i was so thrilled that the outdoor seating area of my hawthorn project was included in this houzz article on landscaping redesign. we had so much fun creating this inviting dining and lounge area for the garden. many THANKS to lauren dunec hoang of houzz for including my project in the piece and to heather knierim of HBK photography for the lovely photo.
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i was thrilled to have my juniper office project “linked” (i just learned about this process… i am not terribly techie!) in this article about coping with working at home (which most of us are STILL doing a fair bit nearly TWO YEARS after this pandemic began - HAY SEUS!) look for it under the anchor text “office environment.” x0x
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(bludot felt upholstered lounge chairs in front of the mountain view)
the newly opened boulder office of whispir, a global digital communication agency, is located on pearl street in the center of boulder’s downtown walking district. the upper level office enjoys both street scenes and stunning mountain views from the multitude of windows that wrap the building.
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trash the runway is a design competition established eleven years ago by the creative lab at common threads in boulder, colorado. middle and high school students design, actualize and model super creative, high fashion looks made entirely of found and recycled materials. the garments run the gamut from ultra chic to whimsical cheek and have been created out of the most unexpected “trash”: discarded dog food bags, bubble wrap, gum wrappers, wall paper samples… for kids growing up in a town that regularly tops the “worst dressed” list in america (albeit with the most exercised, toned bodies underneath the fleece and spandex) i find it miraculous and inspiring that they design clothing made of literal garbage that rivals the looks of new york fashion week. this show is so much FUN and i am so proud to be a sponsor this year. purchase tickets here! x00xx
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we LOVE valentine’s day around here… we love MAKING valentines…
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i am so GRATEFUL to have won the “best of houzz service award” for 2022. (i’m not really sure why it isn’t for 2021 since 2022 just started but it DOES make me excited about the potential for 2022!) i have been so lucky to work with such talented, helpful people (my amazing accountant, amy hubbard, my favorite photographer heather knierim of HBK photography, my super supportive “business therapist” ashley wick, my teachers and classmates from heritage school of interior design and of course my wonderful clients. THANK YOU all! x00xx
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it was so exciting to be included in this article by stacey lindsay for camillestyles.com about color trends for 2022. i chose terracotta. sam, one of my SUPER talented classmates from my studies at denver’s heritage school of interior design, employed this color so effectively and beautifully in her work that i fell in love with it too. and with all that we’ve been through already in 2022 - fires, shootings, blizzards, omicron - i think the warmth and earthiness of terracotta will do us all some good. THANK YOU sam, thank you camillestyles.com and thank you heather knierim of HBK photography. here’s to terracotta and feeling safe and grounded in 2022! x00x
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(LOOK at the cheeks on that guy - i cropped his cute bum out because he gets embarrassed now…)
when you have a new baby, especially a cute one, the grandmas come up to you EVERYWHERE - in the market, at the park, in restaurants and coffee shops and the line for the loo and warn you, “ENJOY that boy… it goes so fast!” you nod at them sweetly, inwardly annoyed and think about the fact that you can’t remember the last time you slept through the night or slept in or felt even remotely well rested and it just seems impossible because time actually feels like it’s on pause. and then POOF that little cherub of a baby is SIXTEEN YEARS OLD and you just want to bubble wrap him and keep him in the closet so he can’t grow up anymore. so don’t look for theo around town because that’s exactly where he is… i am keeping him safe and sound and frozen in time because i finally understand what those grandmas meant. i will be happy to pass on your birthday wishes to my sweet boy who will not be getting any older… i love him too much for that! HAPPY, HAPPY BIRTHDAY my dearest, darling theo! x0x0x
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(my mother’s high school senior portrait)
my mother is a study of contradictions. she grew up on a farm in the very small town of atlantic, iowa. she embraced the no-nonsense, stiff upper lip, super kind, mid-western values (AND the comfort food, which i grew up with) but always felt misplaced on a farm. she did not enjoy collecting eggs at the crack of dawn - she says the hens were ruthless and would pinch the backs of her hands and twist her skin… i have to ask her why she didn’t wear gloves - or get particularly attached to her 4H cow (who she showed in penny loafers, not work boots) or adopt a runty pig like fern that she bottle fed and doted on. no - she moved to the “big city” of minneapolis straight away after college and started working in fashion. she preferred urban sidewalks (where she could wear pretty shoes) and buses to fields and tractors. she was thrilled that her job as a junior buyer for dayton’s department store took her on regular trips to new york where she could soak in the energy and art and architecture and bagels (which she’d never had before) of the biggest, most exciting city in the country.
