Tag: sponsored

Know Any Good Cast Iron Jokes?

Sponsored by Blue Apron.

Most people know the basics of cooking. But did you know that in order to make a meal truly special, you must begin by arranging all of your ingredients in pretty bowls and placing them on and around the antique kitchen scale your husband balked at? It’s true. Do not skip this step. No substitutions.

Brandon was a little confused by the scale’s arrival, seeing as how we don’t have all that much counter space in our kitchen, but I showed him, didn’t I. Everyone appoints their kitchens according to an item’s photogenic qualities, yes? (It could have been much worse.)

And it’s cast iron, which goes nicely with our cast iron stove and my new cast iron braiser. I haven’t seen Inception, so I had to ask Brandon if it was an appropriate reference for making a joke here. All I know is it’s a dream about a dream inside a dream… swap out the “dream” with “cast iron” and there’s a joke in there somewhere. No? He said no. So I challenged him to come up with something better, which he could not, because it seems I had not stumbled upon the comedic goldmine I thought I had.

I do love that new braiser though. I’ve cooked with cast iron and baked with enameled cast iron before, but I would have normally used our big stainless steel sauté pan for a dish like this (chicken bolognese & rigatoni pasta with mascarpone cheese from our latest Blue Apron delivery). The braiser is about the same size, but it regulates the heat much better on our crazy stove and it was still easy to clean. Plus, it is a lovely shade of pink.

I did not have something suitably twee for making the summer squash-arugula salad, and so I had to settle for a perfectly useful but not terribly cute stainless steel mixing bowl. My assistant made up for it with added cuteness, which was welcome — though she did keep stealing slices of the squash.

Look, the scale is useful once again!

That pasta was tasty. I don’t think I had cooked with mascarpone before, and it added a nice creaminess. That’s part of why I like Blue Apron: there’s usually an interesting ingredient or twist on a classic dish that we wouldn’t have thought of. Having the meal planning done for us is awesome too, and everything ships for free. If you want to get an idea of what you get, you can browse their recipes. Don’t the Thai-spiced salmon and hoisin-glazed chicken thighs look good?

The Family Plan with a delivery once a week works for us, but they also offer two shipments per week or a smaller 2-Person Plan, and you can skip or cancel any time. I’m always happy to share them on the blog, and Blue Apron is offering the first 100 readers that sign up here two free meals on their first Blue Apron order!

And I was close to something with the cast iron thing there, right?

July 29, 2015
DIY Abstract Art Clock and Serving Tray
This is a sponsored post by NESTLE Coffee-mate.

All reviews and opinions expressed in this post are unbiased and based on my personal view.

I was able to chat with David Bromstad recently about his limited-edition labels for Coffee-mate’s French Vanilla and Hazelnut bottles. There are four designs — two for each flavor — and they will only be available at Target. I loved his approach to the designs, and being known for his painting skills and use of color, I was inspired by David and “the art of a fresh start” to do a little painting of my own. I customized a tray, and wanted to take on another project too. I suggested a clock last week and you were into the idea, so I went for it!

The tray was cute, but you guys. The clock? LOVE IT. Eleanor has already laid claim on it, so it’s going to be moving to her room, and August wants one too (in red). Here it is paired up for now though with it the tray that preceded it. I even snipped a few flowers from the yard for the table, remembering David’s fondness for his mom’s garden.

Want to make a clock or tray (or both) of your own? Here’s what you’ll need:
- a clock that can be taken apart
- art brushes
- a serving tray
- painter’s tape
- acrylic craft paints
  I used 24K gold, coral, shell, ladybug red, egg, deep sea, and robin’s egg
Painting a Serving Tray

I started by taping off the sides of the serving tray with painter’s tape so that they would stay white. I used small (4-6″) strips of tape because it’s easier to work with than long pieces, and I let them overlap a little each time for complete coverage.

