Never sewed nor had a lesson in my life, but watching my mom for years must have paid off! I just saved this robe and another similar one from the dustbin since the belts were hanging on by only a few threads on one side. A guest dog a year or two ago had gotten to both belts and chewed three holes in them so that pulling them through the loops became an increasing challenge. Shando was impressed with the tenacity of my work (perhaps not aesthetically) and could not believe it was my first time sewing and threading a needle. Unlike him, I never took a Home-Ec class. 🙂

I needed something to pop for a bed cover. I liked the red warm blanket contrasting the blue headboard and the green wall, but it was not quite big enough. After years of owning this same bed, I’ve come to the realization that it must be a California King and not just a King because King-sized blankets never fit well enough. I bought this paisley California king cover and it’s bright enough, but the pattern isn’t as visible as I had imagined it would be from afar. At least it fits and I like the material, and it goes pretty well with the matching lamps that I now have in the bedroom. None of the variety of reds was close enough to the red color of the warm blanket we have here, so I decided to go in another direction.

Previously I had some desk lamps that looked like they belonged in an office. They matched, which I think is important for both nightstands, but these cheap-looking “Tiffany-style” lamps made of plastic are a little more colorful and fit better in the bedroom. The REAL fake Tiffany-style lamps are in our living room, of which there are now three, and they are much more convincing (and expensive) but nothing near the price that a real Tiffany lamp would cost. At least they’re glass and intricate. The bedroom decor is more fun and utilitarian since so many fewer guests would ever see it anyway.

We only have this bathtub because demolishing it would mean future grandchildren had nowhere to bathe in our house since we have two walk-in showers in the bathrooms now (such a dream). However, this bathtub, as nice as it is with the big window letting natural light in was SCREAMING for something, so I determined it had to be a caddy. I love the way it looks!

Our small bathroom is Parisian-themed in part because I had an Eiffel Tower shower curtain before converting the bathtub into a large walk-in shower. Now that I have an odd number of Eiffel Tower icons, I can put them in one place again!

I’m constantly looking for utilitarian objects to manage our bathroom tools and supplies. Some are more practical than others.

We had a small bridge in this location for a while which the dogs didn’t really use much and which was hard to see. It also only took like one step for a human. This new bridge feature may be redundant, but it looks great and will contribute to the continuity of the paths that we have in our uniquely shaped garden. The guardrails are actually high enough for a human and it makes a great transitional piece that fits with our decor, as far as I’m concerned.

To his credit, Shando put it together himself in our garage. He never looks forward to these kinds of projects and when we first placed it in this spot it was dusk, so he was skeptical that it would work. We had to jerryrig one side of it to keep it balanced, but in the daylight, despite the rain, we both love it.

The smaller bridge that we used to have is now up in the tiers and will used exclusively for dogs!

For perspective, you can see BOTH bridges here:

This is a combination of all other areas of the house that I didn’t spend too much time redecorating, but I still want to memorialize the updates just the same.