Summer's End

Around here the mornings and evenings are cooling down, but the days are still hot. With school back in session and the days getting shorter, I’m almost willing to embrace fall. But – summer still has a bit of a hold on me. I’m not quite ready to string up colored leaves and buy pumpkins. Still, I’m willing to say goodbye to seashells and flowered tablecloths.

I came up with this simple centerpiece to celebrate the golden end of summer.

I started with a vintage tablecloth and added a jute wrapped wreath I made a year or so ago. A red fiestaware salad plate happened to balance perfectly in the center of the wreath. I topped it with a milk glass vase of fall blooms.

I love the mix of warm yellow, natural jute, fresh white, and a small pop of red.

Mmmm, there’s nothing quite like the afternoon light this time of year.

How do you decorate for the changing of the seasons?

<3
Hattie

vintage goodness

I had to show y'all the adorable vintage tablecloth my parents gave Brad and I for our anniversary.

It just has "summer" written all over it! I love how the red, blue, and green pick up all the colors in the kitchen. The blue especially helps the blue glass bottle and the blue in the framed flour sack pop out amidst all the red.

I didn't think my little woven lemon worked as well with this tablecloth as it did with the cloth that used to be on the table, so I borrowed from another room for a new centerpiece.

This lovely red glass is actually a wasp catcher, but I love it too much to hang it outside. It used to reside on the hall table, but I'm really liking it on this saucer as a centerpiece. I'm thinking that if I play around with it enough, I should be able to figure out how to get a candle to stand upright inside the glass for a little extra glam at dinner time!

<3

Hattie

A little more red for the roost

I'm 26 today and I have two new birthday treats to show you that add a little extra red to the kitchen. I also received some wonderful gift cards and checks that I'll use for new clothes for me and some new decor for the roost. Thanks to everyone who made my birthday special!

Here is the little tablescape I put together with the new dashes of red.

My Grandma gave me the red glass jar, and I found the red wire basket yesterday at the Dollar Tree.

Those pink carnations are still going from the Mother's Day tea party two weeks ago! I love the texture the basket adds to the arrangement. It feels a little beachy to me as well, sort of like a wire lobster trap. My Dollar tree had them in red, white, and blue in the 4th of July section. What an awesome basket for only a buck! I plan to use it mostly as a bread basket, lined with a crisp white napkin, but it could also hold rolls of silverware, a few small books, office supplies, etc. Go get one before they sell out!

This vintage glass jar is also pretty swell. I love the funky raised design. I think this will be great for storing cookies or flour, but I can also envision it full of white tulips or daisies.

Have a wonderful Memorial Day tomorrow!

<3

Hattie

Ain't no party like a tea party!

So, the Mother's Day tea party on Saturday was so much fun! We all enjoyed being girly, getting dressed up, and eating tiny food. My mom and grandma even wore fancy straw hats. I'll have to post some pictures later so you can see what southern belles we were. For now, I have some pictures of the tables and decorations.

Here is everything right before I laid out the goodies.

I searched everywhere for a little tablecloth or runner, but I couldn't find anything I liked. On Friday I spotted a pack of five flour sack cloths at Wal-Mart and got a brainstorm. I took those suckers home, printed out a few of my clip-art flowers on some iron-on sheets, and made two tiny custom tablecloths.

A little close up of the center piece.

While I was on a clip-art kick, I also made laminated name cards for each place setting.

So, yes, it is a little matchy-cutesy, but tea parties scream for matchy-cutesy. Plus, it's really fun to go all out girly every once and awhile.

Here's a better look at the whole table.

I experimented a little with the tea party spread. I usually just lay everything out on plates and trays, but I thought it would be more visually appealing to have things at varying heights. I only have one real cake stand, so I had to get a little creative.

Why yes, those are indeed upside down milk glass vases. I just stuck a little plastic wrap between the vases and the plates to keep things from shifting around.

It worked pretty well, and it was fun to do something different.

Here is everything with the goodies all spread out.

Yummy!

Happy Mother's Day Mom and Grandma! I love you both very much!

<3

Hattie

An Invitation

All the women in my family love tea, and we all love tea parties. I figure I should take that as a sign that a Mother's Day tea party is in order for this year. I have some very cool ideas for laying the table and displaying the goodies that I'll share after the fact, but today I wanted to show you the invitations I made.

