Recently, I was asked to share with you the new line that Cortney and Robert Novogratz created for CB2.  Have you seen it yet?  Inspired by their family trips to Brazil, the furnishings are infused with a playful mix of bold color and modern style.

CB2 and Novogratz Collection

To me, one of the most impressive parts of the Novogratz story is that not only are they talented designers who have been working together for over twenty years, but they are also mom and dad to seven… yes, seven… kiddos.

Let that sink in for just a minute.

I have worked professionally with my husband for two years and I can completely relate to the fun and occasional challenge that arises from combining business and marriage.  Being parents to two, our plate feels VERY full.  However, if we added five more kids to the mix, our household would be off the charts.

But Cortney and Robert have been able to balance running a successful design studio and having a big, busy family.  The proof is in their latest line for CB2.

Some of my favorite pieces include:

Luli Table Lamp

This white ceramic monkey is whimsical and combined with the simplicity of the grey lampshade, it would make a perfect addition to our daughter’s bedroom.

Botao Stripe Armless Sectional Chair

I’m a sucker for a stripe and this color combination is super versatile.  This chair is a more sophisticated update to the one Tess already has and I also love it in the grey or violet versions.  Either would be amazing in her room!

The Boa Sorte Backgammon Set

I had to include this since I grew up playing backgammon with my family.  Frankly, we are competitive and cutthroat.  That’s why it made total sense for me to try to teach Tyson how to play on our honeymoon.  It didn’t go well.  Thankfully, he decided to stay married to me.  We haven’t played again since, but this would be a great set for my brother.

I highly recommend checking out the new CB2 line by Novogratz.  And for additional fun, CB2 is hosting a sweepstakes.

The details for your chance to win:

-      You and 3 friends could win the trip of a lifetime! Win a one week stay at the vacation home of CB2 collaborators Bob and Courtney Novogratz in beautiful Trancoso, Brazil.*

-      
10 other lucky winners will receive a CB2 giftcard worth $100 along with a personally signed copy of the book “Home by Novogratz”.

-      To Enter click the link:  CB2 and Novogratz Brasil Sweepstakes  Sweepstakes to run from May 2nd through June 3rd.

What are your favorites from the new CB2 line?  Let’s be honest… how great would it be to win a trip to Brazil? And get to stay at the Novogratz vacation home?! And maybe even take your favorite blogger along with you?!!

Okay… just kidding on that last one.  Just a little…

So I started taking note of things that caught my eye to share with you here.  A couple of items I purchased, but most of them are now on my IKEA Wish List.

Heart Shaped Ice Tray

My friend, Alex at Northstory does amazing things with shaped ice trays.  Where I think “just add water”, she sees the possibilities of so much more.  You can see some of her fun ideas here and here.  For .99 cents, I knew it was time to take a page from Alex’s playbook pick up this little heart ice tray.

Cute Daisies

I mentioned in my Mother’s Day post that I love the simple elegance of daisies.  I even keep some permanently in my workroom.  However, these guys are the perfect size for a small vase and at $1.49, they make an easy home accent.

Springform Pan

This is one of the items I truly regret not getting.  This springform pan has heart shape embellishments on the bottom and it has an insert to easily convert it into a bundt pan style.  2 for 1 and all my future Picaken problems would be solved.

Plants & Lace Pots

I passed these up the first time I saw them in the store, but when I hit the second display, I knew they would come home with me.  There’s something about the lace like trim and the playful little leaves that I love. I’m not sure where in our home this set will end up, but everywhere I place it, it just makes me smile.

Bedspread & Cushion Covers

I love grey and red together so when I came across a display of this red bedspread set next to the same set in grey, they immediately caught my eye.  If we were in the market to replace our summer coverlet in our Master Bedroom, I think this would be the perfect option.  It’s understated by being just one color, but the decorative stitching keeps it from being boring.

Akerkulla Fabric

If I hadn’t already done Tessa’s desk chair in IKEA’s Janette fabric, Akerkulla would be my fabric of choice.  I really like the playfulness of the pattern and the simple grey color allows the pattern to be the star of the show.

Leather Chair

I SO wanted this YSTAD chair to come home with me.  It would be perfect for the family room.  Not too big, not too small, just right!  It was in their “As Is” section and marked down to $450.00.  Someone in Portland has a great new chair.

