Jason and I have been dreaming big lately… dreaming about houses. I’m not ready to tell you why yet.
Here are some inspiring images I’ve found.
Dream Home Inspiration: Exterior
10/25/2011
8 Comments | 
Art, Art: mid-century design, Art: modern design | Tagged: dream home, dreaming, eichler, homes, inspiration, mid-century modern, modern | 
Permalink
Posted by mahlbrandt
Phone Photo Friday
10/21/2011
1 Comment | Art, Art: God's creation, Art: mid-century design, Art: Phone Photo Friday | Tagged: cell phone photography, fall, home, mid-century modern, our house, Phone Photo Friday, ranch | Permalink
Posted by mahlbrandt
Rocker
10/03/2011
I was so excited that I have something to share that’s not related to foster care or babies… it’s actually home related and mid-century modern, too! Then I realized it is still very much related to foster care and babies. Oh well. I tried.
Last Monday night I emailed Jason a link and said, “Can I get this? I want to rock my babies.” He replied back, “Yes dear. You can rock your babies in that chair. Go for it. Sweet mama and wife, I love you!” A couple of clickety clicks later on my Amazon iPhone app and it was ordered. It arrived on Thursday. Talk about rockin’ service! It took no more than 5 minutes to assemble and is exactly what I was hoping for. A white plastic-shell Eames replica rocking chair for our kids room. Precious and I have been enjoying it.
PS. If you want to get a real deal Eames rocker, you can buy one through Herman Miller for $479.
6 Comments | Art, Art: Bedoom for Foster Kids, Art: interior design, Art: kids room, Art: mid-century design, Art: modern design, Family, Family: Foster Parenting | Tagged: babies, baby, eames, kids room, mid-century modern, nursery, retro, rocker, rocking chair | Permalink
Posted by mahlbrandt
A New/Old Dresser
07/07/2011Feeling the pressure of our home study and inspection encroaching, I purchased a less-than-ideal dresser on craigslist a couple months ago.
What we wanted: a mid-century, not to wide, medium stained wood, changing-table-height dresser. Like this inspiration board picture:
What we got: a modern Target brand, dark reddish-brown wood, not too wide, a little too tall for changing table height dresser.
I had been searching craigslist, thrift stores and estate sales for months for the ideal dresser and hadn’t found it. On Sunday Jason suggested we stop by Pre-to-Post Modern, a retro and vintage store in Nashville, just for fun. There I discovered the perfect dresser. A mid-century, not to wide, medium stained wood, changing-table-height dresser.
Thank God, we resold the first dresser on craigslist in less than 24 hours for the same price we bought it for. And the new/old replacement was only $24 more.
Lucy approves. Or perhaps assumed I was taking pictures of her.
6 Comments | Art, Art: interior design, Art: kids room, Art: mcm thrift store find, Art: mid-century design | Tagged: dresser, kids room, mid-century modern, vintage | Permalink
Posted by mahlbrandt
House Tour: Kitchen & Dining Room
06/27/2011Kitchen
Our living room connects to the kitchen and dining room. Just before we bought our house in 2007 it was fully renovated. The original hardwoods throughout the house were refinished, some walls were removed, everything was covered in a fresh coat of paint. The room the presumably had the most floor-to-ceiling changes was the kitchen. The cabinets are from IKEA. The countertops are square foot granite tiles. The floors are 2-ft travertine tiles. I love that it’s open and airy. It never feels too small to me, except when we have parties and everyone ends up standing around in the kitchen. (Why is that?)
Dining Room
Yes, it bothers me that the light in the dining room is not centered over the table. It’s even worse when the table is extended to it’s full length. Someday we’ll get around to fixing that… and probably changing the light altogether. It’s a small dining room but it works. The walls in the dining room and kitchen are Sherwin Williams Greek White. The door there leads into Jason’s studio (which used to be considered the den).
4 Comments | Art, Art: house tour, Art: interior design, Art: mid-century design, Art: modern design | Tagged: house tour, kitchen, mid-century modern, our home | Permalink
Posted by mahlbrandt
Phone Home Home Phone
04/27/2011When I first found out that we have to have a land line home phone available for our foster children to use, I was excited to go out and find a retro one like this. It’s $40, looks like it’s mid-century but it’s all new digital technology:
Then I remembered these really cool clear trimline phones from the early 90s that light up when they ring. My big brother used to have one but I searched my parents house and it’s no where to be found. I read here that Urban Outfitters was selling them last year for $28 but they’re not available anymore. Boo.
Then, we talked about it in class with an experience resource parent and realized that we should get one with a speaker phone. And while we’re at it, you can get a pretty fancy digital cordless phone for less than $20. So much for retro-cool.