I was inspired by these Target plates my mom and I found at Goodwill a few years ago. I just love how girly and vintage looking they are. I don't get a chance to use them very often, so they will definitely be put to use for the party. Since I love them so much, I thought I'd design the invitations to match.

I am very good at assembling things and very bad at drawing, so I knew I would need to start with some clip art. I don't have any fancy designer software on my computer, so I used plain old Microsoft Word.

This cute clip art was close enough to the flower design on the plates to make a good starting point. The key to manipulating clip art is a little trick called grouping and ungrouping. It is definitely worth reading the help section in word on grouping to get a good overview of this, but I'll give you the gist.

First insert the clip art in a blank document. Now, on the drawing tool bar at the bottom of the screen you should be able to select ungroup.

This allows you to manipulate every part of the clip art. You can delete elements, move them around, and change the size and color. When you're done, just click on regroup to save the new image.

I took the bee clip art from above and tweaked it to make the two flowers on this invitation.

Then I added two text box borders and matching polka dots to mimic the edge of the plate.

I had to make my own envelopes because I chose to make the invites a bit over sized.

I just folded and glued paper to fit around the invite, then folded and glued the bottom manila envelope style. The top is left open so the invitation can be pulled out by the ribbon. These will be hand delivered on Friday, so they won't have to stand up to the postal service.

So, If any of you are as neurotic as me and would like to match your invitations to your plates, or shoes, or wallpaper, or whatever, now you know how!

<3

Hattie

The red in the roost - the kitchen

As you know if you've read my profile, The Little Red Roost is so named because it is painted red, but also because I have a passion for all things red. There is something so vibrant and cheerful about red. If energy and enthusiasm were a color, they would be red. So, in honor of my favorite color, let's take a tour of all the little splashes of red I have around the roost.

I thought I should start with the kitchen, because saying it has a splash of red is something of an understatement. Some people would probably say I've gone overboard, but standing in my kitchen, looking at all the cute, vintage red items, makes me feel happy and inspired.

When you turn the corner from the front door to the kitchen, this is the view you see if you look to your left.

The graphic cookie jar was half price after Christmas and Wal-Mart! My Mix Master and red cow creamer are two of my very favorite things in the kitchen.

Now, take a step forward and look straight ahead.

Little red table from Class and Trash

Ok, now turn to your right

Another piece from Class and Trash. My mom convinced me that framing this empty flour sack would make a great piece of artwork for the kitchen - she was right!

And to your right again.

Turn right one more time and head out of the kitchen

Because the modern gift for a first anniversary is a clock, my parents found this awesome kitty-kat clock for us. The tail even wags!

So there ya have it - a little taste of my red kitchen!

Which room should be next - bedroom or living room?

<3

Hattie

Spring Spruce Up

In honor of spring (and because I wasn't a huge fan of the blogger default settings) I decided to spruce up the blog with a new page header. I made this using a great free program called scrapblog. This highly addictive site allows users to create professional looking digital scrapbooks. Of course, they would also love to sell you printed versions of your creations, which do look very nice. The cool thing about scrapblog, it that they also allow you to save your pages to your computer as JPEGs, meaning you can use your creations in anyway you would any digital photo. This makes scrapblog my go-to site for adding a little pizazz to a website. When I first discovered the program I used it to make the "about us" page for my library. I also used it to create our Christmas cards this year. Take a peak below. You could use this same concept for more springy events like save the date cards or graduation announcements.



I got a little carried aways and made three different versions, but I think this is my favorite.



But I really like this one because of the snowman!



Thanks to my amazingly talented friend, Tracy for taking the photos of Brad and I!

Happy scrapblogging!

<3

Hattie

Out with the old

After Valentine’s Day, I always feel like spring should just get here already. In an effort to speed things along, I decided it was time to switch out my winter drinking glasses, with my vintage daisy glasses.





I love the red snowmen and snowflake designs on these Target glasses, and the fact that they were purchased half price after Christmas two years ago.

These stay out for the rest of the year. I think the yellow and white daisy pattern is a nice contrast to the red fiestaware dishes.

It may not be spring outside, but at least it’s starting to feel sunnier in my kitchen!

<3

Hattie