Posters for Sale

10/01/2012

I recently got inspired to design a new Welcome Home Mid-Century Modern Poster (maybe because I’ve been longing for “home” so much?) I ordered a few extra so I could restock my Etsy shop. They’re 11×17 and cost $12 plus shipping if you’re interested.

Also, because I get requests for it every year I’ve added the Wishing You a Shiny Brite Christmas poster back to my Etsy shop as well. Same as the Welcome Home poster – 11×17 and $12 plus shipping.

I’m trying something new this year. I also turned two color variations of the Shiny Brite Christmas poster into downloadable PDFs that can be printed at home on 8.5″ x 11″ paper. They’re $2 a piece and free shipping, of course.

Shiny Brite Poster – Green Print-at-Home   /  Shiny Brite Poster – Brown Print-at-Home

I’ll probably mention these again as Christmas gets closer—I know, I know, Christmas decorations on October 1st—but I wanted to get them into my shop early this year so I’m ready to go.

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Phone Photo Friday

09/28/2012

Most of my Phone Photo Friday pictures are from my Instagram feed. Follow me @mahlbrandt if you’d like!

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New Home Update

09/27/2012

We have had a lot of work done on our new house the past couple weeks that’s not very visually interesting. We’ve had duct work run for the heating and cooling system. We’ve had gas lines run for appliances and vents for those appliances. We’ve had all the electrical work in the house roughed in.

Also, the courtyard leading up the front door got cleared out and a concrete footer was poured for the steps.

Next up: concrete for the front porch and steps, the garage and the back patio. I think. And soon after that: insulation, doors and drywall. Woohoo! We’re half way there.

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BAS Lampshades

09/25/2012

Have ever mentioned how much Jason loves lamps? I call him a lamp lover, because I think it’s funny. But he seriously finds the greatest mid-century modern lamps every time we’re out hunting. Recently, we realized we have 8 lamps that need shades. We’ve been trying to find simple white or off white cylindrical drum shades, with no bell. That aren’t super expensive. Why is that so difficult?

We decided to take matters into our own hands. I sent Jason a link to this tutorial and he ordered and shopped for supplies to make our first 4 shades. So far we’ve just made one, because half the lamps are in storage and the other half…we don’t have anywhere to put anything these days. We made this guy 15″ in diameter, 12″ high with white muslin. What do you think?

Lucy is in this shot for scale. A big lamp needs a big shade.

Otis the lamp got a fresh coat of paint. While painting it, Jason noticed it’s marked Quartite Creative Corp. 1959. Remember the original?

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Phone Photo Friday

09/21/2012

Most of my Phone Photo Friday pictures are from my Instagram feed. Follow me @mahlbrandt if you’d like!

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Cincinnati Visit – September 2012

09/19/2012

Besides checking out the Sign Museum, we also had some time to just chill out and hang out with our friends Sean and Renata and their crew. Their house is so cool! It’s like an MCM showroom. It’s fun to share that interest with them.

We also had a very important little dude that we were anxious to meet. Little Jonas and Ali are birthday buddies! They share July 20 and are one year apart.

Renata and her dad with Jonas. (Her mom was there also but not feeling well, so no pics.)

Ali and Olivia are very close in age and this is the first visit where they’ve really been able to play together. “Play” meaning mostly taking toys from each other…we’re working on sharing.

Ben has a special place in my heart. He was one of the first babies born to any of our close friends, right after this dear family moved away from Nashville. He’s a cool kid. My two favorite Ben quotes from the weekend:

1. Sitting around the table eating breakfast: “I have a lot of babies! Baby Olivia, Baby Jonas, Baby Alianna!” Yes, Ben, you have a lot of responsibility!

2. After his dad asked him if he wanted some coffee. “Noooo! I’m a boy! I’m not a man!”

A few more cuddles with our buddies before we left go to IKEA and then home to Nashville.

Good friends are a blessing from the Lord! We love you guys! Thanks for having us!

