward, right? However, yesterday the streets of New York were a riot of flowers. I saw the most beautiful bouquets gliding by me on the subway — it seemed everyone had flowers, from the redhead with 6 dozen pale purple roses to those with a single red rose, almost no one was empty handed. I love the flowers Tim bought (esp. the crazy flowers with the green centers) and figure any day that yields such lovelies can’t be all bad. I hope all of you had celebrations both large and small. Some more beautiful UTOWA creations below:

I’m delighted to announce that I’m participating in this month’s Poppytalk Handmade Market! Jan at Poppytalk is the organizing genius behind the market and she and Earl are truly a pleasure to work with. There are so many talented participants, and so many lovely spring themed items! I particularly impressed with the stationary of “Things are better with a parrott”. I love her custom stationary ($40 for a set of 25 cards)!

This past weekend M. and I did brunch at Clinton Street Bakery, then tea at Donut Plant (where we bought donuts for later in the day), and then wondered around the lower east side. Somewhere along the way we found The Light Fantastic, a tiny wonderful lighting store on Clinton Street. Damien, the owner, collects these lamps at estate sales and other secret sources. I thought he had a great selection and that the prices were reasonable. I particularly liked the chandelier below (sorry for the crappy pictures). In any case, he doesn’t seem to have a website, but the shop address is 37-39 Clinton Street (between Stanton & Rivington).

I saw these Kate Spade Post-it notes yesterday as I was trying to find numbered labels to create some sort of inventory system for Abigail Vintage. 500 matchboxes will wreak havoc with your life and I have 850 more on the way! The great news is that the matchboxes are selling (which has been a wonderful surpise — who knew there were other people out there obsessed with matchboxes). The internet is amazing.

But, back to the post-it notes at hand: the yellow, the white, the font of the numbers, all perfect! I’m longing for a life so in control as these post-it notes. Of course, they are insanely expensive ($9!) (for post-its!). Clearly, life as a working person as gotten to me — I haven’t paid money for post-its in years. Maybe St. Valentine will deliver them on the 14th? Then again, my birthday is the 16th (I love dropping hints).

I took this photo in Paris last year, how fantastic is this woman’s dress next to the Monet painting?  She made my day then and last week I was honored to receive You Make My Day awards from two of my favorite bloggers, Cup of Jo and Aesthetic Outburst. Thank you lovely ladies!

So it works like this:

1. Write a post with links to 5 blogs that make make your day.
2. Acknowledge the post of the award giver.
3. Tell the award winners that they’ve won by commenting on their blogs.

Here are five blogs that are making my day, these days:

Poppytalk (loving Jan’s posts on collections and all the energy she puts into Poppytalk Handmade)

Orangette (the best writing on the web and the recipes are inspiring)

Decorno (lovely interiors and just enough rants about Pamela Anderson)

Cowgirl You Got That Something (Tara makes me laugh and laugh and laugh plus she’s a dj, plus she finds beautiful things)

Cake Spy (the name says it all)

I’m loving this love apothecary jar (I think apothecary is one of my favorite words) from Jonathan Adler ($65).

My cousin Ruth is an artist and yes, pug lover, thought of me when she saw this knitted olive valentine — I love them!   PS Check out Cut Out + Keep, its a cool DIY site with great step by step instructions for making things like, well, knit olive valentines.