Flea Finds

Today is the third Sunday of the month and that means it's time for the Long Beach Flea Market!  It was nice and breezy when I got there and then I found these four Midwinter 'Sun' plates and hauling them around made it a bit tiresome as it got hotter and then on the last row I found the vintage Le Creuset pot and let me tell you, hauling around cast iron in the sun isn't as much fun as it sounds but at least I got a workout?

The plates are a pattern I've been stalking for a while now. They're easy to find on eBay but they do get expensive. I snagged these four for $10. The Le Creuset is an iron bottom "E" which means it's 4.5 quarts and the bottom tells me it's from the 80s. It's in a great school bus yellow color and the interior was a bit browned with years of use but my trick for that is to soak it in water and a bit of dishwashing detergent. Cleans it to bright white every time. $35 is what I paid for that. I guess this means I have to cook and serve dinner tonight?

Dining Room

I'm a fickle girl, I admit that willingly. Since we've lived here I've shuffled chairs and tables and I keep doing it. We are now on our third dining room table.

Up until last week we had an Ikea Docksta table. It was OK, just OK. While it looks like a Saarinen table, it's just isn't. It chipped if you looked at it funny, the base was always getting dirty and it wobbled.

To refresh your memory, here's the Docksta. The left photo is for show, the right is how it actually looked on a daily basis here (minus the piles of mail, projects and other crap that would pile up). 

Since I don't have a spare $1,700 for the table I really want I have to keep it affordable and inexpensive. Enter Craiglist. For $30 and a quick drive I picked up an Ikea Melltorp table. It is the same exact table we moved into the place with, only a rectangle instead of a square.

      

I think rectangle works better for the space and it hold all the many chairs I need in my life. The picture on the left is for show, the one on the right is how we've been using it. Here's the view from the kitchen:

The sweet little tealight holder is from J.C. Penney, excuse me, JCP. It's by Design for Conran. It's super cute and super affordable. (Pictures from my Instagram)

 

Hopefully there are others that are afflicted with the same Table/Chair ADD that I have.

Live Nude Chairs!

I'm a firm believer in the saying (I just made up) that "There's nothing a sheepskin can't fix". They're great for hiding tears, stains or any other flaw. They say "Hey I'm totally casual draped all over your bed" or "Check me out on this bench being all bohemian".  

I got my grubby mitts on a gray sheepskin and wondered the way only a person with a sickness can "How would this look on each and every chair I own?" So I lined up all my chairs (actually that's a lie there were two or three that weren't part of this weird parade) and threw the sheepskin on it and photographed it all for you but probably more to indulge my chair hoarding brain.

See how each chairs transforms from "GIMME YOUR BUTT" to "Hey chillax, get groovy on me and we'll wait for Stevie Nicks to come over"?

The winner of this super weird game was the last chair, It works great as my workshop chair for when I'm cutting leather (Have you been to Love & Arrow yet? Go Go Go, Buy Buy Buy!). Also Bruce can't resist putting his hairy behind in any and all chairs, check it out.

Which is your favorite?

Love & Arrow

I have a secret to tell you. I've been working behind the scenes, planning, preparing and crafting. I've been gearing up to launch a new shop and TODAY is the day!

Living in California, my adopted home state, has given me a love for the desert, brass, cowboys, primitive art and all things simple and rustic. I've been doing some leather crafting and curating of vintage objects and I'm ready to share it all with you.

Come and take a look at Love & Arrow on Etsy, Check it out on Instagram, Like it on Facebook, come chat on Twitter and for extra credit follow on Tumblr.

Soap!

How much do I love my new bathroom? The answer is a lot, a super lot. It's clean and sexy and super rad. One thing less than stellar about it is the sink. It's a pedestal sink with zero space for your stuff. Now, normally I love tiny sinks, like little halfsies sinks but this pedestal business just isn't working for me. It's too narrow to hold pump soap or a soap dish. So I set out to find an awesome wall mount soap dish which is not an easy task. I found one that was worthy of my bathroom. Perhaps the most boring post ever? Who cares, let's look at pictures


This was a temporary solution, I was still using the complimentary soap from the ACE Hotel hung from the bottom of the medicine cabinet by magnet hook.

and then this happened...

 Gorgeous right? All Brassy and perfect. Let's look again!

and again and again, from different angles!

The soap is from Once Upon A Time Soap, and it's so amazing. I just gave some as a Housewarming present. You should buy some too. It might be slightly unnatural for me to love this soap dish as much as I do but it is what it is. Who are you to stand in the way of our love?