wp fluorescent

fluorescent orange seems to be grabbing my attention everywhere these days, i guess that's what that color is all about. we stumbled upon a great estate sale up in forestville this weekend on our second cabin trip. the woman who owned the house was a bit of a shop-aholic, but the goods weren't what really got me, it was her choice of wallpaper. we walked into the laundry room to find the most perfect paper ever.


the living room and dining room had some pretty good metallics, but my phone didn't capture them very well.


nothing prepared me for the kitchen paper, i was in awe. the estate sale guardian couldn't believe how excited i was and that i wanted a photo of these chickens and roosters. they are now wallpapered on my phone.



i did end up with a $6 food processor (a sunbeam oskar!) , some old sunset magazine cookbooks, and a gorgeous vera scarf which kept my greasy locks covered for the duration. to get the goods for $5 along a viewing of this papered home was heaven. i wanted to go back on sunday but we had too much to do.

uo aa apc

i know it's cool to hate urban outfitters, just like it's cool to hate american apparel. i guess it's even cooler to hate them when you're kicking it in your aa t shirt and uo knee highs. i like them and i don't care. uo is selling an exclusive collection of alexander girard items and i think that's pretty cool. american apparel is selling expensive t shirts and pant suits. apc is having a sale that starts at 11 am on my 40th birthday. the russian dress is on sale.

farm

i met leigh at the mid-week noe valley farmer's market this afternoon. i needed some fresh items, but this farmer's market is just as much of a rip off and disappointment at the saturday market on 24th street. i got a few things -- green garlic, little gems lettuce, yellow nectarines and a small bag of cherries (like 25 cherries for $3.50... um, no). but now that i'm home making a fruit tart and freshening up some frozen tomato sauce with the green garlic, i'm glad i went. i have been thinking about the first harvest at thewhofarm today. wonder what they harvested.

pacific

we did a lot of shopping for the cabin this weekend. saturday we hit ikea for the second time in three weeks, which is pretty scary. no melt downs either. we got some bedding for the day bed so tricia has a cozy comforter to sleep under this weekend when she comes up. al got the black wardrobe he wanted, but we did not get the yellow sideboard. today we met tony up at heath ceramics and found this gorgeous pacific blue tile. we got a box of 3 x 9 and a box of 2 3/4 x 3 to tile behind the wood burning stove. this is the color we both really wanted, and we got the only two boxes in stock. tricia and i have a date planned for sunday and tony might come up to help al set the tile that day, so i'll miss it, but the space won't really allow for more than two people working anyway. i guess it's ok, tony knows what he's doing. now i'll to create a mock up so we can figure out the pattern.

pre b

last night al and i wandered into cary lane for the first time. we were just wasting time, enjoying some window shopping before dinner at broken record. it's probably a good thing we hadn't gone in before because i was loving too much right away. i found a sweet little blue jacket that i'm quite tempted to go back for, but it's pretty pricey. i did end up walking out with this pair of Jean-Michel Cazabat Luxury Rebel boots. i love the creamy color and they are the softest leather. the best part is the dusty rose leather lining inside. well one of the best parts, the other best part is the snap closure in the back. they are an early birthday present to myself. i'm off to a spa now, another early birthday present courtesy of sarah. i'll ponder the jacket while i have a massage. i feel like i'm some rich housewife, but i'm neither rich nor married.

fish 'n glass

up at the cabin last weekend al speared the biggest ling cod in his diving history. it was the ugliest things i'd ever seen, julia agreed. last night we cooked up some greasy fish 'n chips! we fried the fries, battered the fish, cut up some red onions for the remaining batter and waited in anticipation for it all to be ready. during the last batch of fish frying, which contained the prized cheeks, al noticed something funky in the water. the thermometer had broken during that batch and we had to toss the fish. i almost cried. we sat down to a large batch of fries and three pieces of fish. no onion rings. no cheek. no thermometer.

landing

we're here and we can't believe what the young's left behind for us. we knew they were leaving their furniture, but we found they also left their tv (and there is cable somehow), sheets, towels, blankets, dish towels, some kitchen essentials and their coffee pot. we unpacked most of the things we brought, i just need to get into my kitchen boxes today and figure out how i want to set up the cabinets. there is a fire going, al just left for a dive, i've got the shout out louds going and it's time to get prepped for some cookie baking. i'll head out to the yard later to weed a little bit and cut some wild strawberries. i brought the ice cream maker up here because there is actually room in the freezer here. i want some lemon verbena to make up a batch. too bad al took my car and it's a bit far to walk anywhere. we need a bike up here. maybe i can convince al to bring up one of the 5 in our garage at home. no rain, but it's a bit cloudy. we still feel like we're in a weekend rental. oh, and obviously we snaked onto someone's wireless. that means i can study up here!

closed

pine paneling here we come! we are heading up to the cabin today around noon (maybe after scoping out a great looking estate sale). my car is jam packed with stuff, and it doesn't even have any of the furniture we want to take up. we've got to borrow david's truck in a few weeks for that load. boy do i wish our kitchen looked like this, alas it's mostly white cabinets and a light counter top, but we've got some plans for improvement. i'll document all the updates and changes as they happen, our goal is to get a lot of color into the now very beige space. this kitchen belongs to the lucky marusica, and i do love her style. the only similarity we have is the electric stove, which is not going to be an easy transition after cooking on the wedgewood. we need to add propane to the house and get a gas stove in asap. it looks like rain up there, but i've got plenty to do inside. al plans on diving, but we'll see if that happens.

feeling blue

with the cabin supposedly closing today, i decided to make a little treat for albert using some puff pastry & berries that need to be eaten. i chose a small egg from the farmer's market for glossing, it just seemed too small for breakfast. this little baby is blue! and i mean little, just over an inch and a half in length.