I was aiming for an abstract look, concentrating on fields and splashes of color. (Eh? Inspired by David. Get it?) Magic animated gif painting process time!

I peeled the tape off carefully and let the tray sit overnight to be sure that the paint was completely dry.

The paint peeking out from the bottom of the tray is such a happy detail! Little things like that are always a nice grace note in the morning.

An Abstract Art Wall Clock

Painting the clock was similar, but with a few differences to note. I chose the paint the sides and the face, so there was no need to tape anything off. I also wanted to add a bit of gold this time. I had picked up a bottle of gold paint to use on the tray, but I changed my mind. The raised numbers on the clock presented themselves as the perfect spot for it!

I unscrewed the clock and took everything apart so I could paint the face. I let the colors mix together more here than I did with the tray. I also used a round brush instead of a wide filbert, so that changed the look too.

The first few layers don’t look terribly promising, but the magic comes as you keep going. I had a hard time deciding when to stop because I kept wanting to tweak it here and there, but I had to call it and walk away so I wouldn’t overwork it or muddy the colors.

I let the paint dry completely before coming back to paint those numbers gold. The metallic paint was semi-translucent, and I think it took about five coats for it to turn opaque. The numbers catch the light in the best way though, so taking the time to apply layer after layer of gold was worth it!

After the paint on the numbers dried, I reassembled the clock and hung it. Not a bad way to check the time, right? Eleanor’s a smart kid, stealing that clock for herself.
July 27, 2015
My Dream Wood Floor

This post is sponsored by Floor & Decor.

Here’s a quick ‘how long have you been reading this blog’ check. Remember when Brandon and I installed bamboo flooring in a couple of rooms in our first house?

We were so house-proud. Dark bamboo was especially good against pale pink walls!

It looked equally at home with charcoal gray, too. There are a bunch of options out there for dark bamboo, depending on whether you like it to be almost black, a little warmer with more brown, textured, or smooth. This espresso stain looks the closest to the finish we used all those years ago. Floor & Decor has a bunch of videos on their site, including one all about bamboo flooring.

That home was old (built in 1910), but the second floor was a later addition and we felt like we could deviate a bit from the style of the house. The dark floors were dramatic, and they provided the contrast I tend to love in design. A word of warning though — dark floors, be they wood, bamboo, carpet, or tile, need more frequent cleaning because every speck of dirt, dust, or pet hair shows. Still, they look good enough that I would take the tradeoff.

We’ve put in new flooring in the Victorian too. I was very pregnant when we remodeled the second floor, so I wasn’t about to do the installation myself. We did half of the hallway and got to a stopping point, with the intention of taking a break, having a baby, getting the house rewired, and then continuing on. The electrical work is about 80% done, according to the electricians, but the last 20% is going to see us ripping up a lot of the house to access everything. Poor house. But then we can finish the hallway (and a few other projects that the rewiring had put on hold)!

The solid hardwood I chose for the hall is a skinny Gunstock Oak. I tried to match up our existing wood floor as closely as possible, in color and width. I do sometimes miss the drama of the dark floors in our old house, but a medium tone is beautiful too.

In a different house though? I would kill for a chance to install one of these gray wood finishes. I’ve seen a few of these at the store, and I think this one is my favorite. Installed in a chevron or herringbone pattern? It would be so good.

You know, like in Jacques Dirand’s Paris flat.

Sigh. Total dream floor. Does it really fit in a Chicago Victorian? DON’T CARE. But it doesn’t make sense to randomly add it to a hallway, and so we didn’t. Now if we were ever to replace the floor in the main rooms? It would be a serious contender.

July 23, 2015
An #InspiredStart with Coffee-Mate and David Bromstad

This is a sponsored post by NESTLE Coffee-mate.

All reviews and opinions expressed in this post are unbiased and based on my personal view.

