French Invasion!

During a quick trip to the KC Gift Mart, we were happy to find one of our vendors was carrying a line of home decor we'd had our eye on for some time. The catalog we had been saving looked great, but we have learned to look at things in person! What a relief to find the products from "Comptoir de Famille" looking just as we had hoped. They offer several smaller furniture pieces, and some nice larger pieces such as tables and chairs. We have a few pieces to start with, but browse their web pages and then come by to see it in person. If you want something we don't have, I'm sure we need an excuse to buy more inventory! Let us know what you think.

This cart provides 3 shelves and a wine rack on the bottom. The brass bar on the side holds a hand towel.

A triple basket could hold a lot of things around the house. I'm sure we'll fill this one up fast with things around the shop! It has a really pretty detail of some colors woven into the handles

Sorry about the poor photography, but you can at least see the tray table and get a good idea of it's size. It looks great next to a chair and we have a full sized lamp, a tea set, plate and some books all sitting on top. Another great thing about this table is the small area it actually takes up on the floor---while the top is large, the base does not take up much area at all.

Decorative Tiles

Tiles can be more than just the squares under your feet! There are a lot of decorative tiles out there, and we like a lot of them. We have been partial to Motawi for awhile, so we are especially proud to have them in our store. There are many ways to display tiles. We have some hanging on the wall and some are on small easels. With little felt pads underneath, you can just lay them on your coffee table for display. Visit the Motawi website and look through some of their installations. Keep in mind that you could use them as just the accent tiles in a backsplash, or maybe as the center attraction behind your cooktop.

Here are just a few of ours:

The pictures just don't do them justice. Come by and see them in person. You'll want to start your own collection.

One of our favorites!

Surely you've been to Atchison to visit her stores. We've made the trip, and some of us have gone "several" times! It's Mary Carol Garrity, of the now famous Nell Hill's stores. Visit her website: http://www.nellhills.com and then make a point to visit her stores. There are two in Atchison, Kansas and one now in Kansas City. Her decorating ideas are some of the best, in our opinion!
We made sure we took the time to attend Mary Carol's seminar while we were at the Dallas Market. That's another great thing about attending Market---there is always something going on geared toward owning a business. Mary Carol told us all some of the things she did to market her "little store". Of course it boils down to a lot of hard work and her love to decorate! You cannot deny that she has an eye for design, and if you buy her books you'll see that on every page.
We all need our "favorite people" to keep us motivated!

Art Glass, it's beautiful!!!

Kitras Art Glass

We found a wonderful new vendor at the Dallas Market a couple of weeks ago. I wish you could see their beautiful pieces on their website! They do have just a couple of pictures, but of course they don't do their glassware justice.

http://www.kitras.com/products

We were greeted by their daughter, Sophie, in the showroom. She told us about the product, the uniqueness of each piece (which is something we are always looking for), and the stories behind some of the new items they are making.

We placed our order with our own Christmas list in mind, and hoping our customers will want to place the Kitras Art Glass on their list, as well. We'll follow up with the pictures from our shop later this Fall when we receive our order. But for now, enjoy some of the pictures from the Dallas Market.

Can you see the tree inside the ball? This is a sphere ornament, and the design is called the Tree of Enchantment. They are also available in oil lamps, which we will have in the store. Each one includes an inspirational message specific for their color and style.

Just a gathering of some of the garden items available from Kitras Glass. Included are hummingbird feeders and suncatchers.

These are some of the most beautiful gazing balls I've ever seen.

No, it's not a lollipop! It's a glass medallion meant to be in your garden! I can't wait to see the sun shining through these!

Making a room come together

Great working relationships make for great rooms. We had several meetings with these clients. We all worked together on choosing the fabrics for a breakfast area, living room and dining room. Suggestions were made for trims and linings, drapery hardware and window shades. The clients were enthusiastic for the projects and were convinced to move forward after seeing the new floorplans and the renderings of the window treatments. The before and afters are below to view. The rooms are still a work in progress---lamps, artwork for the fireplace and a new area rug are just a few of the things we'll be adding. Before of the Living Room

After of the Living Room
and another view of LR into the kitchen:

Before of the Dining

After of the dining room, better lighting!

Finally, a closeup of the breakfast area:

More Furniture! More Lighting!

Come on in, sit down, relax. Isn't that loveseat comfortable! It's one of the new pieces we ordered from Justice Furniture. Since our floor space is limited, we opted for the loveseat instead of the fullsized sofa. We love the new layout in the shop, it even more inviting with the extra pieces of upholstered furniture. The coffee table is from British Traditions http://www.britishtraditions.com/

Here's a better view of the set-up. Note the new little chandelier, also the black floor lamp. Both are new and are some of the best quality lighting fixtures we have seen. The company is Currey & Co. http://www.curreycodealers.com/ We are looking forward to visiting their showroom at the Dallas Market in just another week. We have more from Currey & Co. but you'll need to stop in to see them yourself!

Local furniture Market

Justice Furniture

We call this furniture market "local" because we can drive there and back in one day. Also, this particular brand is made in our state of Missouri, and is shipped and received very quickly. That is important to our business. First of all, customers are happy when they receive their orders in a timely manner--we like a happy customer! Second, we are proud to buy American made products and try to get as many of our items from the US as we can.

I'll post some pictures below of the furniture we saw a couple of weeks ago. We already have our own sample in the store, but I'll show that picture another time!

Great little rocking chair for baby's room!

Slipper chairs are great space savers---no arms make them fit easily into a room.

Do you recognize the slipper chair---it's hidden in this sectional sofa. There are many arrangements available with this sectional!

Can you guess the chairs?

Did you guess "Recliner"??

Mothers Day Open House

What: Mother's Day Open House

Where: 505 West 2nd Street, Joplin, MO

When: May 3, 2008 from 12:00 until 6:00 pm

If you need a reminder of the items that will be on sale, here's the list:

30% off rugs and lamps

20% off decor accessories

10% off our new Vance Kitira candles http://www.vancekitira.com/index.html, Gianna Rose soaps http://www.giannarose.com/, fused glass jewelry and Michel Design Works http://www.micheldesignworks.com/.

Hope to see you this Saturday!!!