First Born Curious. The End.

I excel in procrastinating.

I also excel in obsessively working on a task until complete.

Once I decide to get 'er done.

(Larry the Cable Guy is way overrated. As is his overdone phrase I used annoyingly above.)

Here is the final product of my almost-10-year-old-curious-boy's-bedroom:

Probably the only time it will be a nicely made bed.

Curious and I both stinkaroo at bed making. Workin on it.

Well, he is. Me? Not so much.

I've never really understood the art of daily bed making.

Someday I'd like to learn it. But I've got better things to do for now.

Painted a section of black wall behind the bed to ground it in the room.

Added an old barnwood frame with a display of curiosities.

Wrote some random words around the perimeter of the paint with white chalk.

Next to the bed he has lots of places to store his gatherings:

A view directly across from the bed. His coin collecting desk area.

His favorite coins went into plain frames that he can easily access.

Fake wood clipboards are the el-cheapo version to display stuff.

No need for an expensive built-in window seat.

A set of wood and metal schoolhouse chairs does the job. Scored the whole set for $10:

His collections and curiosities are displayed on the black shelves in front of the black window wall. I wanted it dark so the objects would pop.

The 6 foot antique snakeskin mount became an unusual window dressing.

Not my original plan, but not planning is typical for me.

So is spilling food on myself daily.

I adhered vintage game cards around the window trim and Mr. Puffer hangs from Mr. Snake.

Last, but not least...

This is for the peeps who thought there's no way an old elk leg could look cool:

I know you're out there. And you still may not think dat's cool.

It's okay because I like it. Plus Curious is the only one I need to please.

And Curious loves it.

His room.

All of it.

First Born Curious

I have another Sweet Love in my life.

(If you want to know who Sweet Love is, and the story behind my shop name, read this)

My other Sweet Love is my first-born son who I love just as sweetly.

He doesn't have a nick name so I'll call him Curious. Because he is. So is his mother.

Curious is 9 with a birthday coming the end of May. Double digits.

Woah! (said in the voice of Joey from the 90s sitcom, Blossom)

Where did the time go?

Curious has always been a collector. Always into gathering rocks, specimens, shells. Anything small and sortable. Even as a toddler, he would walk along the sidewalk and study any little speck. Pick up a leaf in wonderment. He was a happy but serious toddler. And curious.

My latest creative project is to finally decorate his bedroom. After 2 years of living here.

I excel at procrastinating. Obviously.

Here is the starting inspiration of some of the things that Curious loves:

• An old diamondback rattlesnake skin mount
• Antique elk leg (it's twin is in the shop!)
• Gigantic steer horn mount
• Wolf or coyote skull
• Preserved puffer fish I brought back from Mexico
• Gator head he picked out on a family vacay to Florida.

Curious also has jars full of rocks, shells, shark teeth and fossilized miscellany. Along with:

A kangaroo foot his auntie brought back from down under.

Blue Morpho butterfly mounts from Brazil. Done by my dad, who is also quite curious and always has a hobby/obsession of some sort. Grandpa has recently gotten his grandson into major coin collecting. Fits the bill. Small and sortable.

1938 schoolhouse map I found thrifting. Curious begged me not to sell.

A vintage preserved snake head I also bought to sell in the shop. Again, I got the, "Mom, please-please-please don't sell this!"

I must admit, I love this. I love that I'm not doing a stereo-typical boys sports room. Not that it wouldn't be fun, but this road is much closer to my house in Unusualville.

Next steps: Paint. Bedding. Incorporate textures. Assemble. Repurpose. Re-arrange. Think outside box. Research. Donate old stuff. Bring in old stuff.

And do it all in my creative, thrifty way.

It definitely won't look like a page out of the Pottery Barn Kids catalog. Thank God.

(No offense Pottery Barn. You are just too mainstream. I want it to look more unique than you and not scream POTTERY BARN!)

So stay tuned...

For his Museum of Natural History living space.

And quite a curious one it will be.

Tacky-dermy

Bucks on walls.

Uncool. In my opinion, of course.

Hubby loves to hunt and we have a preserved antelope head mount in our basement.

I should mention that the above is not Hubby in picture. Nor is it our basement.

I'm generally not attracted to the black-rectangular-mask-over-face-with-XL-overalls-that-takes-pics-of -self-with-favorite-deer-mounts type.

But I bet this guy would have an entertaining garage sale.

I see Hubby's antelope head as a decorating challenge that I will make look cool.

Somehow. Someday.

Maybe I'll mix up the antelope head with these ghost mounts from Pedlar's Webstore:

Totally cool.

And fish mounts? Gag.

Unless they are these:

I would love a Mahi dolphin bull fish or Sailfish mount.

I think they would look amazing in a well decorated room.

Plus they are nostalgic for me.

My Papa (grandpa) caught one of each in his young years in Florida and they were mounted up at his cabin in Forest Lake.

Which has long been sold. And the memory is so faint, but it is there.

And Papa has been gone for a long time.

He lived to be like, 96 or something.

He just died of plain 'ol age.

With plain 'ol good taste in design.

Damn Stinkin' Chairs

This damn stinkin' chair.

I love this chair.

I have a thing for chairs in general. Vintage ones.

I lugged this one home a while ago and can't find room for it.

I've been walking around it, stubbing my toes on it, and moving it from room to room.

Apparently stubbing my toes on one chair that I didn't need wasn't enough.

So I brought home this chair 2 days ago:

So awesome. So Anthropologie.

Except Anthropologie would have a price tag of $899.

Of course I can't find a spot for it.

And I've been walking around it.

And stubbing my toes on it.

Damn stinkin' chairs.

A Very Eclectic Girl

I am not a matchy girl.

I've never been one to purchase the 7 piece set from Slumberland including matching lamps. Way too predictable for me. And I definitely don't want my house to look exactly like a page out of The Pottery Barn catalog. Don't get me wrong, Pottery Barn is great and I own a couple things from there. Key word: couple.

Combining styles along with vintage/new pieces has always been my thing. Interior design & decorating have long been a passion of mine. (I am also an artist and crafty girl, so this fits right in with what my brain craves.)

I also consider myself lucky that Hubby lets me make the decisions in the decorating department. (Thank God, or we would have a rugged-dead-animals-and-stuffed-fish-on-the-wall-with-the-Slumberland-matching-7-piece-set-and-deer-antler-chandelier living room). However, he usually freaks out when I lug home a "new" piece of furniture that in his mind is ugly. He has a hard time looking outside the box, but once I put it all together he is usually happy with the result.

Except that one time I turned an antique chicken coop into a coffee table.

There has never been gobs of disposable income in our house so I have to get creative. I'm not complaining - it's fun to challenge myself to make a room look good on a major budget.

Take our dining room for instance:





The only things purchased new were the rug (West Elm), the throw pillows and the centerpiece.

• Black vintage 1969 modern line sofa: Thrifted


• Mid century modern chrome base table with wood top: Craigslist


• Vintage chairs: Craigslist - paid for the table to go with them but didn't take it. Too matchy. The chairs were boring brown wood with horrid covers but they had awesome lines. I painted them with a few cans of white spray paint and recovered the pads with black easy-to-wipe vinyl from Wal-Mart.


• Vintage geranium placemats: Thrifted and for sale in my shop!