This is where a little boredom and a lot of spray paint will get you.
Problem: A boring ol' terracotta pot, the kind you get from Home Depot for like $7.
I'm tired of seeing my plants in these pots, so I decided to play around and give it an update based on my last experiment with leftover bottles.
Given a free afternoon and some leftover spray paint, here's what I did. First, a coat of white spray paint. Then some painter's tape and some sides to an old audition to create some diagnoal stripes:
And a few swipes with my beloved gold Rust-o-leum spray paint...
Peel off the tape and voila! A brighter, more modern pot!
A few weeks ago I made a weekend trip out to Portland, where I caught a case of terrariumania. Nothing like a dose of the lush Pacific Northwest to appreciate living on the West Coast. Seriously! Just a short two hour flight away from this...
...is this:
My gal pals...
Goonies! This is the beach in Astoria where they shot that final scene when the Goonies and the Fratellis escape the pirate cove to be reunited with their parents and the cops.
Starfish!
...and introducing the best Frenchie in the world, aka Mr. Tobias Funke.
There was a 30-minute hike to get between parking and the beach, and we found some wild sorrel along the way...
Just to give some perspective...them trees is HUGE!
Foraging for wild sorrel...
...which was later used for a delicious home-cooked dinner:
Small details in a house make it a home. I'd much rather have a half-designed home full of little personal objects that have stories and meaning to them than in a "finished" house full of off-the-shelf decor bought at Pottery Barn.
I'm a sucker for fresh flowers.
These are from the Larchmont Farmer's Market, bought for me by Alex. And the jewelry hook thing is a gift from my friend's trip to India. The hanging aortic heart is a thank you gift from my childhood friend.
I love a good bedside table.
The glazed ceramic bowl is a wedding gift from a friend. And the succulent I got at the Rose Bowl, then planted in a vintage Japanese tea cup for our wedding.
I've since changed these curtains that were bugging me so much, but the garden view is what I love. I inherited the purple and white flowers from our previous tenant, and I love that they face the bedroom window.
This is the kind of view I never had in New York City. My apartments usually had prime views of a brick wall or maybe a window where I could see my neighbor going number 2.
The Chanel No. 5, a gift from my dad. I think he learned long ago from my mom that you can never go wrong with giving her a new bottle of No. 5, and he's since passed that wisdom down to me. The pearls, a gift from my mother-in-law, passed down from Alex's grandmother.
The rabbit dish, an engagement gift from my producer and good friend, Angela. It incongruously showed up as a prop in the movie Looper. The watch, an engagement gift from my parents, with a matching one to Alex. And the rings, they were from Pottery Barn, of course.
I kid!
Lastly, this guy makes all the difference in our home. It's like rooming with a miniature friendly lion.
On a weekend trip to Portland, my friend brought me to what probably only could exist in Portlandia...a terrarium emporium!
Okay, it wasn't called that, but it was basically a store made up entirely of terrariums (terraria?) and their components. I didn't wanna be hauling any sand or glass vases onto the plane back home to LA, but it was enough to inspire me to use up some of the empty glass vases we have at home, as well as the succulents that are growing freely in our front yard. Yes, terrariums are played out, and yes they are to me on the same level of http://fuckyournoguchicoffeetable.tumblr.com/. But oh well, I like 'em (just like I like my Noguchi).
First, I gathered the materials and set up shop in my garden...
Bags of sand and white rock, glass containers, different succulents from the yard and my favorite gardening store Rolling Greens, plus some reindeer moss to top it off. I chose this guy from the store...
And this juicy looking fella was from my yard ...
My first try was with this long glass vase that the previous tenant had left behind. A layer of white rock on the bottom for drainage, some dirt for the succulents to take root, and a top layer of sand. I didn't have charcoal, which normally you would use to soak up some of the moisture. But I'm hoping the drainage rocks at the bottom and LA's dry weather will work.
After some meticulous work with chopsticks, I got those suckers into the sand. Alex said that if was a scene in a movie and they had my character using chopsticks to plant the terrarium, he'd be like, "Oh, come on!" But it was true.
Here's another bigger one I messed with. It's a little messy, but I still like it.
The shell is from the beach in Anguilla, where we went on our honeymoon.
And lastly, I made a gift for our friends Lynn and Abe, who had us over for vegan enchiladas and a night of Electric Dreams and video watching. I've had Taylor Swift sans goat stuck in my head ever since.
mmmmm...enchiladas!
My little terrarium even got a mention on Lynn's food blog! I'm so proud of that guy. One day they're in the nursery and the next they're all grown up and being featured on blogs. Ba dum bump! Jokes!
On my solo morning walk today, I snapped some pics of Reasons Why LA Is Prettier Than Strip Malls. These little tidbits from our Hancock Park neighbors' homes and nests make me totally envious happy. Luckily, nobody called ADT on me, the creep stalking about with my iPhone camera.
Why have fences when you can have a wall of climbing roses?
God, could this beautiful house be any more English Tudor gorgeous? Just a minute, let Carson fetch my finest barfing urn so I can throw up how much envy I have.
I mean, seriously? Are garden gnomes doing their bidding? Look at those luscious flowers!
Succulent succulents
I remember buying birds of paradise from the bodega in NYC for like $10 a stem. Here they are, in their natural environment, growing by the dozens.
I just want to take off my shoes and sink my toes into this lush grass! It's very Alice in Wonderland.
One day, I would like the option to plant an entire front yard of succulents.
Forget Trader Joe's, I'm getting all my rosemary from this yard from now on!
I love the varying shades of pink here. Much like how I used to match red with pink in 7th grade.
Sometimes I just have too much time on my hands. Last weekend I was spray painting some frames, so I thought I'd play with an empty Calvados liquor bottle I had lying around from an Apple party (Apple TV +Apple liquor + Apples to Apples = NONTSTOP FUN) a few weeks back.
The original bottle looked something like this:
I washed out the bottle and removed the label, then spray painted it all white. After it dried, I covered half with painters tape, and sprayed the bottom half gold:
Let that dry, then removed the tape. Ta da!
A single flower vase repurposed from an old liquor bottle!
My inspiration was this Nate Berkus for Target bowl:
Less gloss, but free and a fun random project. And now I have a skinny vase, to match my cocaine and speed salt and pepper shakers.
