I love to bake…and create. So, in efforts to get ready for Wren’s first birthday party, I decided to create a small dinner party complete with cupcakes & champagne. I envision a little bit of a tea party for grown ups, since really, she’s going to be 1…and she’s not going to remember this. And, Wren is the second kiddo…Beck got the full-on-crazy first birthday. There’s no celebration that says, “yeah, you made it through the first year, with your second baby.” Maybe there should be. So, using the cupcakes for the St. Paddy’s Day bake sale for Beck’s kindergarten last night, I tested out the place settings I wanted to use.

I found some great orange colored glasses at a local thrift store, and some sweet saucers with a teal and silver patina. Using the goblets as stands, and the saucer as the plate, I created little cupcake stands. I think I might use these with some paper treats as placecards or maybe just all together in a first birthday cup-cake arrangement.

The possibilities are endless with a great local-vintage find. Total cost: $1.90. This just needs some sweet letterpress treats…designing is on my mind today.

sweetly: kelsie

Nothing is sweeter than a little hand-made letterpress on this love-ly day.

This Danish Modern beauty was at a yard sale, $30! Look at those arms! The fire-orange is perfect in my white-white 1951 house.

I’m keen on finding, it seems, chairs, on the side of the road. Maybe I should open a shop, “Lizzie’s Lost +Found”? Must it’s the instinct to “nest”, to sit and enjoy my home. It’s a comfy chair in front of the fireplace.

My mom’s apron (apron story shortly).

The Heidelberg moved in thanks to my husband’s hours of coaxing it off a tipped over, oil-covered flatbed. Large things must sometimes be moved by brains + millimeters (think pyramids!), then wiggling it through a door with 1′ to spare. THEN another hour getting it off a pallet jack in a very small studio, with no help at all.

It was synchronicity that got it to Sugarcube; Toxic Coyote Press (aka Frank Boross) wanted to sell and remembered us from the LA Printer’s Fair. He owned it for 25 years. What a gift!

The green chair was literally on the side of the road in Ojai! We were walking and there it was in the weeds. My friend sat in it until I could return with a car. A little shampoo and beating the feather cushion made it gorgeous.

I found the dresser at a garage sale in Seattle; this robin’s egg blue is it’s 3rd paint job, from lacquer black + chartreuse. The knobs are vintage butterfly prints.

In our computer-dynamic insta-world, a REAL Thank You note is more special, unexpected. It used to be one would never not send an immediate handwritten Thank You for a gift, a luncheon or an act of kindness. This man John Kralik www.365thankyounotes.com wrote notes that change his outlook on life… Is there someone you could thank today?

Nothing is complete without the details! So, here they are…

Above, I added willow branches to intertwine on the canopy area of the crib (Bratt Decor’s Venetian Iron Crib). The bedding is from NurseryWorks and has since been discontinued, but I found it at a great discount on Overstock.com. It just happened to be the perfect shade & pattern for the room. I hung some great hand made paper mobiles from the ever-talented Michelle Moode from the crib posts. We had met while we displayed our sweet hand-made goodies at the LA Printer’s Museum, along with some of our L.A. letterpress peeps.

In all my spare time (my bowl is pretty full with sugar), I also freelance design for textiles and printed matter for small businesses (logos & identities, letterhead, business cards, etc.). The textiles on the Petunia Pickle Bottom bags hanging from oversized thread spools on top are some of my favorites that I have created…on the left, their delicious Cake Cosmopolitan Carryall Bag in Pistachio Layer Cake, and their Glazed Boxy Backpack from the Spring 2010 Collection, Tea on the Thames. All packed and ready to go!

In the middle picture are hand-painted watercolor bird prints from the mid to late 1800′s. I hung them on vintage clothing hangers (found on etsy) and used vintage spools of thread to cover the nails. The light fixture was the piece de resistance for me. I had seen, along with everyone else, the beautiful bird cage light fixture from Anthropologie. I thought I could make it myself (I’m still convinced I could). But, time was running out. So, I found one that Urban Outfitters made. But, it just wasn’t the same. It had the great structure, but needed some improvements.  So, I removed all the faux birds and copper perches it came with and replaced them with branches, more realistic faux-birds, butterflies, moss, nests & eggs. And, it came to life once we wired it as a light fixture vs. a plug-in fixture.

On the bottom picture (above), the shelves behind the door, hold felted birds (I had to learn how to felt, of course), along with moss, branches, a nest, a vintage brass birdcage, an old wood type W, and Sugarcube Press’s A to Z letters were used to spell out “Wren.” There’s also a print by Oh My Cavelier!, a couple circa 1850 vintage egg prints, and some silver spoons from my husband’s Grandmother’s Collection.

Hope you’ve enjoyed the sweetness! Now, off to have this baby!

We’re going to be welcoming a new baby girl into the Sugarcube Press world tomorrow, so we thought we’d give you a sneak peek into what we’re now referring to as “Wren’s Nest.” Now, if she actually sleeps in this room until a few months from now, we’ll see, but it sure is sweet-as-can-be. The inspiration was vintage 30′s, with pale pinks, creams, charcoal, and olive accents. Of course, it’s not perfectly finished…there’s always the two curtains on backorder that we’re waiting for!

My husband & I waited awhile between children. Our son, Beck, is now 5 1/2 (that 1/2 is very important to him) and knew this probably was going to be our last. I was in dis-belief, happy and scared (all in one) to find out we were having a girl. My husband, as well as my friends, are very concerned about how I’m going to handle the shoe and clothes situation…I’ve been known to harbor a clothing & shoe obsession for myself…what would happen when I had a mini-me to dress as well?

So, as the designer of the sweet girly duo, I set out to make Wren’s nest a few months ago. It was really an empty shell of a room, having been my past home office a year ago. There was not much in it, and badly needed to be re-painted. Having a baby is a good excuse to get the rollers out. So, after 2 coats of paint, and several trips to Lowe’s, the pale pink walls, cream baseboards and charcoal-taupe painted brick laid the groundwork for some furniture.

We were on a budget, so we had a lot of d.i.y. and re-purposed elements involved in this room. The glider (even though I really wanted a new one) was from my son’s nursery and is a olive green toile adorned with ruffled pillows from Pier One Imports. The walnut colored bird mobile, by Helen Ige, is also from my son’s room, but worked perfectly above the changing table. After all, I had stored these items all this time, I felt I should really use them again.

The industrial metal cart & vintage-styled crib found me at the LA Mart when I was picking up some letterpressed card samples at our wonderful showroom, The Lynn Mitchell Group. The room was built around those two pieces. It happened to be the sample sale week, so it fit my budget perfectly (as well as already being assembled). I really loved the metal and wood, as well as the heaviness of the cart, but also knew I had to even it out with something softer & lacey. I found the great tablecloth cover at Anthropologie (on sale, too!). It’s a linen cloth, along with creams & charcoal lace doily edging. The metal bins were re-purposed from my son’s room and were from Target. The cabinet above the changing area (purchased at Pottery Barn), holds antique and family curiosities, and is filled with vintage pocket watches from my husband’s grandfather, scales & silver spoons from his grandmother, spools of thread from my great-grandmother, and even a few hand-made owl plushies from our friends over at Night Owl Paper Goods (and the wonderfully-talented Lori Nichols). I used moss as a soft landing spot for many of the pieces. The lamp was purchased at Urban Outfitters and was used in my room prior, along with a lamp shade that was purchased from there for my son’s room. I used an olive tweed train case found on Etsy for all those baby-essentials and the beautiful print of the bird creating flowers is from Oh My Cavelier! on Etsy

Stay tuned for all the sweet details and more photos!