Mini Globe Lights

This little impulse buy has left my family asking “what’s up with that?”  I thought they’d be cute out on the patio table when we BBQ this summer.  I picked up the aqua colored ones and they look like little eggs (or aliens… I can’t decide) next to our owl candle holder.

Have you had any success during a recent trip to IKEA?  Do you get sucked in by the wonders of their store?  See anything here that you would add to your IKEA wish list? Let me know which are your favorites or something that you might already own.

The Fine Print:  This is NOT a sponsored post.  I’m just a girl sharing her infatuation with swedish home furnishings.

However, when she passed away several years ago, my mom came across all of her recipes.  Many of them were torn from newspapers and magazines, but my favorites were those that she took time to write out in her beautiful handwriting.  I made sure to get copies of those for my own little collection.

Speaking of my own collection… frankly, it’s a hot mess.

I keep my cookbooks to a minimum, but I continually find myself collecting recipes that girlfriends have emailed me or items from Food Magazine that look SO amazing.  But these clippings don’t really fit in a traditional recipe box.  They are starting to take on a life of their own and it’s time to wrangle them in.

Last week, I made a trip to IKEA to pick up a set of their KNUFF boxes.  I searched several craft stores and container supply and there’s nothing truly like the KNUFF containers.  They come in sets of two for $9.99.  They are sturdy and (my favorite) customizable.

Before I could prime the box, I taped off the interior.  I like the natural wood finish for the inside, but I have something unique planned for the exterior.

In my prep, I was sure to cover the holes too.

 Once everything was taped up, it was time to prime.

Then came a few light coats of black spray paint.

For the next part of this project, I color copied one of my grandmother’s recipes.  My plan is to create a decorative border from the antiqued cards that are in my grandmother’s handwriting.  Of course, I didn’t want to destroy any of her original recipe cards and they copied beautifully onto a heavy card stock.  I also picked up Washi Tape and these decorative frames.

Before applying my copied recipe cards, I marked a 1.25 inch guideline around the bottom of the KNUFF box.

I then applied the copied recipe cards with Mod Podge and sealed the whole box off with a top coat.

Using leftover chalkboard labels and my chalk marker, I was able to make a title card for the inside of the wood frame.

I love having a larger box to put all me random recipes in… one that can stand up easily next to my cookbooks.  Tyson loves that life is a little more organized in our home.

Do you have a special memory of your grandparents that makes you smile? What about a family recipe that has been passed down through the years?  How do you contain recipe clutter?

This project was made with love and is being included in Victoria Elizabeth Barnes‘ link-up party.  To check out all the other well loved projects or to share your own, you can visit Victoria’s site here.

But trust me… I normally want the parade.

However, that’s not to say that I don’t have some picks that would brighten someone’s day.  I think these are some sweet little ways to pamper mom and they’d also be nice for a friend, neighbor or even teacher appreciation.

Dove Sea Salt Caramel Dark Chocolate.

Honestly, I picked these up because they matched my table decor perfectly, but they did not disappoint.  You’ve got sea salt, caramel, AND dark chocolate… what’s not to love?! Fair warning: my family who typically turns down the sea salt and dark chocolate combo devoured these.

Archer Farms Shortbread Cookies.

These little treats are courtesy of Target and they are A-MAH-ZING.  They are buttery, sugar goodness looking like an innocent cookie.  A little strawberries and cream and they would be the most divine mini-strawberry shortcakes EVER.

Daisies.

Flowers are always a safe bet for Mother’s Day, but I love daisies for their simple elegance.

Cute Napkins

Decorative napkins are always a fun and practical way to dress up a meal together.

Homemade Breakfast

Nothing says “I love you” like cooking for me.  Tess has been making this Easy French Toast since she got The Gourmet Cookbook for Christmas.  It’s so delicious!  Also, this recipe can be made ahead of time… even the night before.  Then while it’s cooking, you can really impress by making homemade syrup (from the same cookbook).  It will blow your mama’s mind!

Happy Mother’s Day to all the mom’s in my life!