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(my little socks)
i know that we’ve had a rough start to 2022 with so many heartbreaking disasters and brutal events and this fucking pandemic that JUST WON’T END… but this week something amazing happened. when i was putting on my fuzzy socks (yes - i still wear my christmas ones even though it’s january) there was a little sock inside of it. i was beside myself because the little socks that i wear with my vans are always inexplicably disappearing. i put a pair in the wash and only one makes it out. my mother sent me a meme to explain this problem:
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so it turns out i didn’t just have A virus over the holidays… i had THE virus! when i got back to boulder after christmas i had a sore throat which progressed into a throat ON FIRE with a runny nose, headache and some nausea. i was pretty flat for three days taking nyquil, drinking theraflu and sucking on ricolas (which i HATE so that is an indication of how tender my throat was - i only had them in the house because my dad loves them so i keep them on hand for his visits, which obviously haven’t happened since before the pandemic so they were very old, but still strong and nasty!) during that period my friend dropped off a home test which came back negative. i wasn’t seeing anyone (except hank, of course) because the kids went skiing with my first husband and i was feeling super cruddy and i wouldn’t have wanted to spread what i thought was a bad cold or strep anyway.
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i was so excited to learn that my juniper office project was featured in a houzz article on how to remodel your home office. thank you so much patricia lee for including my work and THANK YOU heather knierim of HBK photography for the great photos!
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i am so delighted to be included in boulder county home + garden magazine’s winter 2021 issue. this story about mixing antiques with modern pieces is the first time all of the projects represented have been mine. MANY THANKS to heather knierim of HBK photography for the lovely photos and to all of my wonderful clients for allowing me to share their homes. x00xx
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i am writing this on the afternoon of new year’s eve 2021. i am relieved for the start of 2022 because generally, i like even numbers much better than odd ones (which is why i skip the odd birthdays and just stay an even age for two years which CAN lead to some confusion and me not always knowing exactly how old i am, but then i just check my bumble account because that thing updates automatically) and because 2021 was mostly a shit fuck of a year…not so unlike 2020.
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(even at 15 my grandmother seemed to know exactly what she wanted)
my paternal grandmother was fierce. she lived the way she wanted and you pretty much just went along. she liked things a certain way and if something wasn’t to her choosing she would wave her hand, say, “oh FISH!” and carry on as she deemed appropriate. you didn’t really want to get in her way.
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we spent the weekend baking and frosting and assembling and decorating and sprinkling our gingerbread houses and christmas cookies. (this was NOT the most successful year for the houses - despite a year of studying autocad my construction drawings must have been a bit off or the builder was not paying close enough attention to the dimensions - one collapsed completely and another one got a big crack by the front door. we did manage to get that one to stand but it will be pretty drafty in there and it is not coded for a fireplace.)
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we spent five christmases in amsterdam while we were living there as expats… there is no more magical place to spend the holidays… there are strings of lights outlining the bridges and arching across the streets so that the whole city is lit up, there are pop up outdoor ice skating rinks and holiday markets and olie bollen (DELICIOUS big round donuts doused in powdered sugar) trucks suddenly appear all over the city. but my favorite tradition was the christmas candy. pompadour, our beloved neighborhood chocolate shop, made whimsical marzipan characters (funny frogs, little piggies, red, polka-dotted toad stools) and fruit (oranges, pears and a pokey, round one that i could never identify) each december. i still don’t know what those guys had to do with christmas, but i looked forward to seeing them (and EATING them) in pompadour’s front windows during the holiday season.
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once again my kids completely lucked out for our holiday photo. my super talented friend, stephanie beresford, wanted to try out some new camera lenses and did a little shoot with them in the backyard. i have no idea when we did this… just that it was “some time” during the pandemic (i think i have permanent corona brain, which has left me unable to remember when anything happened) but it WAS in 2021. theo’s hair is even longer now and lucy has more of a “middle school” air about her, but beyond that they look the same. after all that these kids have had to process in the last two years: the corona, home schooling (especially “math with mom”), me being in school and FREAKING OUT over autocad and sketchup, endless door dash, multiple horrendous shootings, me too, BLM, all the wild fires and smokey air, the loss of our beloved GG AND the loss of our grandma on the “i” street, my vacuum being in the shop for so long (which has lots of ramifications for MY mental health and subsequently theirs) and just the loss of “normal life” (i keep imagining them sitting in a bar in their forties chatting with someone about this pandemic period, “how crazy was your mom during corona?”) i just couldn’t put them through further trauma for a more recent photo… i’m an AWESOME mom like that!
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(nancy when she finds that elusive clock)
mothers take on many roles: taxi driver, referee, party planner, aesthetician, tutor, home chef, nurse, cleaning service… but one gig no one talks about when you are pregnant is that of detective.
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i was lucky enough to have three grandmothers (FOUR if you count the grandma we used to wave to on the “i” street): my father’s mother, my mother’s mother (who i never met because she was gone long before i was born) and my gg, my grandpa’s second wife. all of these women had a huge impact on my life.
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