Come on Baby Relight my Candle!

 I am so lucky to have many taleneted and super creative friends, but the one I'm gonna talk about today is my friend B.J. She is a girl of many talents: She is a well known photographer, amazing stylist and last. but not least, candle maker.



I have mentioned her before, and her candle line, Relight Candles. Before B.J.'s candles, I was lost... Seriously! I love candles, especially good smelling ones, but the good smelling ones always came in ugly jars, so how can you both hide, and smell, a candle at the same time? It's not possible! So I had to display an ugly jar with an ugly decal on it, or go very much "90's" style with pillar candles, but no good scents... See, I really was in a pickle before Relight candles!!

Relight candles are hand poured, 100% soy wax, in vintage glassware.

Each vintage container was specially chosen because of it’s own special beauty and uniqueness.

When you are finished burning the candle, please recycle the glass. Simply wash out in hot, soapy water and reuse. (but never the dishwasher)



 It's fun to shop with B.J., and together we can spend hours in vintage stores, antique stores, and thrift stores! She always run straight towards the home goods section, to search for vintage tumblers/glass ware and planters to make her amazing candles in!



Honestly I don't think she knows LA by neighborhoods, but by thrift stores. She knows about the most absurd little junk shops and "ohhh, I know where that is at, it's right by "John's Junk O'Rama"
She shares my interrest in decorating, clothes, etc. and she has the cutest and best smelling house in Hollywood,  from where she runs her candle business.



My favorite scentse are: Baby Powder, Currant/Fig, Gardenia, Lavender, Orange, Rustic Woods and Vanilla.... Can you smell my house from here?
"snif snif… scratch your monitor and guess the scent" ha ha











Check out her page, buy her candles and before you know it...Your house will smell ALMOST as good as my house, and in a very stylish way!!!

Webpage here: Relight Candles
Etsy page here: Relight Candles on Etsy
Facebook page here:Relight Candles on Facebook.


If you live in SoCal, you can find her at different craft fairs, like: Unique LA/ Unique SaMo, Patchwork Long Beach etc.
Find information on upcoming events on her Facebook page!!!


On another note : I did sell a bunch of my Atomic ranch magazines and made almost $100!!! Wooohoooo

ATOMIC?

Over the last few months, I've turned my home upside down. I've been organizing, and still am, pretty much every inch of my home. Last week I gave myself a challenge: to get rid of 5 items every day for a week… I ended up getting rid of over 100 items in that week. Big or small, didn't matter, just clearing out the clutter… and it feels great!!! One thing I got thinned out in is my stashes of magazines!
Back in 2006, I stumbled over a magazine called "Atomic Ranch". As I opened it, my feet tickled and my palms got sweaty. "What an awesome magazine," I thought to myself, and and I went out of my way trying to find older issues of the magazine. That year for Christmas, I got a subscription from my mother-in-law! (Did I mention that she's awesome, and when she goes antiquing, she keeps an eye open for stuff we like? Yeah, she knows what's up and she rules!)
Back to the magazine: over the years, in my opinion, it's gone downhill, not just a little slide, but rollercoaster-style down.
Now when I open it, I actually get mad and the houses' interiors look like an Ikea catalog with a few vintage items in there, like pottery, a painting and lamps. You see before and after pictures of cool bathrooms and kitchen getting torn down and new blond wood, with shiny new chrome handles getting put in. And at the same time it's all money talk. How they bought this killer 50's/60's house for X $ and gutted it and "renovated it" for a triilion $ and bought a few pieces of  Jacobsen, Miller and Nelson.
A few months ago I wrote about how I can live with a few Ikea items in between, but in my book, having it the other way around… there is nothing "Atomic Age" about that!
Maybe it's just me and my subcultural background, but to me that is cheating. You don't get style with money, and spending lots of money at once is, to me, not collecting. To me collecting means a little at a time. Looking, searching and finding good deals, with time, having a good collection. AND it's not 'cause I'm butt-hurt that I don't have that kind of money and cant do so! I actually enjoy going treasure hunting! Of course I can dream up an awesome house filled with perfect things, no problem, but why take the cool out of COOLecting!
So I have a stack of Atomic Ranch magazines lying around, so I think I'm gonna try to sell them on eBay and maybe make some pocket shopping money on them, and I can get something cool for my house instead… Wish me luck!!!

