Finding Inspiration

Before there were blogs to view there were magazines.  I adored Country Home (so upset when that disappeared I wrote the company - to no avail).  I had a subscription from 2002 - until it's demise.  I have loved Country Living for over a decade.  Remember when Country Living used to put out a separate Christmas Issue in October?  Adored that and started haunting stores for it in early October just to get a copy as they usually went fast.

Here in Canada I have had a subscription to Style at Home for about 13 years too.  So.... what this means is I had a lot of magazines.  When I moved, 3565 km to be exact, it was a paid for move so I didn't care what I packed.  Coming back home to beautiful Alberta was on my dime so I had to reduce the pounds.  The best place to reduce was my collection of magazines.  I'm sure I had about 100 + pounds.  So before the chaos of the move set in I started cutting.

I discovered by cutting out the pictures of the homes  that I loved it afforded me more time with what I wanted and less time being bothered by ads. I purchased two folders, 1 for Country Home and another for every other picture I had loved.

And I started to fill them.  They are so full  together they are about 9lbs!

 I had collected some treasures along the way,

I picked up this brochure when I went to Shabby Chic (the Newport Beach store).  It just has furniture in it but they all look comfy and soft.

As well I had this brochure,

This was for a beautiful decor store in Vancouver that has changed hands now.  This store was in a large warehouse and these stairs are painted concrete. It was an amazing place. 

Here's a peek inside.

All my stuff got moved in in early July and I have been unpacking and painting and then a few weeks ago I realized I had not found these folders.  So I started opening boxes and peeking around and still I could not find them.  I went to bed trying to remember where I had packed them (5 months ago).  I woke up thinking I should check somewhere important.  Sure enough, packed in a plastic container with family pictures, hiding at the very bottom, under everything precious were my folders - relief!

I had pictures of inspiration,

From Country Home, done by Michael Mead and inspired this:

and pictures of my dream house,

                 

These 3 pictures are from Mary Engelbreit's Home Companion - Dec. 2006

Inspiration is everywhere, sometimes it's in cheap plastic folders.

Until next time,

Patricia