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American Sign Museum

09/18/2012

A few weeks ago while we were up in Cincinnati visiting friends, we went to the American Sign Museum. There were lots of signs and it was very cool, especially for this graphic designer. That’s about all I need to say about it.

Look The Erie Enameling Company from Erie, PA! That’s where we’re from.

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Phone Photo Friday

09/14/2012

Cousins sneaking in a little more pool time before it’s too late. Ali calls her “Eye-za” and Eliza calls her “Owie.” They’re good buddies.

Most of my Phone Photo Friday pictures are from my Instagram feed. Follow me @mahlbrandt if you’d like!

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New Home: Kitchen Plan

09/12/2012

I sketched out the plan for our new kitchen in my moleskine journal:

Make sense?

Basically, I want walnut-stained wood cabinet doors on the base cabinets and white wall cabinets. Somewhere on the same wall as the refrigerator, I want a small open shelf for our everyday dishes and glasses. Plus, a whole lot of specifics that won’t matter to anyone but us.

These are my inspiration kitchens:

Source: Uploaded by user via Martina on Pinterest

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Source: designsponge.com via Martina on Pinterest

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Source: designsponge.com via Martina on Pinterest.

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The good thing about our house taking so long is that we have time to change our minds about things as many times as we want. For example, at first we thought we wanted all white cabinets. Now we want half white, half walnut. We thought about doing soapstone countertops or concrete countertops…now we’re set on kashmire granite.

Here’s my inspiration board, our plan for the kitchen (not that we can’t still change our minds!):

Sources

1. Sherwin Williams Greek Villa – (main color throughout the house)

2. IKEA MINUT pendant 10″ globe lights $30 each

3. White upper wall cabinets

4. 3×6 glass subway tiles for backsplash

5. Delta 9159-DST Trinsic with pull down single handle

6. Double under mount sink (50/50) with lower center wall

7. Kashmire (Cashmere) Granite countertops

8. Woodland Garden 2×3 from Urban Outfitters $18

9. Walnut-stained (probably cherry wood) base cabinets

10. Hickory wood floors

11. Tabouret counter-height metal stools $40 each

12. Whirlpool White Ice appliances

13. Whirlpool 30″ stainless range hood

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Ice, Ice, Baby

09/11/2012

One Friday night we went on a fun family outing to the appliance store to look for a refrigerator, dishwasher and range. We don’t need to purchase them for a while but we figured it would be helpful to decide what we want to get, especially since we had to order the range hood for the HVAC guy. We know we want to get a gas range. They scare me a bit (thanks to our first apartment and its ancient gas range that almost blew up the house…) but Jason is more of a cook and he’s set on it. If he’ll cook more, it’s all fine by me. He assures me that a new gas range will not almost blow up our house. Beyond that, we know that we prefer a side-by-side refrigerator/freezer to the popular french door model.

We just assumed we’d get stainless. That’s what we had in our last house. That’s what you put in new houses. But then… Then, we saw this.

Can you hear the choir of angels singing “Halleluh…” because I can. It might seem silly to most people, but I totally fell in love with this Whirlpool White Ice line of appliances. They’re white but not the textured white with the white handles like we had back in the 90s. They’re a smooth semi-gloss white with sexy stainless handles. (Yes, I just said sexy stainless handles.)

We had a few irritations with the stainless appliance at our last house: 1. they scratched easily, 2. drip marks were constantly appearing on the dishwasher and the freezer door below the water dispenser and 3. toddler hand prints. I can’t say for sure that these won’t scratch or show drip marks but it sure doesn’t seem like it. We asked Ali to test irritation #3 and she was happy to oblige. NO TODDLER HANDPRINTS! Yay!

I’m sold. We walked all around the store looking at other stainless appliances but I couldn’t get White Ice out of my mind. We haven’t purchased them yet, as I mentioned, but we will be. I have a Kitchen Inspiration Board post coming soon.

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