Tiny She Shed

She Shed Decor Inspiration

With the upcoming shed renovation I have been doing a lot of online research for ideas of how to personalize the Shedquarters for Bohemian Cottage. I thought I would share with you here some of my favorites. You can see them all on my Pinterest board for Artist Studio, which is half of the intended purpose of the shed, along with running a business and relaxing too of course.

Tiny She Shed

Love the window boxes and color of this tiny shed. Source House Beautiful.

Some of the ideas that I am considering for decorating are to paint the sky mural on the pitched ceiling like I had at my old house and to finally add the 2 crystal chandeliers! So far I have one of the chandeliers and it gives off wonderful light with LED bulbs. I think I will keep the walls fairly subdued in color, like an off white or a tea stained parchment sort of color to give it a vintage look. I was considering doing a floral mural too. (read more)

She Shed in painting in progress

She Shed!

This is the front and main entry to the shed, IT was a sad little shed before…

For the entire year of 2016 you may have noticed I have been MIA! haha! Mia as in missing in action. There are many reasons I took some time off from the blog and the development of the business aspect of Bohemian Cottage. After my mom died in January of 2015, I had a really hard time focusing. I struggled with depression and and grief and that lack of focus eventually lead to less and less time devoted to the things I love, like cooking and sharing recipes, gardening, writing…Then my Dad announced in the fall of 2015 that he was going to move in with us! I had encouraged him to move to Colorado for many years, and he finally came to a place where the timing was right for him. Well, as you can ascertain from the pictures of some of my decor projects and parties the cottage was very small for 5 people! My Dad was shortly after his announcement of moving in with us, in a pretty severe motorcycle accident. He ended up in the hospital with a fractured skull, broken collar bone and lots of cuts and bruises.  He also sold his house to someone he knew, so he had to be moved out within a month! Smash cut to a few weeks later, Tom and I are there helping to pack up all of his belongings and driving him out here. He had to sleep on an air mattress for 5 months poor guy! (read more)

Thanksgiving Table Decor

Giving Thanks

Thanksgiving Table

Our humble Thanksgiving table

There are so many great blog posts, articles, even entire books dedicated to the biggest food event of the year, Thanksgiving. At our house we usually keep it very traditional, serving pretty much the same meal every year. With so many resources about entertaining and menu planning and recipes on Thanksgiving out there, I just wanted to share with you some of what I am truly Thankful for.

Thanksgiving Table Decor

Thanksgiving Table Decor

When my grandmother hosted it at her house, she managed to make the entire meal herself and every year, it was impeccable and exactly the same. Some of it was a little…different. Like lime jello salad with shredded carrots and pineapple. Without fail, it was always on her Thanksgiving table. Along with the cornbread stuffing and turkey giblet gravy with chopped up hard boiled eggs in it and tamales. The tamales became part of the tradition over time due to living in Arizona. It was one of 2 meals of the year that were served in the formal dining room with the fancy china. Christmas was the other meal served in there. Of course my brothers and my cousins and I were all banished to the “kids” table. That is where all the fun happened I’m sure!  I am thankful for those family traditions that helped to form who I am today. (read more)

Magical Samhain Night

Enchanted Floating Candles

We made these enchanted candles to give a magical touch to our festivities.

One of our favorite holidays to celebrate is Halloween or Samhain. Sometimes we get a little carried away with decorations and treats, but it sure is fun! More is more! We had fun making some crafts, spooky flying fairy skeletons, enchanted candles like in Harry Potter and ribbon garlands to hang over doorways in Halloween colors and patterns. Food. We also made lots of tasty food. Spooky food. Ok, maybe not so spooky, but creative and festive for the occasion. I got lots of ideas from magazines and pinterest. Check out my Halloween board to see some of the inspiration. I discovered ways to take the inspiration and make it my own, and in some cases improving on the ideas. (read more)

Painted metal chair makeover DIY

Outdoor Chair Makeover

Chair makeover. Before picture of our metal chairs before painting.

These metal outdoor chairs were in sore need of some TLC.

These outdoor metal chairs were rusting and a greyish color as you can see from the picture above. When we were getting ready to host a bachelorette party for my friend Autumn, we needed lots of seating quick. We were short on time and budget, so we decided to paint the chairs we already had. We used a Rustoleum spray paint that said it worked on metal in a gloss finish for 3 of the 4 colors and a satin finish in one. We wanted them to look colorful and bohemian to go with the bright southwestern tie dyed table cloth I had. We chose a lime green, turquoise blue, and coral in the gloss and a purple in the satin finish. To do this project, we just had to clean the chairs, sand down any rust spots and spray paint a light coat or 2 of the Rustoleum paint. We laid drop cloths right outside and worked on a day that had minimal wind. Check out the results! (read more)

Bohemian peacock vignette display.

The Art of the Vignette. Styling Decorative Displays

I don’t have a big home improvement budget at this time in my life, (working on changing that!) but I do have a voracious appetite for beautifying our home. One of the cheapest and easiest ways to change up your decor and to really add a personal and bohemian flair, is to style a vignette of favorite and collected objects, or still life. Vignettes can be as simple as grouping several heights of candles together in front of a mirror, to a carefully curated cluster of gathered pieces, thoughtfully placed using the following principles… (read more)