Category: Honor Roll

I’ll be twirling into the weekend like a big happy rainbow in my new Marimekko maxi dress. I shared it on my Instagram Stories a couple of days ago because when I told Brandon that he probably wasn’t going to like my latest find, he said “I’d love you in whatever loose linen sleeping bag you put on your body.” Jokes on him. It’s cotton.

Onward!

• This look inside modern day MLM companies was fascinating. They’re not pyramid schemes, no, no, no! Of course not. But… are they much better?
  (Illustrations by Kobie Nieuwoudt)

• There has been a lot of talk about how we might be over midcentury modernism. I shared that link on my Facebook page and reactions were pretty evenly split between “finally,” “never,” and “more for me!” Where do you fall? I’m enjoying the swing back toward Victorian, for obvious reasons, and there’s even a subset of renters in Chicago looking for “time capsule dwellings” (untouched, unremodeled apartments). Also? A little love for vintage kitchens!

• Sarah Sherman Samuel’s Pink Agate Wallpaper is available! So very pretty.

• I’ve never done Whole 30, but I do appreciate the snack ideas! Coming up with new things to eat is most definitely not my strong suit.

• Freelancers: get the credit you deserve! I put on pants today, and I want everyone to know it! (They weren’t LuLaRoe though. Wouldn’t that have brought everything around full circle.)

• I like that area where kindergarten crafts meet grown-up decor. I’m willing to bet you’ve got the skills to pull off this paper chain wall hanging!

• J. Crew is killing it right now with its statement earrings. Trying to decide between these in pink lucite and ivory drops. (Please. Like I’m not just going to get both.)

• Do you hate Comic Sans?

• Making the rounds in my crafty circle is this response to The Renegade Craft Fair’s arrival in Detroit. I’ve seen thoughtful responses from both sides, and I’m not totally sure where I stand here. What about you?

• A conversation about new media and burnout.

• Real-time Animal Crossing music as you move throughout the day. Now if only I could shake a tree and score some new wallpaper…

• San Francisco, go check out Color Factory! There’s something magical about being immersed in color — it reminds me of one of my favorite art experiences ever, walking through a room of shifting colored light.

I just got back from driving out to Northbrook to pick up a couple of chairs. I got there about 20 minutes early (didn’t want to be late with traffic, so I played it safe) and had a little time to kill. Drove around looking for a place to grab coffee and found a consignment shop instead. Guess who came back home with four chairs today instead of just two!

The pair with rush seating is the pair I went out there to get, but the others were too good to pass up. Either set could be a candidate for painting. But on to this week’s Honor Roll!

• A guide to Chicago’s vernacular architecture. (Our first house was a cross between a Workers Cottage and a Bungalow.)
  image: Curbed Chicago Flickr pool/Debbie Mercer via Curbed

• Is it pretentious to have a drawing room? I mean, kinda. But I like a little pretention. Excuse me whilst I retire to the parlor.

• I’ve been noticing an uptick in Bauhaus style too, and I am fully on board. That, Art Deco, and ’80s Memphis Group style all seem to be trending.

• More light shed on Sylvia Plath. (Did you read the unabridged journals back when they came out too? Ah, my early bookstore days.)

• San Francisco’s lollipop landscaping is pretty cute.

• Top sheets. Gah!

Please vote!

A reminder to please vote for my rug designs for Annie Selke so that hopefully one (or more) will go on to production!

1. VOTE — like this on Instagram: Snug as a Bug in a Rug
2. VOTE — like this on Instagram: Going Buggy Rug (my favorite)
3. VOTE — like this on Instagram: A Quilty Rug (in the lead)

I went on a walking tour of the Pullman neighborhood yesterday wearing what I thought were comfortable shoes. Six blisters. A personal record! (I carry bandages in my purse because I’m a mom, but I also carry Band-Aids for Blisters, heels and toes, because women’s shoes are stupid sometimes. Those things make walking bearable today.) So I need some new summer sandals. Low to mid block heel, tan, not too clunky, not a clog. Any suggestions for the magical mix of comfort and style? I stopped in at Nora’s Shoe Shop after the kids’ exams and I think these might be the ones.

Or I could make these.

Coo.

• The color-drenched house tour of jewelry designer Solange Azagury-Partridge is all kinds of inspiring.

• If you missed out the first time, the ever so cute Rifle Paper Co. collection for Keds is back in stock!

• Volunteer location-scouting for Wes Anderson. These are spot-on.

• The ‘Ferris Beuller’ glass house is being restored!

• Where it’s so quiet, you can hear the grind of your bones.

• I asked E if she would be rude to me when she’s a teenager. “Probably.”

• Take a tour of Jennifer Perkins’ parents’ pink Victorian home: ‘The Birthday Cake House.’
  “The house was white and the carpet was soaked with cat urine when my parents decided to take a leap of faith and buy their very own never-ending DIY project.”

• The restoration of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Unity Temple here in Oak Park is nearly complete, just in time for what would have been his 150th birthday.
  We had the rehearsal dinner for our wedding there, but I haven’t been inside in ages. I’m eager to see it again!

• It may be that you like your IKEA furniture more because you put it together yourself.

• Scientists sometimes have wonderfully bizarre carry-on items.
  “My strategy was to pretend that everything I was doing was perfectly normal.”

• Not super excited about clothes on the racks right now tbh.

• In honor of the latest GOT teaser trailer that has been flooding my Facebook feed…

I’ve had some near-accordion-purchases lately, but I have yet to acquire one. We had one in the house when I was a kid, but I would be pretty much starting from scratch to learn it (and Brandon’s not so super excited about that prospect). I almost settled for a concertina for sale at an estate sale, but a woman drove in from an hour away just to buy it and I wasn’t about to swoop it out from under her while she browsed (she was still “thinking about it” because they wouldn’t come down on price on the first day of the sale).

Anyways. Happy long weekend!

• Tickets are on sale now for the annual Wright Plus 150 walk! I try to go each year and I’ll be there with a press ticket this time, but interior photos aren’t allowed. If you want to see inside these houses (some are Wright homes, others are just beautiful houses in Oak Park), the only way is to go on the tour, May 20. It’s a walkable loop this year, which is so nice!

• I wore Chucks and paratrooper boots back then, but the girlier/popular ’90s girls among you probably wore these… and they’re back.



• Andrea Beaty has brought us some of our favorite kids’ books (Iggy Peck, Architect; Rosie Revere, Engineer; Ada Twist, Scientist), and she has four posters available as free downloads. If you’d like them in a larger size, she has made them available through the March for Science (and they receive 100% of the net proceeds).
  p.s. Andrea Beaty was the first author Eleanor had ever met when we went to her signing in 2014. She was so excited — dressing up with a headband and necklace to be fancy — and she was nervous as we waited in line. She was so little! Meeting her favorite author was a big deal, and those books have grown with us. Pick them up, if you haven’t already.

• Cavalia offered us a pair of tickets for ‘social media week’, and I took Eleanor. Horses! Gymnasts! Such a beautiful show! Tickets are on sale right now with the code SOCIAL.

• It’s acceptable to search for love through online matchmaking sites now, but friendship? Meet some of the people doing just that.

• Star Wars Land. Looks like I have a family that’s going to want to go to Disney in 2019.