flourescent

this cover really knocked me out. fluorescent orange title? i love you gourmet. and that raspberry buttermilk cakes kicks ass.

naps

i've found some great vintage napkins at estate sales, these birds are my favorite. i thought i might try to use cloth napkins at my upcoming party, but i don't have enough. i tried cutting some vintage fabric with pinking shears, but the fabric still came apart. then i remembered i had these bird and shell napkins. i didn't think those two packages would be quite enough so i found a few more on etsy. i tried to coordinate the colors, but it was hard, and i couldn't pass up these cable car napkins.
in other news, the upgrade to leopard went terribly wrong and resulted in me freaking out for about 7 hours, lots of tears and major stress. thanks to aimee it's all fixed. the cabin isn't closing today like we thought so we have to spend the night in this dumb ole house. so today i decided to treat myself to arizmendi and we might go play bingo at st. paul's tonight, it just depends on the roast's schedule, al is cooking.

lucky

we went to a couple of estate sales this weekend and i ended up with a few new small items, all of them black. without me seeing al purchased some japanese opera glasses. i've been wanting some for a few years and these were in good condition and cheap. i found a cute old stationery set, and this gorgeous johannes itten book called the elements of color. it's really clean and looks like it was rarely opened. it reminds me of the color theory we did back in college, huge color charts painstakingly painted 1 square inch at a time. everyone sweated those, usually for several all niters. i'll read this one up at the cabin.
i'm procrastinating but now i guess i'll upgrade to leopard. i'm trying to thwart unexpected disasters which i'm expecting.

want

this house has so many great things in it, i wish our cabin could look like this. we'll definitely be replacing a lot of the furniture the current owners are leaving behind for us, so we have plenty of time to find the perfect pieces. i'd love an old bed like this, but i bet we can't find a queen size from the 50s. i also really think we should have some fish on the walls. maybe one fish is enough, but i'm going to find it out there somewhere. i'm excited to bring out my chenille yellow bedspread, it doesn't quite fit the bed or decor in this house, but it will be great up there. it's really similar to this one, but sunny yellow. hmm...more yellow.

tiles

today al said he wanted to put heath tiles behind the wood burning stove at the cabin. he hadn't seen my post about this very idea from earlier this month. our stove is black and the wall behind is stark white, we can't remember what it is. i'm thinking we should create the opposite of the image in my post, black stove, teal tiles? we're placing a large orange rug in that room so i don't think orange would work. yellow or pale green would just blend in with the pine walls. but this yellow is pretty sweet. am i developing a thing for yellow?

furnished

al and i spent a good part of the weekend talking about cabin furniture, what we could take up now (like an air mattress) and what we need to buy first (a sofa bed). i've been wanting this yellow sideboard from ikea for a while, but i don't know if i can talk al into it. i could deal with the black version of the cabinet if it was my only choice. we did find some things at jen and cristal's garage sale, and a few things at an estate sale, but nothing large as we don't really have room to store it here at this house. al called me this morning to let me know the sellers would like to leave all their furniture in the cabin, except a few frying pans!! everything is extremely "beige" but we can't believe the windfall, we don't have to buy a thing until we're ready and we won't have to take up an air mattress. now i really think that yellow sideboard could spice things up.

cabby

the cabin inspection went off without a hitch and we are moving forward. well, al is. we are taking mom & dad up tomorrow to check it out, and it will be just the second time i've seen it myself. our plan is to get the sofa bed first, take some random pieces of furniture and the air mattress up for now, and slowly buy stuff as we can. hopefully we can score at estate sales, which we need to get back into our schedule. time for some russian river vacations! we can't wait.

d grind

everyone is gone and it's back to work for me. we had a great time, but didn't take many photos. here dad is checking out an old wagon we saw up near heath/fish. we had a great time but all sort of got the cold that mom ended up with (for mother's day no less!). i'm feeling rough and canceled my library shift today. al is up north doing the cabin inspection right now. then we'll know if it's really going through! i just heard a string of email come in, time to get back to it.

cyclo

after i grabbed everyone from the airport yesterday we took a drive out to cheap pete's to pick up the game fish cyclopedia. it's quite massive and there is really only one wall in the entire house it will fit on unless we hang it in the really dark hallway. the bamboo frame looks amazing and it's really impressive on the wall. it's hanging too high now, needs to come down about a foot, but we needed a safe place for it to rest and we had a nail in the wall already. once al got home we took off for some dinner at pot de pho, then headed to north beach for some dessert at stella pastry & cafe. we dropped the family off at their hotel and al and i came home to look at furniture on craigs list and ikea.


i hope to go grab this quartite creative corp lamp after we eat some breakfast, visit the de young, and stroll over to the rose garden in golden gate park. there is a great looking estate sale today, i hope i can talk them into going.

sleepy

aurin, mom & dad arrive today at noon and i couldn't sleep this morning thinking of what i want to get done and what i need to get done before heading to sfo. also, word is the cabin is almost ours so i've been thinking of what we already own vs. what we have to buy and started a spreadsheet to track it all. i've also been looking at different treatments of rooms with wood paneled walls and found some really gorgeous stuff. time to hit the estate sales hard.


our paint by number clipper ship will probably have to move up north.

cabin fever take 2

i tagged along with al to the golden gate park casting pools this week. he practices there using his vintage fenwick fiberglass rod, scored at an estate sale. i usually take a book and sit on a bench while he casts, but this time i got a few photos of the anglers club because the light was nice and everything is in bloom. this club must have some pull because it's one of the nicest city maintained buildings in the park. i find it really charming and wish he would join the club so i can get inside. it was built on feb. 22, 1938 A.D. according to the front door plaque.


it reminds me of the cabin we saw up at russian river saturday. we have high hopes.