Check out Atomic Ranch magazine here

Last Christmas

Ohhh yes, June is around the corner, but I'm thinking about Christmas. Christmas has always been my favorite Holiday. I'm an early bird when it comes to decorating my house… not in June, hahaha, but around Nov 24th I put up sooooo many decorations… and I want it there for at least one month. The last couple of years, I've been hosting the X-mas Kick-Off on Dec 1st. I invite friends over and we hang out, eat vegan Christmas treats, drink hot chocolate, soy "nog", play board games while Christmas music is playing in the background, and our home sparkles and shimmers from the decorations. And that is what Christmas is to me: beatiful decorations, good food, old black and white Christmas movies, and friends and family!
I'm so excited about this years Christmas, only 6 months away…
Here are last years photos:



The green and blue aluminum tree in all it's glory, with our Atomic star on top.


The original tree box.


Home made Holiday Candy…YUM!


The table is ready for us to sit and enjoy the goodies.


Kitchen view.


Decorations and holiday-scented candles by Relight Candles on my desk.


The tree again, with the color wheel and the elf named "Charlie".


Lots of "Bambis" and Relight Candles all over the house.


I have two of these little mice, and by request, they are named after two of my friends, Trine and Henrik.


I can almost smell it!!


The bathroom is decked out… Fa la la la la la…


Merry Christmas.


Knee-huggers and Tree-huggers!!


A little decoration has even found it's way into the bedroom!!

Last Christmas… I did give you my heart!! And I can't wait to give it again this year!

All the time, anywhere, turn around and I(KEA)'ll be there!

This past week, I've been organizing and organizing and then organizing a little more, everywhere from our garage to closets. It is actually pretty much one of my favorite things to do. It's very rewarding. I find it amazing how fast, even a fairly organized person can build up lots of clutter. Without thinking about it, you just start collecting trash behind your closet doors. Clothes you've never worn, or just like having in your closet, but you never really get to wear, letters you never filed, envelopes you didn't throw away right away, gift wrap that's been sitting in the back of your closet for the third year in a row ('cause you may need it!), girly stuff that you didn't like, but kept… just in case you run out of your favorite lotion at one point, or maybe you friend would visit and like that fragrance, then she could use it! OK brain, stop now! From now on, I should just be better at getting rid of it, right away, right!?
Feng shui, Feng shui, I wanna be better! As I'm organizing, I think of our future move. I think, do i wanna pay for bringing this to our new home? 'Cause the more stuff I keep - every little thing - I'm gonna need a bigger moving truck. That will do the trick for me! Actually, right now, as I'm typing I inspire myself and wanna go organize some more!!
( IKEA enters )
I hate to love you, or  I love to hate you! Growing up in Scandinavia, I've pretty much seen IKEA in every home I've visited since I was born. Just turn around and there it is!
IKEA offers the best storage you can find on the market. Everything from shoes to LP's, they will fit snug in a IKEA gadget. And those little storage boxes/bins and baskets will fit everything from photos, sewing supplies, CD's, bills, etc! and shoe shelf units.
For years I've been trying to live IKEA-free, with the exception of IKEA bedding, napkins and storage! Only the things that aren't obviously from IKEA! As I've been organizing these past days, I found out that those IKEA boxes are evil. You tend to store, well, crap that you don't need, 'cause it fit in there so perfectly and you dont see it! So much that, in fact, we got rid of 6 of those boxes this past week.
With IKEA on my mind, I look around the house, and I see it popping up here and there, I think it's pretty well camouflaged.

I drink out of IKEA.


IKEA drains my pasta.


IKEA protects my poster.


My cats eat and drink out of IKEA.


Our vinyl sits in IKEA.


IKEA boxes of evil are in my closet.


I guess even if I like the idea of being without it, I can't, 'cause somewhere it is just to good to be true.

All the time, anywhere
Turn around and I(kea)'ll be there!

Ohhh BTW, I got this adorable 50's wallpaper on eBay, planning to use it on projects like covering evil IKEA boxes, but when it arrived, there was so much of it! Enough for a small room, like a hallway or bathroom! I can't wait to move so I can slap it on my walls!