To my own mom,

To my sister-in-law, mother-in-law, step mother-in-law, cousin-in-law and aunt,

To my California moms,

To my Oregon moms,

To my blogger moms,

And to all the sweet gals (moms or not) who pour into my kids and make-up for my own shortcomings as a mom.  I’m not going to say “it takes a village”… only that I am forever thankful for your presence in their lives.

Have a great day, ladies!

**The Gourmet Cookbook is an Amazon Affiliate link and has been provided for your additional information.

Welcome to my home, to my life and to this blog.

It was the very beginning of EVERYTHING and I wasn’t sure if I could even write a blog let alone get this one word looking right.  I was pleased that it looked fairly neat and I had another post written.

Fast forward a year plus several months later and that sign still says “Welcome”.  And I’ve been wondering if there’s something more that I can do with it.  So when Young House Love and Bower Power announced that it was time for their Spring Pinterest Challenge, I knew it was time to update my chalkboard.

The Pinterest Challenge this season is hosted again by Sherry Petersik and Katie Bower and this time they are partnering with Emily from Sparkle Meets Pop and Renee of Red Bird Blue.  The goal is to get everyone to put their own unique twist on something that they’ve pinned.

My Inspiration

Dana Tanamachi is hands down one of my favorite artists.  You may have seen her artwork at West Elm or on the cover of Oprah Magazine.  She is a hugely talented hand letter artist and does stunning things with chalk.

Following Dana’s lead, I am combining two popular trends and hoping to create subway art with chalk.

My Pinspiration

There are loads of tutorials on Pinterest of how-to create subway art and chalk lettering.  A few that I referenced were here, here and here.  However, I found My Sweet Savannah’s post to be the most helpful.

I began brainstorming laundry room words: soap, bubbles, clean, iron… you get the idea.

Then I used Adobe Illustrator to help me create a subway art design with those terms. There are a lot of programs online that you can download to use, but since we already own Adobe Illustrator, I went with that.  Sometimes being married to a graphic designer and illustrator has it’s perks.

AI works like several of the online design programs.  It’s a matter of typing in your words, playing with fonts and sizing and moving the words around until you have a layout that you like.  Seriously, I may be married to a graphic designer and illustrator, but I am not one.  I was able to easily figure this out by just playing around to see what happens.

That was the easy step.

This next part would, as my son says, separate the pretenders from the contenders.  That is, I had no idea if I could actually get the chalk lettering down the way I had designed it.

I was hoping to use an image projector to help in this process.  However, once I started pricing them out and realized we were looking at a few hundred dollar investment, I decided I would need to consider other options.

My chalkboard space is 17.5 inches square.  I printed the design off on to two 11 x 17 sheets of paper that I could overlap and leave myself with a half inch border.

You can also take your image file to a local print shop and have it printed on one sheet, but I wanted to see if I could do this challenge completely free and the legal size paper worked.

Once I taped the two sheets together, I rubbed chalk over the entire back of the paper.  I then flipped the design over so that the chalk side was against the chalkboard and taped it down to keep it from shifting.

I was able to carefully trace the outline of the letters to get a copy of my subway art transposed onto the chalkboard.

I then began the process of going over the letters and filling them in… one letter at a time.

At first, I thought all the hand lettering would take forever, but it was oddly therapeutic and went quickly.  I had the added benefit of being able to take the cabinet door off the wall and work on the floor, moving the board all around.

I also used Q-tips and a touch of water to “erase” and clean up any areas that needed a little extra help.

Unfortunately, there is no natural light in our laundry room, so this photo is not ideal.  But I am beyond thrilled with the final artwork.

I still can’t believe it worked the way I had hoped.  Tyson keeps asking if I need to seal it so the image doesn’t get smudged or lost, but I would gladly come up with something new, if the need or inspiration strikes.

Speaking of inspiration… it’s party time.  Time to check out all the great links that are being shared at the Spring Pinterest Challenge.  There is sure to be tons of inspiration and more things to pin.  I’ll be linking up at:

• Young House Love
• Bower Power
• Sparkle Meets Pop
• Red Bird Blue

Have you ever done chalk art or hand lettering?  Are you participating in the Spring Pinterest Challenge? Ever take on a project and wonder if you would find yourself a pretender or a contender?  That kid cracks me up!

For even more inspiration, check out these blogs that I’ll also be sharing this post at: