Matthais Heiderich's Circus image reminds me of how I'd describe our home sometimes. It's colorful, entertaining, and seems to have 3 rings going strong from 6am 'til 8pm... and then add company and it's like our 3 monkeys have an audience. If you have kids, you know just what I'm talking about. It's show time.

 

You know the drill. Company is coming + it’s a good kick in the pants to get your housekeeping act together. Right? Well, that’s how it goes for us. Entertaining is not only incentive to whip the house into shape, but it gives me that push to go ahead + dive into our design dreams or shall I say, design obsessions.

You know how it goes when you get obsessed with a color? For me, I start noticing it EVERYWHERE! I’m feeling like this about electric yellow lately & I have been trying to decide where to use it in our house. I decided on testing it out in a small – statement space. I spent some time pinning. Thinking (or fixating, rather) about electric yellow:

Our foyer is 66 years old – as is our cute little cottage. With it comes the charm of the 40′s, including darling tile, coved ceilings, + wall niches. Even our front door, still original, has a sweet art nouveau peek-a-boo window. It’s a dear space. When our family took the space over from it’s previous keeper, there were nails everywhere – ghosts of what was once hanging. So, being equipped to cover each and every one with some sweet little image, frame, canvas, or panel I took care of business and threw art onto those empty nails with joyful abandon. Good gravy, it was such a hot mess, you’d think I’d never studied art installation had you seen the initial status of our walls. The walls of this entry way were in desperate need of a fresh coat of paint, too. So with the inspiration of company coming to visit, I popped the lid on a can of paint in just the right shade of yellow. Truly, this is a beautiful shade of lemongrass + silk. It is the color of a beautiful silk sash on a dramatic grey taffeta dress one would imagine seeing on PBS’s Downton Abbey. Are you with me? It’s almost yellow – almost green inspired by the lotus in one of my paintings (see below the image of the scrumdiddlyumptiousness) + the color of this enchanting French macaron:

Look at the yellow in this image of macarons I found on Pinterest. Oh, the color!

12" x 12" Four Friends or Garden Party I

The ceilings, in their coved glory, were just begging me to do something special to command attention to their loveliness. Inspired by seeing a brilliant example of organic, free hand scallop detail around a doorway of Lotta Jansdotter‘s studio in a book called Open Studios published by Chronicle Books, I decided to have a go at this whimsical embellishment! How I adore all things, Chronicle. Oh, how I hope we collaborate with them one day soon.

Voila!

So playful + dramatic all at once!

For the love of color! I’m grateful for mustard + ochre + lemons + citrine + gold + daisies + sunshine.

Hi there – Jay here. So, as of our last post, we have completed our first 21 Days of Gratitude. Three weeks. Seems like the honk of a New York cabbie horn in the great scheme of things. Wondering where this whole idea came from I decided to turn to my favorite browser and search it up. After a cursory search of the interwebs, it seems that a dude named Maxwell Maltz coined the 21 day habit thingie back in 1971.

“Dr Maxwell Maltz wrote the bestseller Psycho-Cybernetics. Originally a Plastic Surgeon, Maltz noticed that it took 21 days for amputees to cease feeling phantom sensations in the amputated limb. From further observations he found it took 21 days to create a new habit. Since then the ’21 Day Habit Theory’ has become an accepted part of self-help programs.”
Psycho-Cybernetics sounds a bit like the description from Bjork’s 2003 “All is Full of Love” video. Then, other self-helpers picked up on it and it became a thing.
After 21 days, I say, completely without guile, though I don’t live in the land of the lolly-pops where doughnuts grow, my attitude has changed.
When thoughts like, “How many times do I have to tell the kids to turn off the lights before it actually happens?” used to enter my brain, it would darken my mood and I would grumble a bit, or a lot.

After our 21 day experiment, I now realize it just is part of teaching kids how to be adults. In fact, there are probably millions of adults who don’t give a shit about turning off lights.

But, the overarching point here is that my attitude through being sick, reminding kiddos to turn lights off, serious discussions with Lizzie – through it all, my outlook remains staunchly positive and optimistic. So, do it. Put pen to paper, make it happen.

Not happy with your life? Change your attitude. Just do it, silly lady.

Ciao,

Jay

P.S. If you’d like to understand our little inside joke within the expression, “do it silly lady”, above…then you have to check out this Bad Lip Reading clip – the voice of what Lizzie thinks sounds a bit like Michelle Bauchman’s fun hubby says this 1:52 into the clip. It makes us laugh every time. Maybe Bad Lip Reading should be at the tippy top of our list of things to be grateful for tomorrow. Pure brilliance!

On the heels of a great TED video that we posted to our Facebook page, we started writing in a journal every day for 21 days – the “Gratitude Journal”. Our goal is to share three things we’re grateful for and one new positive experience each day for three weeks. We’re using a notebook/journal we picked up from the Talulah Jones (one of our favorite indie stores + Denver experiences) when we were first conceiving our company. Although we’re writing in the same journal, we’ve kept our focus only on our own entries as we write. We plan to read each others entries after the 21 days, the anticipation grows each day as we near the day we’ll read one another’s writings.

Day 17 + Jay's little smirk at Lizzie's camera.

Today is day 17 of this exercise and we’re already marveling at how listing our blessings reframes our minds and our experiences. The exercise came to us after viewing a simple, yet profound TED Talk by Shawn Achor. Our goal included, as was suggested in the talk, daily exercise, meditation, and random acts of kindness. It’s truly amazing how good you feel when you bring these activities into your daily life conciously. It’s not always “easy”, but when one makes time for these simple acts it’s just pure awesomeness that comes forth.

Print by The Small Object

Reflecting on our gratitude takes such a small amount of time + yet gives us the HUGE gift of redirecting our thoughts and truly, our lives towards positivity. It allows us to focus on what is good and right with the world around us and how we can make it better. The alternative is too bicker and complain about what is lacking. In each moment, the choice is ours.

As for exercise, we’ve taken time for  long walks throughout the city. Yesterday we walked through City Park. If you know Denver, you know how lovely City Park can be, even in the half melted winter snow. We enjoyed the hint of spring in the air, the funny behaviors of curious geese, + the unique assortment of civil war canons and statues – which include the audio tour of the central Martin Luther King monument and, in the distance, standing by himself is Robert  Burns. What do Scottish poets, Civil Rights figures and weapons of 19th century war have in common? We have no idea, but we’re glad they’re there just the same.

What should that fun random act of kindness be for today? It’s a powerful thing to add to your to-do list.

Ciao,

J+L

Our little journal of good vibes – by Sukie (one of Lizzie’s favorite illustrators)