Our House

Next week is our wedding anniversary. It got me thinking;
When I was a little girl, I didn't dream about my perfect wedding to my perfect husband, I didn't look in bridal magazines to find my perfect wedding dress (but I did dress up as a bride, when I was pretending to be Madonna and danced to "Like A Virgin").
What I did dream of as a little girl was to have my own home. To have my OWN kitchen, bathroom, living room and bedroom. I would cut up IKEA magazines and make collages on paper., Cut out my favorite couch, and match it with my favorite chairs and coffee table. They wouldn't all match in sizes, but I would create my perfect home.
I would rearrange my room, maybe once a month and when I was on vacation at my grandparents', I would rearrange my moms old room… borrow pieces from all over my grandparents' house, to make the room my nest for the days I was there. I would even decorate my friends' rooms (with permission  of course).
So you may say decorating and interior design, have always been my favorite hobby; my passion.
The happiness I felt when I had my OWN apartment was beaten the day I married my husband.
Then came the time I had to share and create not my OWN house, but OUR HOUSE!
I must admit that one of my biggest nightmares has always been having to live with a person who owned a leather couch, marble coffee table and a huge Monet print… maybe in a plastic frame… (shudders)! Luckily that wasn't the case, but…
The first couple of months of us living together, our place was a disaster. I had moved from Denmark to America, with only a few pieces of furniture and a couple of moving boxes, into my husbands small apartment. He had moved to Los Angeles a few years before, without his furniture, and was living with hand me down and IKEA furniture - the place was over-stuffed and our styles clashed!
I'm stuborn, (ask anyone!) but so is my husband, (he sometimes beats me at that game!) and he is also very interrested in furniture and making a home very cozy, so we both knew, that neither of us could pull any power-trips when it came to decorating our home!
At that time I wanted off-white walls, to brighten up the small space, and he wanted darker/bold color walls to make it cozy cave-ish… So we ended up with pastel walls. That's how we met in the middle, on our first home-making decision as a married couple.
 
Old color test made in Photoshop.


I think the wall colors are what started our inspiration for what direction we wanted to go with our home: American mid-century. My husband already owned a few pieces, but it was all in storage at his parents' place, so we started out with a few lamps, nic-nacs, etc., but we couldn't fit much more into that apartment.
About a year after I had moved from Copenhagen to Los Angeles, we finally moved into a new place. It was over twice the size and we filled it up with no problem. Finally we had a home that wasn't over-stuffed any longer! It wasn't really until then that we really started to create what was OUR house.

Early stage of our dining room at our old place...We didn't even have dining room chairs at this point.


Years later and 1000s of $ spent on furniture, barkcloth and such… Ohhh and another new home… It looks how we wan't it to look. Of course there are always things that you wanna change, or things you hope to add to your collection. I'm sure if we lived apart, our homes would look slightly different. I think mine would be a little cuter and his a little more modern - I know he would have an orange room…"Can we compromise that to banana yellow maybe?"

Kitchen/Dining room at our current place.


I know I'm lucky. I have a husband, that I first of all love with all my heart, but that also shares my interest in home-making and we share taste in design, etc. I know that there is a special species of humans out there that I don't really get - people, both female and male, who actually don't care about how their home looks!!! I really don't get it!! And I know all of my friends, at one point or another, have lived with a person who has brought awful pieces into our homes - everything from: A big print of a desert to La-Z-Boys, a DJ rig, African masks and soccer memorabilia!! Geez…… But making room for two means you need to meet in the middle and being able to compromise, or else who is truly happy?
When I write in this blog, I call it "my" home, I did, I have, I own, but the truth is its isn't mine, it's "ours", my husband and I. But since he doesn't write on this blog, I go with the "I". Just like I always ask my husband, his ideas for paint,furniture arrangements, and before I spend too much money in an antique store or online - It just take two to tango here in OUR HOUSE!


I'm so house-proud
Nothing ever slows me down
And a mess is not allowed!!

PS. I love you Baby XOXO

You can't always get what you want!

…But if you try sometimes you might find, the HEYWOOD WAKEFIELD  you need!

When you collect, the best thing is find a piece for your collection, at the right time, in great shape… at a killer price!
I think if you could go out and buy the entire collection all at once, the joy and excitement must just be lost.
But boy, have I had cheating thoughts, many times! Imagine if… Dream Dream Drool!




Just like many other people who are into American mid-century furniture, I started my collection of Heywood Wakefield years back. It's getting there, but still isn't big enough!
As I mentioned before, Champagne is my color… and no redone finish, please!!

For those of you who don't know what I'm talking about, in the 40's -60's H.W. came in two different finish colors: Champagne and Wheat.
Champagne is a darker beige color with a hint of pink blush and Wheat is a golden tan color.  It sometimes can be really difficult to tell them apart. The finishes changed a little over the years, and the aging process of the lacquer makes the furniture a little more yellow/orange.
But hey, then it's pretty lucky that you most likely can find it stamped on the back, next to the official Heywood Wakefield stamp!

