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Today M and I went to Unique LA for the first time, and all we could think about was how stupid it was that we haven’t attended the event every season since it opened! Unfortunately we didn’t take any pictures while we were there, but here are a few shots of our loot:

Handcrafted soaps from Luka Soap (they have a really cool TOMS-esque buy one + give one business model, that donates soap to organizations teaching hand washing in developing countries)

A card from Molly M Designs - OK this doesn’t count as loot, but trust me, we will be purchasing something from Molly online in the near future. Check out her beautiful lasercut jewelry, etc. on her website here!

A t-shirt from Maiden Voyage Clothing Co. Pretty sure if you’re reading this I don’t have to explain why I bought a narwhal shirt. 

A beautiful mug from Sadie & Emma. We see their work all the time at Reform School in our neighborhood, and remembered their names because our female cat is named Emma, and Marcus’ childhood dog is named Sadie. Heartstrings much? But besides the coincidental attachment we feel towards their names, their work is beautiful and simple, and we would probably have purchased the mug if their names were Hortense & Bertha. Catch a glimpse of how incredible and adorable they are in this Show Pony video. 

We will definitely be at the next Unique LA event, you should probably come too. -Kayt

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Sneak peak at a personal project I’m working on. Slowly but surely! (Bread and lavender credit goes to the lovely and talented Giulia P) -Kayt

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A few nice things:

1. Small memo books that Marcus bought me while on a recent business trip. They fit in a small pocket in my purse, and I use them to jot down ideas, to-do lists, and sketches. 

2. Handmade soaps we bought at Reform School: Cedarwood soap by Saipua, and Cedar Bark by Opas Soap. Apparently we have a cedar thing happening over here?

3. Linen I dyed by hand. I’m planning on making dish towels and oven mitts from it. The dye was technically black, but I love the eggplant hue that came out.  

4. An old book I found in my grandparents’ old storage unit: Charlie the Tramp by Russell Hoban, published in 1966. It is a sweet story about a young beaver who wants to leave behind the beaver business he is expected to inherit, and set out on his own as a tramp. Not surprisingly for 1966, by the end of the book Charlie realizes that he was born to be a hardworking beaver man and Mom rushes home to put food on the table for the men. I love finding little time capsules like this. 

5. Jakemans Throat & Chest Lozenges from World Market. Yum!

-Kayt

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Recently, thanks in part to my discovery of a few makers like Jenny Gordy of Wiksten and Alice Saunders of Forestbound (and their awesome blogs, here and here), I have started sewing again. When I was a kid I sewed all the time, taking classes, hemming and altering my clothes, and making mediocre little projects. I never sewed very well, but I loved it.

When I was about 10 (I think?) my mom generously bought me a really amazing Janome sewing machine. That sucker was built to last, and after getting it professionally cleaned it still works like a dream. I’m not sure why I took a long sewing hiatus, but after years and years it feels good to get back in the swing of things.

After about ten years, the first garment I decided to make was this simple Wiksten tank. I purchased the pattern online, as a digital file. All I had to do was print it out on normal printer paper, tape the pages together as directed, and cut out the pattern as you would with a traditional sewing pattern. 

Anywho, I need some practice, and I’m slow as a snail, but isn’t it pretty? -Kayt

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Apologies for not posting recently! Side projects and work-work have taken M and I away from the blog for a bit. The good news is that soon we will have a lot to share here! In the meantime, a few images from around the house today… -Kayt

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Our herbs are growing so well! But we haven’t actually… used any of them yet. Is it weird that I’m totally freaked out to trim these little guys? Even taking a sprig of rosemary sounds scary. Like what if we put all of this ‘work’ into raising a few baby herbs only to make one mistake and kill them forever..

But soon I’ll overcome this fear and post a picture or two of some culinary masterpiece like ROASTED POTATOES or CHICKEN and you will be so impressed by our urban homesteading. -Kayt

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My two boys and their paws. -Kayt

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After mounting and prepping our wooden planter boxes, we jumped right in to planting! Because of the amount of light each planter box gets, we decided to use one for herbs and one box for succulents. We placed the herb planter in the sunnier spot (the herbs we picked love full sun) and the succulents in the planter with a little bit less sun because, well, they are harder to kill. 

As you can see, we really went for it with the succulent planter! Succulents do well when planted close together, which makes it incredibly fun to get creative with color and texture combinations.  We decided to arrange the plants into a color gradient, from golden tones to greens to dark purples (going left to right). We also decided to frame the box with taller plants on the outer edges, working inwards to form an extremely dense center. I love the way it came out, and can’t wait to see how it grows!

The herb planter box is much narrower than the succulent planter box, so we arranged them in a simple row. Again, we used taller herbs on the outside of the box to create a nice frame, and used the shorter, denser herbs in the center. I am a bit of an herb novice, so I decided to keep the little tags that have the plants’ information next to each herb in the planter. :)

We LOVE the new planters, and think they add so much to the entrance of our home. They make us so happy when we leave the house and come home from work - a nice little reminder that we have a say in how our apartment looks and functions even though we are renters.  Plus, soon we will be using the herbs in our cooking and juicing! -Kayt & Marcus

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Remember those wooden planter boxes we were building? Well we finished them! 

After assembling the boxes with a healthy application of wood glue and screws, we sanded, treated, and stained them with a pretty cherry stain. Then, we drilled plenty of drainage holes and finished the boxes with several coats of polyurethane. Phew! It only took approximately one million years.

After letting the boxes dry, we placed them onto the ledges outside of our front door. It was incredible how much they changed the space even without any plants in them! Such a departure from the naked stucco ledges we were used to. 

Though the boxes fit snugly on the ledges, we decided to add heavy-duty metal braces to their edges to prevent them from falling out. They are very heavy, and people walk underneath them - eek! After making sure the boxes were secure, we cut up some plastic screen that we bought at the plant nursery and stapled the pieces to the drainage holes inside the boxes. These little screens do a great job of keeping soil inside the boxes during planting and watering. 

After affixing the little screens, we began my  very-favorite-much-anticipated-cannot-wait-omfg part of the project: planning the placement of the plants! I dreamed of this moment for weeks, scouring the internet for pictures of window boxes and container plants to try and lock down the perfect color, texture, and height combinations.

But wouldn’t you know it, it pretty much came down to gut. Doesn’t it always? [Marcus says NO]. After placing the plants inside of the boxes to play around with order, we went for it. Check out our next post for the finished product! -Kayt

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Ta-da! After fixing the structure of the chair (check out the ‘before’ in post 99) we sanded it to remove its worn finish and faded stain. Then came the fun part: making it pretty! We selected an ebony stain to try and recreate its original dark look. We love the way it plays up the wood’s natural grain. It was so easy (it only took 1 coat) and it made such a huge difference. 

After letting the stain dry we moved it inside for the finishing touch: making the seat! Originally the chair had elastic cords stretched across the seat to support the cushion. They were mostly broken and we planned to make the cushion ourselves, so instead of trying to repair the elastic we decided to create a new seat out of plywood and use it for both the seat’s support and for creating the cushion. Marcus used a bandsaw to cut the plywood to fit the seat exactly, and then we cut our foam (purchased at Jo-Ann fabrics) with an exacto knife to fit the plywood.  Then, we stretched our fabric over the foam and used a staple gun to attach it to the wood.

Lastly, we screwed the seat to the frame and we were done!  We love the way it looks in our living room.  We also love that without toooo much work we were able to take something that was going to be trash and, with a little love, turn it into something we’ll have for a very long time! -Kayt & Marcus