Embrace the Camera with the Anderson Crew

Today is my first day

to
Embrace the Camera 
with the Anderson Crew.

What fun this is!

This picture of Calli and I was captured on the Iron Horse bike trail.

I took it (well I didn't take it), my friend Cynthia took it just moments after I finished the fall decorating projects that you read about Monday and Tuesday.

I hope you read about them.

Someone did.

Anyways, it was a lovely day for Calli and I.
Our boys were gone.

They were busy working on the Annual Woodchopping Trip to the Grandparents.

The sons and grandsons travel up every year on Grandma "G"s birthday to get them all 

set up for winter with firewood and a party at Chevy's for Grandma.

It's a wonderful event that we all look forward to every year and

since this year, we girls couldn't make it, we tried our best

to pack in a bunch of fun girl time.

It began by sleeping in, OOPS sorry chickens (usually Jake lets them out), 

to rushing over to Calli's very first pet sitting job for Carol, my SuperFunFriend from

6 girls 3 boys, so far...

After loving on Broddie and Willis

the sweet little dogs

we got coffee at our new Peet's in town,

then we cruised the Farmer's Market

and bumped into our good friends there.

After that we took a quick walk down to Gardenseed, 

probably our favorite shop on earth,

to buy a gift for Carol who had her birthday

earlier in the week.

We were so happy because months before Calli & I found this item
that made us think of her immediately.
Something that spoke to the seamstress talent in her that
we admire.
We went back to it and lo and behold-
it was STILL there, as if little shopping fairies were
saving it for Carol.

Well Gardenseed is right around the corner from Edge

so we popped in there for peek at all the new Fall offerings.

And we can't go to Edge without visiting our friend Missy at Twigss

Floral Studio next door, 

but OH sad, she was closed.
She was probably delivering gorgeous arrangements to some 
fabulous wedding or party.

So to cheer ourselves up we went next door to Twigss,

which is my favorite little shoe store Tootsies,

and they were having a $20 sale.
That cheered us up.

This was probably a perfect day!

I found a pair of zebra and black leather wedges, 

all funky and strappy

for $20!
Yes a perfect day, except we were just getting started.

We returned home with tomatoes, gift and wedges, but instead of making lunch, 

we made fall decorating projects.

I finished up the entry way.

Calli made a bouquet.

Then we found ourselves on the bike trail.

We love to ride our cruisers down the trail, especially this time of day, this time of year.

I do my running on this very trail and have some of my best talks with

God on this very pavement.

However,

we weren't doing any of that this time.

We were making a movie!

Aren't we faaaaaaabulous?!

Actually no.

Jake,

my son,

who is ultra creative and amazing,

(much more about him coming in the near future)

is part of a student film production company

called 

"Soda Jerk Productions".

They were filming a scene for their Hitchcock style film.

So that's what Calli and I were doing.

Taking pictures of them filming.

On the bike trail.

But then,

we went to another film location, then

raced home so that

six sweet girls from Calli's 

Thursday night group

could come over for a sleepover.

Hide and seek in the dark,

dancing with the strobe light on
"I throw my hands up in the air sometimes",

manicures and pedicures,

and a whole host of silliness filled our evening.

The neighborhood gangsters, 
I mean the raccoons, (is there a difference?)

 even made an appearance

to the delight and terror of the girls

who had just snuggled in for the night.

Calli and I really packed in a ton of fun

in one day

but with all the awesome things

going on around us,

this is the only picture we got!

Well there were some in the car but we took them ourselves so someone's always squished out of the frame, usually Calli, so it leaves me looking huge, and who wants to see

pictures of mother and daughters 
waiting in the car 
with huge heads anyway? 

So.

This is the only picture we got!

Thanks Cynthia!
Thanks Anderson Crew for prompting us to take more pictures!

A.B.C.

"A" is for Autumn

"B" is for Boa's

"C" is for Chandeliers

and 

Chandeliers are for Decorating!!!

So I have me one of these!

Which I love.

Believe it or not,

it was a hand-me-down!

When my friend bought her home in Marin, this beauty was hanging in her dining room. The only problem was that her dining room was not much bigger than my entry way and had a low ceiling. It basically took over the whole space. So this beauty made a trip across the bay and moved in with us. It was so appreciated because it replaced a hideous, with a capital "H", chandelier from the 80's that belonged in a bin with acid wash jeans, stirrup pants, and troll dolls. Whoa, I got off track there.

Anyways.

It was just an ordinary, beautiful, eight arm chandelier in an entry way.

A long time ago I decided that it was not just an object of beauty, but it was a platform for decorating. It was possible for it to be even more beautiful, and it was my duty (code "pleasure") to make it so.

I had been to Gardenseed in downtown Danville and was inspired. If you have never had the treat of meandering through this store, then you are missing out on one of the Bay Area's best kept secrets.