David Bromstad is an artist, designer, and HGTV host. He has also gotten into the world of product design. Last year, he made a pair of limited-edition labels for Coffee-mate’s French Vanilla and Hazelnut flavors, and now he has designed four new looks — two each for the same two varieties — available exclusively at Target. I was able to chat with David recently about his inspiration behind the designs, what a typical morning looked like for him, and how his home is shaping up these days. Plus we bonded over a mutual love of pink. “It’s just a happy color!” he says.

Image provided by David Bromstad

This is Bromstad’s second collaboration with Coffee-mate, so I was curious about his inspiration and how he approached these new designs differently. He said that the first round was very painterly and artsy, on the contemporary side, but this time it was all inspired by his mom.

When David was twenty years old and first started drinking coffee, he’d have the summers off, and he and his mom would walk around her garden together. She taught him everything about flowers and gardening, explaining the differences between perennials and annuals, showing him what would come back or die off. The art of gardening is just as much science, and he was fascinated by it. When it came time to create his new bottle designs, he recalled those summer mornings spent with a cup of coffee and the company of his mom, and that led him to the floral imagery he used.

It seems like David is always doing a million things and is involved in multiple projects at any given time, but he still likes to start his day the same way he did when he was twenty! A little breakfast, followed by his morning coffee. Since he designed labels for both, I wondered if he had a favorite between Hazelnut and French Vanilla, but he couldn’t choose. He likes each on their own, but he loves them mixed together too. (I hadn’t even thought of mixing them, but I tried it and he’s onto something there.)

I’d seen Bromstad’s new home featured in an issue of HGTV Magazine recently, and it looked amazing but I remembered reading about his initial missteps in decorating it.

“When I first moved in, I tried to create a whole ‘Mr. Color Splash’ look. I painted the living room walls turquoise and put an orange cover on the couch with red pillows. Then I stopped, looked around and said, ‘I can’t live like this.’ It was the ugliest thing I’d ever done. So I returned 80 percent of the stuff I bought, painted the room white and added some ‘Mr. Color Splash’ touches.”

I’m always heartened to know that even the most experienced designers have trouble from time to time, especially since decorating and perfectionism had been on my mind when we spoke. I was curious about whether his home had continued to change, or if he considered it done.

His home, as it appeared in the magazine feature, was a “very fun, poppy house. Very black and white, which is very cool.” It has completely changed since being photographed though, because of a new furniture collection he had been working on. It hasn’t been professionally shot again yet, but he sent some photos over that he had taken with his phone so we could get a peek into his home’s latest look.

Image provided by David Bromstad

Image provided by David Bromstad

He loves it, and he loves that he was able to switch it up. Like a lot of us, it seems, David sees a house as an ever-changing thing! His partner is not as keen on change as David is, but he was open to it. He was (jokingly) kind of mad about the pink chairs, but even he had to admit that the texture made them “kind of amazing.”

Image provided by David Bromstad

David describes his home as effervescent, saying that it’s soft, chic, and sophisticated, but with tons of color. It’s a little more mature, more his age now, and more ‘him.’ And he seems like a pretty reserved guy, don’t ‘ya think?

Image provided by David Bromstad

I start my day with breakfast and a cup of coffee too, and chatting with David had me feeling inspired. I decided to break out my brushes, and I customized that tray you saw toward the top of the post. I’ll have more photos to share with you next week, but in the meantime, I’m thinking about trying my hand at another painting project. I was thinking about what I use every morning that could use a little sprucing up. Maybe a set of coffee mugs or a clock? I’ve got plenty of paint left — let me know what you’d like to see it used on!

July 20, 2015
Art from Minted (With a Giveaway!)

Minted is a marketplace that hosts regular competitions to source all their art from a global community of independent artists. They recently invited me to select a few of my favorite prints, and they’re hosting a $500 giveaway so that one of my readers can do the same! Details and instructions for entering are at the end of this post.

