Heartsease: Fabulous Functional Pretty Finds

Heartsease (noun):  free from stress and anxiety. My goal to create an uncluttered home … a home and environment that has less stress and anxiety caused by misplaced objects, clutter, and leftovers. But my efforts can be thwarted by love of beautiful objects… Over the past couple of years, I have not brought too many new objects into the home, because our home is small. But what if the item is functional? I love country French, Swedish, and Italian style… I love simplicity… These images show some of my fabulous functional finds that create heartsease. This French market basket holds reading material. This idea resulted from the piles of books on the floor by the door. If they did not make it into my unattractive tote, it may be true, that they piled up on the floor until, I put them away. Now the books sit on the chair in this basket with a linen towel covering the contents, and a bag of dried lavender. When I leave for my destination my books are ready, and I remove the lavender. (The galvanized tray came from Target's Smith-Hawken line, and it holds keys and charging phones. The French market baskets can be found online.)

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Do you enjoy folding laundry? This large wire basket from Hobby Lobby makes clean laundry look so pretty sitting on the console (wink). Not shown in any photos is a wicker basket with one of these gray/white throw rugs covering its contents. Granted, the corner of the back porch, where the washer and dryer are, looks somewhat attractive when unattended. In the meantime, I can feel like I am on vacation until I get to it.

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Recycled bottles and jars, simple vases, and buckets are the aesthetic for bouquets that go with the style created in this home. Bottles and small yogurt jars work well for smaller bouquets created from our backyard garden. Just outside the kitchen is a carport. At one time, I had a china cabinet there, but I gave it to my daughter for books. This opportunity gave me the chance to push for the original plan, A, because all the stuff was on the floor outside the door. So upon request, my spouse built these shelves. Now the area is an attractive visual extension of the kitchen with a place to shelve plant containers. I must dust and rinse the container when I bring it in, but it solves the issue of limited space in a small house.

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I love simplicity and I apply that to baking and food preparation as well. The Wilton six-inch, five pan set, uses one cake mix. It makes two small layer cakes here, because I use two layers for each cake. (The fifth usually gets eaten by the family as soon as it comes out of the oven.)  This is my recipe; I take an ordinary cake mix and replace a cup of water with a ½ cup of wine, rum, or brandy and reduce the water to ½ cup.  These little cakes take just 15 minutes in the oven. After they cool, sprinkle with powder sugar and decorate. Yesterday, I placed one on this Italian cake stand, and added basil and a rose from the garden for decoration. The wonderful aspect is that it makes the perfect size cake for a small family, and in any event, I can freeze the other two or gift a small cake to a neighbor or friend.

Heartsease created by fabulous functional finds for the entry, laundry, and kitchen that are pretty when responsibilities need disguise. Do you like pretty objects that make your home more functional?

Thank you for reading.

xoxo 

Su

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