Anyways, I could go on and rave about this place but I think I'll save some of my raving for another post. The gist of my decorating story is that there are chandeliers dangling down from every possible spot on their ceiling. Each one is adorned and decorating to the hilt. So as I admired them in all their splendor, I decided most emphatically that chandeliers were decorators dreams and few crazy souls would take the opportunity to explore this.

So I decorated mine for a wedding shower I threw my best friend several years ago and I never took down the paper petal garland or brown satin ribbon. It's funky, frilly, feminine and fresh. I never tire of it. I love the chandelier so much more with this soft, full, and tactile embellishment that I just continue to work around it.

So here's something funny!

It's October, that spooky time of year, when decorating gets dark and creepy.

That's not decor. That's dust! Keepin' it real.

Could leave it and call it Fall decorating.

Pretty amazed at how cool and creepy my dust looks. I thought I'd share it with you. I told my blogging audience in the beginning that I am not a perfectionist and here's a visual on that. I better get back on track.

Enter story,

a trip to Richard's, my favorite craft store,

mainly because it's about 4 minutes from my digs,

it has the Ribbon Wall that I'm in love with,

there's a coffee shop almost right next door

(what's not to love?)

and I picked up a few things.

So another thing about myself. 

I hope I don't offend anyone out there, but I'm keepin' it real.

I really don't like Halloween. I don't like scary things. I don't like spooky things. I don't like creepy things. 

I do love October, pumpkins, orange and black, and decorating with all my neighbors, so here's what I came up with for some fall fun without the dark death factor.

It's still a work in progress. I feel like it needs some roundness and oomph on the candle sticks so hang with me and we'll see how it evolves. I must do it quick though because I'll need to change it all up for Thanksgiving. 

If anyone is interested in how this happened, here's a quick sloppy tutorial on the madness that whipped up this big mess of Octoberness.

First the wired netting material. You just bunch it up, finesse it, and twist it. When you get the body you want, pinch tie it together with orange pipe cleaners. The pipe cleaners work splendidly and are easy to remove later too.

It's a lot like T.P.ing (although I never really did that because I was always too scared of getting in trouble and remember I don't like "scary" things). I took this pic so you could see how much I was working with. The netting came in a 10' roll. Just drape it and weave it through the chandelier finessing until you are happy with the look.

I know it's blurry. It was a cloudy dark day that I did this, I just wanted you to know that I was working with it in one looooooong roll.

Once I got it all up there I decided I had enough to add a second ring. I'm glad I added it because with one it seemed a little flat. By the second ring I figured out what I was doing.

Once I got all of that up I decided to work in the black (not blue like they look in that picture) silk flowers.

Now these were a compromise, I wanted black silk roses, but they were pretty pricey and I needed eight. So I picked out these guys which were like $1.50 a piece, and I bought three. They definitely are NOT silk. Crappy polyester maybe. Super cheap and they look even cheaper, so I decided to spruce them up a bit. I knew that I had some orange spray paint in the garage. TrueLove dug it up. 

Here's what we got.

So pretty. And so fun. I have to say that even though it's toxic and torturous to smell, it's so intoxicatingly fun to wave around a hissing can of spray paint. Fuuuuuunnnn!

In 10minutes they were dry. I cut each one into three parts. I grabbed a bit of the black tulle ribbon, black pipecleaners, and turned the pieces into little "nosegays"? Really tiny ones.

All I did was simply take the tulle and tie a knot around the bottom of the floral bit. Then the tails that were left I drew up behind the twigs. Once I had what I liked, I climbed back up the ladder and fixed them to the front of the candle arms, attaching with black pipe cleaner.

Once those were all in place and TrueLove had found the box in the garage with all of last years' embellishments ( I love him so much! and not just because he finds things), I dug out the black feather boas and got busy attaching them with black pipe cleaners to the bottom of the little floral bunches. I just let them hang like weird fluffy tails. Then I took what was left and tried to cover the brass body of the chandelier.

I had some black feathers left over from last year that I poked into the florals so they would fan out. That was fun. They just stuck right in.

While I was up there I tucked in all the brown ribbon and paper petals. I just tucked them into the arms to clean up the profile a little bit.

Today this baby is showing off it's feathers at It's a Blog Party.

Overall, I'm pleased. 

Again, I think the candles need a little more body. I'd love to put black crows on each one but honestly I won't spend the money for them. Little black skulls would be great but I hate them. So stick with me and I'll see if I can find the right thing to finish it off. This trip to Richard's cost me $39, well I did get a few other things- striped candles for some table scapes-little orange lights, etc, but honestly I don't want to spend another penny on something so temporary. 

Even if all the Halloween stuff is 50% off.

So I'm creative, I'll think of something. I'll keep you posted.

Wow! Now I'm depressed. I could have saved myself thirty-nine bucks by going with the natural, creepy, dust theme.

Oh well.