I chose three pieces, intending to group and hang them together above a vintage wooden bench in the hallway. August spotted and loved the Happy Faces print by Kim Johnson though, and he asked if I would hang it in his room.

Maybe all those happy faces will shine down on him and put him in a good mood when he’s having a cranky four-year-old kind of day. (A parent can hope, right?)

:)

The happy faces print was the largest, and it was to be the anchor in my group of three. With that one having been relocated, I set about finding new spots for the other two prints.

We did a ton of work to the hallway on the second floor, reconfiguring the layout, knocking down walls and putting up new ones, smoothing it all out, laying new flooring, and upgrading the lighting. But we haven’t stripped the paint on the window and doorframe yet, and while it would be great to skim coat the walls and remove or replace the carpet in the stairway, it isn’t a priority. Hanging something pretty (Peony Bottle, by Betty Hatchett) draws my eye to the art and lets me kind of ignore the rest.

Remember the armoire with the crazy striped surprise inside that we painted? Here it is in place, a little further down the other side of the hallway. A low-maintenance plant, a thrifted lamp, and a radio have been hanging out on top, and I added my third Minted print over it — Mid-Century Moments, by That Girl Studio.

Giveaway

I narrowed my list of dozens of favorites on Minted down to the three you see above, but it wasn’t easy to choose. They have tons of cute prints! Luckily for you, Minted is giving away a $500 credit so that one reader can choose a bunch of their favorites too. You have until midnight, June 28 to enter. Visit Minted to enter and for the complete rules. Good luck!

Thank you, Minted, for sponsoring this post.

While this was a sponsored opportunity from Minted, all content and opinions expressed here are my own.

* Congratulations to the winner, Stephanie!

June 23, 2015
Cut the Cord(s)

This is a sponsored post written by me on behalf of DuPont™ Corian®.

All opinions are 100% mine.

NeoCon is a huge annual show for the commercial interiors industry held at The Merchandise Mart, here in Chicago. I attended the show last week for the debut of the new wireless Corian^® Charging Surface, and you guys. We are living in the future.

You probably already know Corian^®. It’s a solid-surface material that comes in 110 colors and patterns that can be custom-cut and fabricated with near seamless installation. It’s durable, stain-resistant, and easy to clean, so while most people are familiar with as a countertop for the kitchen or bathroom, it’s often used for commercial and hospitality applications too.

The Corian^® Charging Surface is a transmitter that can be installed below the surface of a counter to wirelessly charge smart devices, stopping automatically when the battery is full. Zodiaq^® quartz counters work with the technology too and there’s no difference in appearance with it installed (unless you want to add an identifying mark), so you get this secret little charging spot that doesn’t change the design of your room! We usually have a phone or tablet (or both) charging in our kitchen, and the tangle of cords drives me nuts. I’m forever gathering everything up to squirrel it all away in a drawer, so to be able to charge everything without wires would be awesome.

Samsung is already offering phones that can be charged wirelessly, but you can adapt other phones with a special case or Powermat^® wireless charging ring. Powermat^® is also making the technology work for commercial spaces (coffee shops, restaurants, airports, etc.) with multiple charging spots and remote cloud-based management. Both the residential and commercial transmitters’ firmware can be updated and are PMA and Qi compatible to support upcoming technology.

I liked the new Corian^® design at the show that looked like marble (without marble’s tendency to stain and etch), and it would work in almost any kitchen or bath. I was into some of the darker options though — almost black, but with enough interest to keep them from looking flat. A dark counter with painted cabinetry in a beautiful color and an integrated Corian^® Charging Surface would be fantastic. Adding one to a piece of furniture in an entryway or mudroom would be smart too. And wouldn’t it be amazing for the technology to take off on a large enough scale so that you could head out with your phone, sans-cords and cables, confident that there would be a spot where you could set your phone down to charge wirelessly? Hello, future.

You can follow Corian^® on Facebook and Corian^® Twitter to keep up with them and their latest innovations.

June 22, 2015