Original Champagne


Original Wheat


Official Stamp



I love the mix of lines in the picture below and the wall color and the barkcloth curtains.



I wanna sit in this living room and drink tea all night with my friends. It looks so cozy!
Dream Dream Drool!!!



Check out the reproductions of many of the H.W. pieces on their page
Heywood Wakefiled Page

Eat to the beat

I'm on a much needed vacation this week. I just got back from 5 days in the Bay Area and now I have two days before returning to the daily grind. Gotta do some cleaning, laundry and updating my blog -check to the last!!
Here are some, again, older pictures this time of my kitchen and dinning room.





The dinning area is the first room we painted when we moved here a few years back.The color is called Island Shore(88GG 68/184) I never got around to paint the kitchen.





The room you kinda see in the back is our laundry room.



The candles are made by my dear friend BJ, I will tell you more about her later!



For a bit last summer I brought back the "90's" birdcage lamp. hehe



I don't really like retro, and hardy ever buys retro items, but when I saw this reprint of a 1947 travel poster , I just couldn't resist.  It reads " Copenhagen Denmark......Gay spot of Europe"
I heart it and I heart Copenhagen.

My cat's are calling me, they wanna hang out some more!!!

Mirror in the bathroom!

I love my bathroom. It has, well, most of the original Crane fixtures and the teal tiles. Even if they are not in perfect condition, they are most adorable in my mind. I love the fact that the shower stall and bathtub are separate. It does make it hell for cleaning the tub… but cute before practical, right?
For the wall color we choose a very dusty pink-ish coral. I think it plays of the teal very well.

More old(er) photos:



Head vases, Bambies, Soakies and Mermaids



Next to the bath tub is an original built-in hamper. We use it as a "linen closet."



Not perfect, but good enough for me… for now!


If I had to re-paint it another color, I would go with the color of our bedroom. It's called "sickling pear" and it's a yellowish green, which depending on the time of day and the light in the room, changes from more yellow or more green - LOVE IT!  Teal, yellow-ish green, with a hint of pink… reads perfect in my book!!!

Actually, now after a few years of living here, I would love to swap all the colors around, so the bathroom would be the color of the bedroom, the bedroom the color of the living room, the living room  the color of the dining room, dining room the color of the bathroom… confused? I just wish I could drag my home into Photoshop and, with a few clicks, change the wall colors all through my home.

I did a search, and I found this vintage Kohler ad, with a very similar color scheme!



Since it's raining and it's Sunday… I'd better cruise down eBay Ave. for some monitor shopping!

I wanna Paint it Paint it Paint it ........BLACK???

Often when people come to my house or see pictures of my home, they comment on the wall colors. Some love it and ask for the color names/codes, and some say, "well only you can pull it off, I couldn't live with colors on my wall." To the last I say" arrrgh! bull!". But to be honest, if you had asked me 10+ years ago, if I would want colors on my walls, my answer would have been, "maybe in a hallway or bathroom, but not in a larger room."
Everybody changes and your style changes too.
Growing up in Denmark in the 80's, you saw a lot of colors in home exterior, but coming into the 90's it was all about the off-white/white/eggshell/pearl walls… Everything had to be light and bright with antique-white painted or dark mahogany furniture. In my first apartment I sure followed that trend!



Now, I couldn't imagine not having colors on my walls. White walls kinda make me sad and a little depressed. I see it like this: decorating a room is like painting a picture. You have the perfect motif done in beatiful shapes and colors, but without a background on your painting, there is so support to your motif and your painting isn't complete - just dull! So imagine your furniture being your motif… your walls are your background! I think it's amazing what wall color can do to your furniture… it just makes it pop!
I'm a believer in that colors makes you happy. You just need to find the right one for you. "Green" isn't just green. I can sit for days (yes, geeky, I know) and look at color swatches, just to make sure it's the right shade of green. And what a joy it is for me to mix my own colors, when i'm working on smaller projects… just that sec when you hit that right shade… Pure happiness in a paint bucket!



I love to look in old Home and Garden magazines for color inspiration. Swatches like these are so much fun!

Ohhh, and I have a confession to make. My kicthen and laundry room, I never got around to painting… depressing white walls. Buuut beautiful 40's yellow tiles, kinda make up for it. And if we didnt have plans on moving sometime in the near furture, I would have painted it by now!