Anyone have any suggestions for land line phone service? It costs $25 a month to add phone service to our AT&T Uverse internet service. Not a huge chunk of change but it still seems like a waste of money to me. Requirements are requirements, though.
Help me out here, readers. Do you still have a home phone? If you have a cell phone, why? How much do you pay a month for service?
4 Comments | Art, Art: mid-century design, Family, Family: Foster Parenting, Other | Tagged: home phone, land line, mid-century modern | Permalink
Posted by mahlbrandt
Merry Christmas from My Mid-Century Modern Life!
12/06/2010
I’ll be celebrating Christmas for the next few weeks on this blog, mid-century modern style. I hope you stick around. It’s the most wonderful time of the year … though I could do without the cold weather! 🙂
Jason and I got an early Christmas present from my parents this year: a fresh balsam wreath. It’s lovely and it smells like Christmas. We had it hanging in the house for the first few days so we could enjoy the smell but it started shedding a lot so we moved it out to the front door. Isn’t it lovely?
1 Comment | Art, Art: mid-century design, Art: modern design | Tagged: Christmas, evergreen, mid-century modern, wreath | Permalink
Posted by mahlbrandt
Naples, Florida: Mid-Century Modern
07/13/2010Naples has a lot of mid-century modern architecture: lots of peach and turquoise ranch homes with concrete block, flat or slow slung roofs. There was even an A-frame walk-up Dairy Queen. But … I did a lousy job documenting all of that. I was too busy looking out the windows and taking it all in. And leaving my camera and cell phone at the hotel for fear of sand somehow working it’s way into my precious electronics. Sorry. I did take a few mediocre pictures. Next time I’ll do a better job of documenting the neighborhoods.
1 Comment | Art, Art: Drive-By Shooting, Art: mid-century design, Art: modern design | Tagged: mid-century modern | Permalink
Posted by mahlbrandt
George Nelson Starburst Clock
02/24/2010When we moved into our house 3 years ago I immediately started keeping my eye out for a great deal on a mid-century starburst clock for our dining room. Problems: the cool ones are super expensive, usually electric and many are brass with traditional roman numerals … we prefer something more modern.
Here’s a beautiful example of Westclok brand Sputnik-style atomic wall clock that’s available through Etsy. LOVE the teak and the spokes. It’s $110 and if you have that much money sitting around you should definitely buy this.
Anyhow, last summer at a yard sale Jason and I found a retro modern starburst clock. We haggled with the stingy seller and finally walked away with this plastic time keeper. It was silver-plastic faced with navy blue spokes so we decided to paint it black and white. I’m very happy with the result. We used appliance spray paint on the spokes (because we had some sitting around) giving them a really glossy finish. (I’ve blogged about it before.)
Also, we changed out the hands to some simple chrome pieces from a free clock I got from work.
Recently, I saw a blog post somewhere about this clock available from MoMA. I can’t believe it! I think our plastic garage sale find must be a replica of George Nelson’s 1949 Starburst Clock. The aluminum and wood version from MoMA is also a replica. And those clock hands? Yeah, that’s what ours looked like, only navy.
I’m not ashamed to admit that I like ours the best! Sorry George. And now that I know it’s a George Nelson replica, what was intended to be a temporary place holder for a vintage atomic clock will be sticking around.
One of the owners of Wonders on Woodland – our neighborhood MCM antique store – gave Jason and I a valuable piece of advice last year. If a piece fits with your decor and looks vintage who cares if it’s just a replication or modern interpretation of mid-century. It’s your home – fill it with things you love!
1 Comment | Art, Art: interior design, Art: mcm thrift store find, Art: mid-century design, Art: modern design | Tagged: atomic clock, mid-century modern, retro clock, retro modern, yard sale find | Permalink
Posted by mahlbrandt
A Teapot, Short & Stout {MCM thrift store find}
01/19/2010Not technically from a thrift store, we got this funky, mustard-yellow, wood-handled teapot from Stu on our trip to Cincinnati. (We met him at a thrift store so it’s almost a thrift store find.) This was one of the first things Jason spotted when we walked in the door.
It’s definitely vintage and the inside was really cruddy. It had some caked-on calcified minerals stuck to the bottom and insides. (I made that up but it was something hard and gross!) Thankfully my amazing, persistent, determined husband spent hours soaking, scrubbing, soaking, scraping and washing it until the speckled cobalt blue insides were restored almost back to their original mid-century modern glory.
Leave a Comment » | Art, Art: Cooking, Art: mcm thrift store find, Art: mid-century design, Art: modern design | Tagged: mcm thrift store find, mid-century modern, stu nitzy, teapot, vintage | Permalink
Posted by mahlbrandt
myMCMlife.com 