My Style

What a goof I am! I just realized a day after I wrote this post that I think Lauren meant for me to show a picture NOT from my place, but from some other random place that expresses my style. Oh well, I already wrote this ridiculously long post about it, so I'm leaving it!

Lauren of Dear Golden tagged me to choose one photo that bests describes my design style. A fun game of tag! It's hard to pick one picture, but I think the one above would have to be it, for now anyway. This is the wall in front of our sofa, so it's what we see most of the time when we're at home. It pretty much sums up everything that's important to me in my design style--surrounding myself with things that are old, personal, and warm. What to call it, though--my style--I'm not really sure. What would I call it? "Flea market country" maybe, but I hesitate to use the word "country" because it seems to have such a bad reputation these days. I think it conjures up images of stenciled chickens and old teddy bears--poor "country" it's gone "rooster chic" as Decorno put it. Whatever you call it, it runs in my family, starting with my grandma. If you went to any one of my family member's houses, you'd notice we're all related just by looking around even though we all have our own personal style. I still don't really know how to incorporate Andrew's style more with mine, but one day maybe we'll get there. Lucky for me, he likes my style as it is.

In general, I like old things that make me wonder about their past lives--old painted furniture, old oil paintings, old rusty wrought iron, old wicker, old linens. Old things just have a lot of character to me. Like the painting above, I bought it for $15, I think it was, at a flea market near my mom's house in McDonough, Georgia, and it's one of my favorite things. I wonder about the person who painted it, where that little stream is--if it's a real place or just a place in the painter's imagination--I wonder what time of day it was supposed to be. Sometimes it looks like morning, sometimes evening. I wonder where it was that the frame got all scratched up. In some box in a garage for years? I also like that the water makes me think of my mom who loves the water.

I also like spaces that are personalized. My nephew's silhouettes are on this wall, and a few of the paintings are by my uncle who's an artist. Every year he paints something for all of us for Christmas. There's a little winter scene on the wall (just above the bar) that he did one year. Also, Connie, one of my grandma's closest friend's, paints a version of the Madonna every Christmas and prints copies of the original and mounts them on her Christmas cards. I have quite a growing collection now and have this one, above, framed on our wall.

I also like framed letters. It doesn't get more personal than that, does it? I just have this one note from a friend in high school framed right now, but I keep all my letters and cards (lots of others from high school, which are really funny to read), so I have plenty to choose from if I ever do get around to framing more.

And family pictures--I love lots of family pictures, but, for me, I only like them displayed on dressers and tables. I don't really like family pictures on walls unless it's one whole wall dedicated to family pictures. I think I get this from my mom and grandma, too--that's just how they do with family pictures.

Lastly, (gosh, I'm going on and on, aren't I) we always try to bring something home from our travels to remind us where we've been. There are little things here and there all around our apartment that we've brought home. The little girl silhouette I got at a thrift store in Zurich. She's cute and now reminds me of being there.

My mom is probably most responsible for my style, in large part because she gave me so many things that I have, like the painting above, another one of my favorite things.

So I think that about sums it up! Lois' room is my favorite room in our apartment though. I like it more than our own bedroom. Enough about that, though, now I guess it's my turn to tag, so I tag Lisa and Caroline to show one picture (or some pictures!) that best describes their design style. Hope ya'll don't mind!