Pix from my creative field trip

Sometimes you just need to get out and see the world to get some inspiration, aka go shopping with your girlfriend(s). So that is what Wendy and I did yesterday. Here's a look at what tickled our fancies:

Our first stop was Architectural Antiques, 403 Dawson, on the near east side of San Antonio, where I spied these great old ceiling tiles. I am thinking of facing the skirt around the tub in my bathroom with these. The plain old white tile is rather boring.

Wendy was looking for some columns to use as decor pieces in the remodelling of their nursing home. Nestbit Living & Recovery Center in Seguin is going to be like no other nursing home I've ever seen:

This pair of columns were just the right height, and also still had what's left of their paint job. Architectural Antiques strips a lot of what they sell, but Wendy wanted the old crusty paint. She said she only needed one column but I was so uncomfortable with that idea. "You can't just buy one of them. What about the other one? You can't just leave it here," I reasoned. She bought them both. Women are just reasonable that way.

While Wendy was seriously shopping, I noticed I really liked the "patina" on this old door. If I was to use this as a linen closet or pantry door, I would leave it just the way it is.

My favorite thing about enormous old antique stores and warehouses like this are the surprises you'll find around every corner. This beauty below was hanging from the ceiling -- above the loading dock. Go figure.

Totally gorgeous and interesting. You won't see this quirky chandelier hanging over the breakfast nook in your local McMansion. Please note: they do not sell this in the Pottery Barn catalogue. I really, really wanted to take it home.

OK these were so cool and I'm sorry I don't know their official name. They were in the lighting area and so I know they are globes for some kind of hanging light fixture. They were fabulously gold on the outside and silver mercury glass-like on the inside. LOVE IT!

I could imagine myself building an entire house around this door. It was at least 8 feet tall.

If you have just the place for this cool old bank vault door from the old Jourdanton State Bank, it will only cost you $12,000. I'm betting for that price you would be furnished with the combination.

After spending around two hours in that big old warehouse, we got a good recommendation for lunch and found our way to Madhatter's in King William. They have an inspired menu of sandwiches and soups and teas and wines. It looks like the restaurant is located in two old houses joined but a glassed in connecting hallway. Rooms go this way and that and so it's easy to find a great place for conversation. It's also a cell-phone-free zone, the big sign tells you at the door.

When we were walking to our car after lunch, I spied this darling house with the good paint job:

You can't tell from the picture, but the wall color is a soft blue/green. The trim is a creamy antique white but much less white than it appears in this picture. And then those dark accents were a darker green that I wasn't crazy about but it was still very well-done.

We then visited some quirky second-hand shops in the Midtown area on Blanco Road north of downtown, but the salvage place we wanted to visit was closed. There were some interesting pieces suitable for transformation but in major need of new upholstery, right across the street from Casbeers. Next time we'll have to make the trip there again and then see what's going on over on Hildebrand. ...

When you first get one of these awards, it's real exciting because you feel someone finally noticed. And then comes the pressure. It's akin to receiving one of those chain letter emails that suggests if you don't forward it on to at least 29 people you do not love the Lord. I hate those. At first I sent them and then I decided the Lord knows me and he won't mind if I don't play along. He did make me a non-conformist, after all.

But Honest Scrap? This one is fun. Here are the rules: First, choose a minimum of seven blogs that you find brilliant in content or design. Secondly, show the seven winners' names and links on your blog, and leave a comment informing them that they were prized with “Honest Scrap." Well, there’s no prize, but they can keep the nifty icon. Lastly, list at least ten honest things about yourself.

I don't know if I have discovered a minimum of seven brilliant blogs yet but I'll nominate the blogs I like and hopefully if they've already been awarded and/or think these awards are stupid, they'll just ignore them. I do think they are useful for drawing blog readers to your blog if that's your intent.

Brilliant Blogs

1. Lucchese to Louis Vuitton. Honest woman that Meg. And she always plays a song on there that makes me go back in the day and get all misty-eyed. Her latest series on divorce has killed me. And she's also a West Texas girl which is all I have to say about that.

2. Hill Country House. Don't know her at all but whenever I check out her blog she always has something on there design-related that interests me. Special note: she is based in the Hill Country (duh!) so she's kind of local and the places she writes about are do-able.

3. Laura U Blog. She's way to busy to respond to this award, but Laura U of Laura U Collection always has something interesting to say on her blog and something interesting to buy in her store.

4. Design-Block. I'm always looking for a new post from Miss Design-Block and we really do need to have lunch because I have a lot of questions I want to pick out of her brain that are design-related. We go way back ... and yes, she's another West Texas girl.

OK, that's all I can muster. I have other blogs I follow when I can, but these are my top four that I think even need mentioning. Some of the others, like Cote de Texas are just too world famous, so I'm not even going to bother. And Lavenderchick nominated me for this award so she's already gotten it.

OK now for the hard part. 10 Honest Things about Me. Yikes.

