Repurposed and up-cycled objects have a way of bringing such soul and texture to a home! I have been working in this vein a lot this year and decided to share some of the things I have found and repurposed in my home. 



An antique clothes washing plunger (can you imagine?) makes a great T.P. holder in the bathroom. Particularly good for baths at summer places (ours is at the lake) that see a lot of guests and traffic.

This is an old rake just spray painted and hung on the wall to hold my necklaces.

Flammable; to easily set afire: combustible, incendiary http://thesaurus.com/browse/flammable

An unfortunate reality of living in the Rocky Mountain West is the annual fire season.  This year smoke hangs in the air, the famous hundred mile views of my home state are obscured, and it gets harder and harder to breathe. I wake up at night with the taste of wood smoke in my mouth and the sting of it in my nose. It is the smell of campfire unchanged from my earliest memory. Strange to have a smell I have long associated with joy and peace become such an unwelcome companion. 

simple life

I just spent 4 days in a vacation rental in Red Lodge Montana. In a really simple, very old, little house. It hides a cool secret- it looks like a regular house on the outside with painted wood siding. But when you open the door you walk back in time and enter a log cabin. VERY cool!
Anyway, living in a one bedroom house and walking every where I went for 4 days started me thinking of (actually longing for) simplification in own world.
Not that my life is complex. But it does need editing.

Looking forward to a very productive and simpler new year.