A Creative Sea Glass Lamp!

Wow - August has been such a whirlwind! I am so glad to be home for a few weeks and get caught up.

We just got back from our summer trip to the Pacific Northwest to see friends and family. So much fun!  Crabbing, beach walking, sea glass collecting, oyster eating, bbq'ing salmon, beach fires and sticky sweet smore's.....

My friend Cami (another Aries girl!) surprised me with an awesome Seaglass lamp. I LOVE it!  She is so darn creative.  I am not exactly sure how she put it together.....

All I know is that it started out as an innocent bottle of wine at Cami's house in May when I was in the Northwest for "Viking Fest" (that's a whole other story!)  hanging out in her hot tub in the rain with my Poulsbo girlfriends...



An empty pretty wine bottle, a string of lights and a collection of pretty sea glass -

Voila'!

Thank you Cami and John Hattrick!

Holiday Stress....

Crazy week in the life of an online retailer!

When I used to have our "brick and mortar" store, the planning for holiday merchandise and our store layout started clear back in May.  I used to think that our online business was not quite as time sensitive.  Last year, I was proved wrong, and was not ready for anything!

It was a great holiday season, but boy were we behind schedule the whole season.  This year, I am determined not to be in the same position as last year.

 It can't EVER be as bad as wrapping gifts for customers until we finally shut the doors on Christmas Eve (one year I ended up in the emergency room - it wasn't pretty...), but we will definitely have our act together better this year.  Don't get me wrong, I LOVED our customers, but I somehow always forgot about enjoying the holiday season for me.

We have been attending trade shows,(walking miles - I had the blisters to prove it!)  pouring through trade magazines, looking at tons of independent artists to feature, ripping out pages in catalogs, and generally spending hours, upon hours of research so that we can make a Coastal Christmas really happen this year!   (These stocking were a HIT last year!)

I know that our online customers are going to love the new holiday products that we will be adding over the next month, as well as all of the new beach house decor and gift items we've already added.  Here's a sneak peak of a few of them....

Beach House Holiday Stuff!

Coastal Home Decor and Gifts...

We are very excited about a holiday campaign that we will be running with Emily Henderson, from HGTV's  Secrets of a Stylist fame.  I do like her HGTV show, she seems like a real sort of person.  And I am super excited about exposing our growing little business to a wider audience.  Check out her blog, which is more like a magazine - Style by Emily Henderson.  What do you think?

After spending this week in front of the computer - I am ready for a break!  Tomorrow we head home to the Pacific Northwest. Can't wait to see our families, especially my kids, spend some time roasting smore's  and chasing crabs on beach.

We're in Vegas!

We're looking for new coastal home decor products in Las Vegas.   Yesterday we only made it through 4 floors of products in 1 building of 14 floors, 2 more entire buildings to go..... I was more than a little overwhelmed when we first checked in at the registration desk yesterday!  Today should be easier,  we have a little bit better idea of where everything is, including the FREE breakfast, lunch and cocktail hour appetizers (free food and wine is always good!)  

We've been posting the pics on our Facebook page if you'd like to follow our journey!  Here's a link: http://www.facebook.com/CaronsBeachHouse

  sorry this one is a little blurry! Lazy Susan showroom -lots of coastal/beach colors and inspiration

 

We're off and running for the day!  We will post pics on our Facebook page throughout the day.


**As a Thank You to everyone who entered our Wabisabi Pillow giveaway - we have teamed up with our artist to offer FREE Shipping!  Coupon Code - seafan     Thanks again!!**

 

















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Creating A Space for Memories... Coastal Bookshelves

I admit it, I am a collector of stuff.  Books, sea glass, shells, vintage coastal pieces, photos, driftwood - I need a place to empty my pockets when I get home from the beach.  Poor Tom finds sea glass everywhere; in the dryer, in the car, in the couch cushions.....  have I ever mentioned that he is a saint?

Got out the design books this past week, and did some searching on the internet to find some great beach house book shelf ideas.  Here's just a few pics that I found to inspire me to redo my "hot-mess" of a bookshelf!

 Love the clean lines of this bright white space with dark wood accents.  Check out the Nantucket baskets and tiny dark blue model sailer.. (image courtesy of Coastal Living Magazine)

 From "French Seaside Style" - a traveler nook!  Vintage lamp with a nautical chart inspired shade..  the collection of ships at sea art is really interesting

 Also from French Seaside Style  (my new favorite interior design book!) Another nautical inspired shelf and room, with a classic tripod lamp and photos of vintage ships...

 Cottage inspired bookshelf with classic bead board styling, glass floats and pretty white starfish (image courtesy of Coastal Living Magazine) Needs a little more color for me, but still very pretty!

This might work - has my favorite color of aqua!  Not too crazy about the floral chair, but I like the collection of "stuff" - natural collected shells, baskets, boats, oil paintings

What do you think?  What do you display on your bookshelf?

My bookshelf is really a reflection of me, and what I love.  Especially the photos and memories of my family, it's so hard to be away from them, and it helps to see their faces every day on my beach-inspired bookshelf.

Thanks Susan for the wonderful birthday present to add to my collection!  (my birthday was in April - I am just super super late on my thank you notes!)

Susan's art,  "Coastal Collections" can be found on our site!  

Her canvas wrapped pieces would be perfect on a bookshelf!   Here's a few of my favorite images from the Susan Fairgrieve's Coastal Collections:

Would love to hear your ideas!

Have a great Tuesday - we're off to Las Vegas to find more coastal home decor products for our customers - wish us luck!

We have a Sea Turtle Pillow Winner!

Congratulations to Nantucket Daffordil for winning our Eco-Friendly Sea Turtle Pillow give-a-way!   If you get a chance, pop over and visit her blog  - www.NantucketDaffodil.blogspot.com - "A Nantucket State of Mind"

Thanks to everyone for entering our blog give-a-way, I met so many wonderful coastal friends and discovered a ton of new blogs to read.

Will have to do this again very soon!