{from ruth} trending tuesday - pumpkin season

It is October, and even though it is 100 degrees is southern California I refuse to let one more moment of fall pass by without proper seasonal cheer. Good ol' Charlie Brown knew that pumpkins are the real star of fall time! There are so many ways to decorate, eat, and smell them. I will be trying a few of these tasty treats and sprucing up my sweltering house with a few of these festive decors....if i can't have a real fall I will bake, and decorate, and light pumpkin spice candles, and blast the air conditioning until I can drink my pumpkin spice latte' in mild chilliness.

one- glittered pumpkin candle holders | two- pumpkin mac&cheese | three- who can fully appreciate the fall time season without a little Harry Potter! | four- geo dot carved pumpkin | five- pumpkin spice chocolate chip cookies | six- pumpkin pecan tassies | seven- vintage dome pumpkin vignette | eight- pumpkin cheesecake bars |nine- pumpkin casserole dish | ten- pumpkin spice candle | eleven- buffalo bills pumpkin ale | twelve- blush glittered pumpkins | thirteen- baked pumpkin spice doughnuts

{from alethea} home sweet home

Hi all! So the other month the awesome wedding blog stylemepretty did a 'behind the scenes sneak peek' of some minted designers - which I was honored to be a part of! (you can check that out here) I tooks some photos of my 'studio' (read: desk in the living room) for that and decided to document the rest of our little city apartment to share here. We seriously love our location in the city, the building we're in and the amount of light our apartment gets throughout the day. We have been renting the place since we got married in December, but over the summer we bought it! Which means I have some serious remodling plans - esspcially for our teeny tiny kitchen...

But welcome! Here is where you walk in...

Entryway and hallway library (or really - two bookcases).

Living room and studio combo. Working from home, I spend a lot of time in this room - and nothing makes me happier than the amount of light this room gets, even on rainy days here in Seattle. And, fun fact, the curtains were made from the aisle runner at our wedding!

The living room and dining room are connected by a really wide archway. And then off the dining room is our one person at a time kitchen. SO tiny - totally works for us right now, but I have dreams of knocking out walls...

And our bedroom. There is no picture of the bathroom because there was no part of that room worth sharing - UNTIL just the other week when we 're-did' it (on the extreme cheap) with some paint and shelves. So I'll have to share that soon. 

Hope you all have a wonderful weekend! 

{from ruth} Trending Tuesday

 With it being fall I am in a harvest mood and wishing I had planted a fantastic summer garden I could be gleaning from now. However, I am confined to a small cement patio, which I attempted to make use of with a few small potted items. I did end up with a tomato plant that jut keeps giving and a basil plant that is miraculously still living despite weather of 90+ degrees for the past few weeks. While looking up new gardening ideas I kept running into awesome ideas for windowsill gardening, especially for herbs. From vintage tin cans to mason jars, almost anything can be used as small planters. I have found countless inspirational ways to set up small herb gardens: on the windowsill, on shelves in front of the window, or in window boxes.

Through all my searching I found great resources for planting tips and information. Such as, Organic Authority's recommendations for the best herbs to grow in a windowsill garden: basil, mint, stevia, sage, and thyme. And Garden Guide's collection of articles on herbs and herb gardening.

 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

And the wonderful thing about windowsill herb gardening, there are so many pretty accessories and tools you can get!

1.Zinc & Willow Tray 2.Metal Herb Pots & Tray 3.McCoy Planter 4.McCoy Planter 5.Twine Stand with Scissors 6.Copper Garden Labels 7.Petite Watering Can 8.Mini-Tools 9.Mini Colander 10.Herb Scissors

{from ruth} End of the Week Insperation

Sometimes the end of the week just needs a little visual pick-me-up. So here is a smattering of some vintage/vintage inspired packaging that has me dreaming up new fonts and illustrations!

Vintage packaging and design seems so straightforward. These examples use only two or three colors, one or two fonts, maybe an illustration...but there's the genius! So simple, yet so wonderful. I love how vintage packaging often has a hand done feel to the fonts and illustrative details. There is nothing like a vintage package or logo to really let a font shine. The fonts used on words like Bingo (5), Sparklers (3), and Blendwel (9) just look like they were especially created to capture the feel of that product. Another fun part of vintage packaging is discovering what kinds of things packaging was designed for...pen tips, wooden rulers, and 'nurse white' shoe cleaner. Not exactly high demand items these days, but cheers to the past for this visual inspiration!

1.Olive Sinclair Chocolate 2.Speedball Pens 3. Easy-Lite Sparklers 4.Best Matches 5.Bingo 6.Ace Staples 7.Jell-O 8.Petring's City Club Coffee 9.Blendwel Crayons 10.Wescott Rulers 11.Cavalier Cleaner

{from alethea} trending tuesday - burgundy

1: Madewell - 2: burgundy and gold necklace - 3: anthro ring - 4: burgundy tights

Honest moment: I've disliked the color burgundy for a long time. I guess it usually feels dated to me... a little too dark and dowdy. Isn't that so unimaginative of me?! So sad. I'm starting to have to eat my words though because I've been eyeing burgundy everywhere lately...and I kind of like it! I feel like it made a big splash in the beauty world last fall-winter. And at that time I'm sure I said 'I will never wear lipstick that dark' - but, um, just call me a trend follower - it's all I can think about buying right now. I'm also really loving the suprising color combos that burgundy looks great in: punchy fushia + burgundy (yes, please), and pale pink + navy + burgundy (I can totally get on board with that). Now I'm not saying I'm going to start painting my walls burgundy or anything, but I think it's time I welcomed some burgundy in my life.

1: Madewell top - 2: Urban Outfitter Bag - 3: Mac Lipstick - 4: Two-toned flat - 5: J.Crew Outfit - 6: Butter Nail Polish - 7: Urban Outfitter Sweater - 8: Beauty is Life Lipstick