Happy Mother's Day!

Before we moved to Austin, Oliver helped my mom digitize and archive wonderful old family photos. He spent entire days looking at pictures of me when I was a kid and came home every time saying that it looked like I had the most amazing happy childhood because I have huge, open-mouthed grins in every picture. 

Please excuse the food remnants on my face; I was a ferocious snacker

Gee, I wonder where I get that trait from: 

All joking aside, Oliver was right; I had a great childhood, and I can attribute it to my mom (my dad, too, but this is my mom's day, plus she carried me around for nine months, so she deserves a giant dose of extra credit). My mom is smart, creative, upbeat, patient, brave and is always up for an adventure. I forever tease her for seeing the glass half-full and looking at life through rose-colored glasses (an attitude I most certainly did not inherit, sadly). She has an innate sense of style, which is visible in her clothing and interiors – this is an apartment she decorated, how awesome does it (and she) look?!?! I hope this is a trait I did inherit.

I really hope she doesn't kill me for putting this up, but it's hot, she's hot, and I couldn't resist:


I'm lucky to have such an amazing mom in my life, and I hope she knows how much I love her. I'm also lucky, because we kind of look alike:

Left: My mom; Right: Me 
I'm especially fortunate because I happen to have snagged myself a fantastic mother-in-law, as well – I'm surrounded by amazing women!! Happy Mother's Day to all the wonderful moms out there! I hope you have a relaxing, refreshing day that's all about YOU. 

Art, Lamps, Lizards and the Perfect New (to us) Chair

We have been busy bees, bumbling around Austin, but here's what's been happening around the house:

We finally put up some artwork in our bedroom! Under our bed, we've been "storing" Japanese wood block prints that my grandfather brought back from Kyoto many, many moons ago. This weekend we dug them out, dusted them off and hung them up! This was before the days of "Put a Bird on It," I'll have you know...

Small impression of impressionist painting by me, circa 2004

We re-wired my grandmother's fantastic milk glass lamp bases (above) so we could use them with dimmers (and so they wouldn't burn down our house) and picked up some cheap-o but much needed new shades for them at Target. I think a scalloped shade would work better with the bases, but the seven dollar price tag called my name. I can easily dress them up with some grosgrain ribbon to add pizzaz and personality. I love the built-in dish, which perfectly (and neatly!) fits my rings and watch!


We hung a piece of Oliver's art in the office/second bedroom:

Note awesome faux Adirondack chairs in the yard. Those things have made this spring unforgettable

The big score of the weekend, however, was an adorable tufted velvet chair! I was jogging in the nabe on Saturday morning, when I passed a garage sale. I had a swift inner dialogue debating the probability that Oliver and I would get back to it before it shut down (slim to none) so I turned around and wandered through a stranger's house in my running gear and sweaty body. The seller was a sweet older woman preparing for a retirement-motivated move to South Padre Island (not bad). I told her I was new in town and had some furnishing to do. As she showed me some pieces I wasn't interested in, I caught a glimpse of the chair. Just as I thought to myself, "I need that chair," she said, "Of course, the chair isn't for sale." In a moment of New York brashness, I announced, "Oh, the chair is what I want!" She was flabbergasted. Not so much at my (sort of) rudeness, but more at the fact that a young person would want her old chair. Apparently, most Austin residents aren't into furnishing with antiques, a trend I've also noted in my interior design work. Well, I am, so we started talking. She told me the chair belonged to her husband's mother and she would call him to see if he would change his mind about parting with the chair. I left my number and a trail of drips behind me as I made my way out the door and jogged home for brunch. During said brunch, we spied a little lizard changing colors on our deck:

The joys of living in a home! I'd never actually witnessed a lizard changing colors, so this was quite an experience! 

I soon got a call from the lady who told me her husband was willing to sell the chair for fifty bucks. Oliver and I sped over to her house, chatted with her for a bit (she is a real sweetheart) and loaded the newest addition to our family of furniture into the vast cavern that is the back of our minivan. We are now proud owners of the perfect tufted chair for our living room!

We will have to reupholster the chair soon-ish, but for now, it's great! We love the small scale, the deep tufted buttons, the cabriole legs and the glam-y nailhead trim!

Happy 107th to Poppi (aka Max Scheer)

Today my Poppi (my paternal grandpa) would have been 107 year old. I didn't know Poppi, a born-and-bred New Yorker (Lower East Side–Brooklyn–Union Square), as well as I would have liked to. He passed away when I was fairly young and I was too into myself to realize how many wonderful stories he had to tell and how much history he could impart on me. What I do know is that he was a hard-working, handsome, dapper man with a twinkle in his eye, a joke at the ready and a scratchy mustache.

Noni and Poppi created a fine little family (my dad is the tall stud in the foreground–loving the socks and tie):


(My dad is on the right – he loves his little bro)

While this is technically Poppi's day, I can't ignore my Noni's contribution to the family. She was one of those rare ladies with a career, who contributed to keeping the family afloat through The Great Depression; she was an intelligent, patient, proud and regal woman, who helped me with my history homework; she only wore the sharpest of royal blue or deep purple skirt suits and the snazziest jewelry, whether it was costume or real and she always timed the intake of her coffee and pastries so "they came out even." She was quite a vision: I remember beaming with pride when one of my childhood friends told me she looked like a queen. She did:

Last spring, when I wrote about the passing of my maternal grandma, I neglected to include this wonderful picture of all four of my grandparents together in my parents' apartment in the 1970s:

Left to Right: Grandpa Killmer, Poppi (Max Scheer), Grandma Killmer, Noni (Yetta Scheer)

How great is that photo? The two couples came from completely different worlds – Grandma and Grandpa were life-long small town Southerners while Noni and Poppi could not possibly have been more New York – but they got along famously. I remember my grandmothers (both tall, stately women with lots to say), would talk for HOURS. Their vastly different backgrounds and life experiences somehow manifested in four adults who had oodles in common. I'm a lucky lady to have had such wonderful grandparents!

To my dear Poppi, a happy 107th birthday!