1. I am fiercely conservative and crazy-liberal, all at the same time.

2. My zone of personal space is extremely wide and deep.

3. Which brings me to the fact that I cannot allow anyone breathing my air. Space issues.

4. I have a thing for chihuahuas. Don't ask me why.

5. I don't like interruptions. I like to get in a groove and go with it. Now you know why I'm so frustrated.

6. In high school I had a spiky mullet. I was trying to be all rock n roll, hard core. It was the 80s, what can I say?

7. The test you take in high school that tells you what you should be when you grow up suggested that I should be a plumber. At the time I thought that was the most ridiculous thing I'd ever heard, but now that I am a decorative painter and realize I like to work alone, in my painted groove, of course, I completely understand. It only took me 25 years to get to this place...

8. I was artistically frustrated for most of my life. And that's why I am a fierce proponent of arts education for ALL children and why the public school system makes me insane.

9. I wish I could eat sushi every day.

10. I take note of the artwork in construction jobsite port-a-potties. In fact, I am going to start chronicling this for all the world to see because it's fascinating. So don't steal my idea.

There's a big question mark hovering over my head...

Make a note of this day: I'm asking for help because I don't know what to do. I'm generally pretty self-sufficient (which isn't always a good thing but can come in handy in a pinch), but I just don't know what to do about this particular problem. So I am seeking the advice of my six or or five blog readers.


OK. Here is the dilemma. You all know I love transforming interesting pieces of furniture with paint and whatever else to give them new life. And, I just happen to have a garage/studio full of stuff that needs a home. I see pieces all the time that are just begging me to fix them and find them a home. I can't buy any more because there's no room. The real problem is, I don't have any idea what I'm supposed to do with the stuff if I was to transform it. So I'm stuck and meanwhile there's not much room for painting the pieces people are actually going to pay me to paint.



See what I mean? I love, love, this cocktail table but I already have a one that I cannot get rid of ... someone else really needs it. I also can see it with floor cushions all around it...

So here sit all these lonely pieces of furniture. If I were to get started on it, will it be the right color? How will the person who needs it even know it's available? Where can I display these treasures for sale? I've said my greatest desire is to hole up in my garage and create these works of art and then have them magically sell. I have the know-how and the want-to, I just don't have the how or the where or the who when it comes to sales. And, I don't exactly live in a hotbed of artsiness. But I am willing to travel.

A retail store requires labor and being stuck there and rent and all that overhead. I've already done that. Online? Ebay or etsy? This is really appealing, but some of this stuff is big. Website? That's great but you gotta know it's a website before you go there and check it out and buy it. I'm perplexed. A cooperative venture is really what I need, but where, and with whom? The perfect thing would be a really cool store with furniture & art & jewelry & my stuff scattered within it.

So there you have it: What should I do?

Do you really want to know this?

It's been so long since I have blogged, I almost wonder whether to blog and why? Does anyone need to know what I'm doing? Does anyone care?

I originally thought I'd blog to promote my work. As an artist, it's difficult to mix in marketing and promotion. In my perfect world, I'd retreat into my garage and not come out until I had created the perfect faux ocelot masterpiece on a shabby little piece of furniture someone had sold at a garage sale -- and then watch as my transformed masterpiece magically sold itself so I could buy some new shoes. When I work, I bust my hump, mostly to suit myself (which is a really hard job). Somehow the client almost always loves it. When it seems like I'm just doing a job for money, and not personally doing my part at beautifying the world, it's no fun. Maybe blogging is self-analyzing. Hmmm.

After that fascinating peek into my twisted personality, here's a gallery of sorts of what I did last year. Depending on how many images make my cut, it will be my Top 6 or 5. (six or five is just funner to say than five or six). These are in no particular order, because it's just a hassle to move the pictures around.

Patty's powder room. It's just pretty and you want to be in Patty's house because of Patty. Base color is SW Nomadic Desert.

My shower wall. This has everything but the kitchen sink on it, but includes Fauxstone Pull-off and a couple of colors of Lusterstone over SW Blonde. It makes me happy everyday.

Who doesn't love lime green bar stools? The antiquing stain makes them a little edgy.

The client wanted leopard. I procrastinated and couldn't find a stencil locally. I didn't know how to do leopard. So maybe two days before the install, I sat down with a printout of leopard skin and made it happen with a cheapy paint brush from my daughters' watercolors. I was quite pleased. God was with me that day, for sure, because I had no idea what I was doing.

Gwynne's powder room. It was so hard and it looks so good. This is Topaz Venetian Gem & wax, and that's all I'm going to tell you. When you walk into the room, you just have to reach out and touch the wall to see what it is.

Though I wasn't in love with this tile, the paint color on these cabinets was such a rich red. The only problem was the painters had cut it so thin everytime you brushed past them they'd scuff. So I antiqued and sealed them and they were awesome. The growling, teeth-baring, massive barking dog on this job that the client told me was just "all bark" and would "eventually leave me alone" made me really glad to get the hell out of that house.

I really worked on my skins last year. This looks like yummy dark brown leather.

Anything I did in a powder bath with this fabulous light fixture is going on my top list. I just love it. And I love the client with the balls to pick it out. When I am a few years older, I want to be like her. Tough and confident and rich so I can be philanthropic.

And then there was my favorite blog, I mean rant, of the year. If you are curious, just click here.