Dream House

I'll just buy one of the buildings from Salve!

Now that I am home and have survived being scrunched in the backseat of our Saab for 13 hours (with my legs under a little red potty, no less!) I've begun to think about what really makes a space stylish and inviting from the very beginning - Like for example, if you just buy a new house or get a new apartment and don't have money to decorate completely yet, what are the basic things that would at least give a little color, warmth, luxury, etc.?  When my husband and I first moved into our last apartment, we didn't waste any time filling it with furniture - it almost seemed to make us restless to not have a coffee table or desk right away - but the weeks preceding our departure, the apartment got barer and barer as we sold things, and I began to realize how little you really need to be content.  (I'm sure it was also the welcome prospect of moving back home to New England)  All I can say about our last space was that it was blank white, shoddily built, and lacked any character whatsoever, so that could have had to do with my nervous obsession with trying to completely redecorate it.  A certain thought kept coming back to me; that if the architecture that surrounds you is beautiful in itself, than the less you will feel required to put things in front of it.  Of course that's easier said than done, but if one looks for quality rather than quantity in anything, I think the result will be far more pleasing than trying to compensate.  I like America; after all its my home, where I was born and grew up.  I like having a free market (as free as it can be right now given the current circumstances) but I do sometimes think of Alexis de Tocqueville when he talked about the inclination for fast money in our culture, which does seem to produce alot of creations lacking in quality or beauty. 

And so, here is my list of things-to begin-living-comfortably-without-going-wild.
1. A nice carpet - provides color to the room, can be sat or laid on - feels nice underfoot.  I could wait for other stuff for a while if I just had a nice rug.  Also, I am just maaaaaad about rugs. 

My pick: this lobster rug from Anthropologie:  to also commemorate my husband's new channeling of careers.  It would look good in any room and it looks so soft.

2.  A tea set.  Tea is my morning ritual.   Whenever I'm at the mall I have to go into the Teavana store and ogle at all the tea sets and take a sip of their so-fancy tea that costs an arm and a leg!  I think this is my favorite tea set from them: it looks so classic.