Valentines Day meets Candlemas

Irritatingly enough, Candlemas/Imbolc doesn't really correspond to a holiday celebrated widely in US culture. Valentines Day is about as close as it gets. But, Valentines is closer than you might think in terms of symbolism.

Like most modern witches, I don't live an agricultural life, so the gestation process of ewes celebrated by Imbolc is not so relevant to my experience of the season rooted in my locale. Early February is cold here, and grey. The promise of rebirth is still hidden. The symbolism of spare, wintry decor, plus candles and kindling fires resonates. The importance of focusing on loving relationships also resonates. Not in term of greeting card romance and shiny gift-giving, but in terms of the sort of warmth that comes of caring relationships with family and friends. The heart theme of Valentines Day makes seasonal sense to me both in terms of valuing relational warmth during a cold time and also because both the color red and the symbolic link between the heart and the element of fire point to the themes commonly celebrated by Pagans between winter solstice and the spring equinox.

In this spirit, I made this crazily simple heart ornament. The wooden ornament itself was picked up on clearance after the winter holidays. Making this ornament involved just a few steps. First, I painted the heart a dark, cool espresso brown. Once it was completely dry, I painted the heart red. Using a light touch, I let some of the brown show through. Vintage sheet music was torn into a heart shape and glued on. The whole thing was lightly sanded to add a bit more tattered wear.

Haint Blue

This is the ceiling of our front porch, before there was Stuff on the porch and before the leaves fell off the trees this year. The ceiling of our porch is wood colored wood. Therefore, I feel like I should not paint it. I love its naturalness.

But I also love Haint Blue. For those not of the American South or not of eras gonebye, Haint Blue is a traditional color for the ceilings of porches. You know how southerners are about porches. If you think people in the south spend their free time fanning themselves and drinking sweet tea on porches, you are totally right on. And the ceilings of those porches are often a pale blue-green color: Haint blue.

Haint blue is said to keep malevolent spirits away. Or maybe it discourages birds and bugs from nesting in your porch. No one is quite sure nowadays whether the purpose of the color is natural or supernatural. Older folks say supernatural. I’ve heard that “haint” is an old fashioned southern, and perhaps a specifically a Gullah, way of sayin “haunt” as in ghost or spirit. As in not Casper-the-Friendly. As in not-at-all-friendly. I've heard that the situation is that blue-green is like water and malevolent spirits can't follow you across a body of water... so. It's protective.

Maybe so. Maybe not. But I love the color. Haint blue can be a variety of gorgeous, magical blue-greens. Originally the paints were probably made from the indigo plant.

Velvet, Cream and Grey-Teal

This is one of my favorite inspirational photos of an interior. Maybe it is nothing extraordinary to others but I just want to melt into that chaise. Simple but not cold. Accent walls normally annoy me (commit or don't!), but I love the deep grey-teal wall with the cream. The fireplace. The hydrangeas. The multiple mirrors. The storage. The basket. The floor lamp. The wee mercury glass tables. The glowing velvet of the pillows. Even the candelabra reflected in the mirror. This please. In the Little Victorian. Now.

Most of the furnishings come from Ochre, which is of interest since their products are contemporary but also lush and likable.

Source

Paint & Suffering

Dead Celery Yellow-Green was the original color of our dining room. Or at least that is what The Chef (/Bob/my spouse) called it. So we painted it the color at the top of this pyramid:

Restoration Hardware Glacier. The result was Not Swell. Lessons learned:

RH’s Glacier is a cool, clear, white-blue. I think it might reflect light sweetly in a bathroom with no windows or a gloomy room that needs cheer. Sadly, we used Glacier in the brightest room in our house. Also sadly, all the other paint colors in the house are more mid-toned and muddy. Glacier looked like it was literally Glowing On The Walls. Scary. No photo. We repainted before the brightness could sear my retinas.

It is also basically identical to Benjamin Moore’s Harbour Haze. Swanky designer, Jeffrey Bilhuber, once listed Harbour Haze as one of his favorite paint colors. I want to ask him where he uses it successfully, but I rather doubt he’ll post a comment on my blog to answer ;).

Alsoalso, the quality of RH’s paint struck me as so-so. It is a bit thin-ish and coverage is not its strong suit. But the Subtle Velvet finish is nice. And Restoration Hardware has some nice colors and a small enough deck to keep the anxious homwownwer from overwhelm. If you choose to use RH paint and not have it color matched elsewhere, don’t forget to stirstirstir because RH paint is pre-mixed and has been hanging out on a shelf for ages.