Closets for Spring: Remove, Repair, Recycle, Replenish

March 22, 2012 By Carole

Enlighten and Brighten your Closets this Season. Time to Cleanse and Purify Within…Your Closet! Your closet is a guide for what clothes and accessories you will need for this season, from sports to romance, your closet needs to fit your fashion story and information about you… the fashionista.  It is a comprehensive space in which you live and dress between work and play.  I find the Spring season is the perfect time to look at your wardrobe, and take a fresh look at what your fashion needs are.
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Home for the Holidays: Promoting Harmony and Balance, Part 2

December 6, 2011 By Carole

Below are some more tips to set the scene and promote harmony and balance at your next holiday gathering of family and friends:

• Greet your guests before they enter the party by setting out a new doormat. This welcomes in new opportunities to come for everybody in the New Year.
• Hang a fresh holiday wreath on your entry door. Be sure to add a red bow or fruit to the wreath to help your guests feel warm and welcome. A wreath is the perfect shape for the door as it is round and denotes harmony.
• Place a bell behind your door, on the knob, to help usher in new energy and harmony.
• Serve your meals with a table setting in accordance with the shape of your table. For instance, if you have a square table, set out round placements and vice-versa. Also, add a centerpiece made of scents and natural elements, perhaps in a large wooden bowl filled with all the colors of the season. Great ideas include apples, pumpkins, and candles, as well as fresh evergreens and cinnamon sticks for a holiday scent.
• Infuse the air with smells of the season. Combine clove, cinnamon, allspice, dried orange peel, orris root and essential oil for an energy boosting potpourri. Place them in balls with ribbon, in cups or as stuffing for a pillow.
• If you have a fire place, place 9 small plants around the hearth to balance positive energy.

Your Home Wellness Check-Up

July 29, 2011 By Carole

How to Create a Nurturing Environment

Are you feeling confused, stuck, or not nurtured in your home? Well it may be as simple as fixing what’s wrong in your bedroom and living areas.

What’s wrong: Do you often feel confused, or unfocused and misunderstood?

Let’s make it right: De-clutter and remove objects and furniture that no longer suit your lifestyle, or that trigger bad emotions.

What’s wrong: When we’re in a rut we may not see the world as comforting or emotionally supportive. It’s really important that all your surroundings reflect and inspire your lifestyle.

Let’s make it right: When you walk in and enter your home, do you feel happy to be home? Remember there are no right or wrong answers, just awareness of how your space affects your sense of well-being. And if things seem wrong, let’s make it right. When you de-clutter, remember to clean out objects that remind you of old ways and old thoughts. This creates a path for new opportunities.

What’s wrong: Are you struggling to make ends meet and your apartment looks neglected?

Let’s make it right: It’s time to identify what are high maintenance material possessions. Notice if it’s worth all the time and energy you have put into these objects. For example, instead of purchasing a complicated stereo sound system, you have a choice, as a little iPod and speaker can give you listening pleasure without financial stress and wiring complications.

What’s wrong: Too many people intruding in your love life?

Let’s make it right: Photos of family and friends do not belong in the bedroom. You really don’t want to invite family and friends into your intimate area.

What’s wrong: Are you feeling boxed in?

Let’s make it right: Open up the space in your living room, it is the nurturing area of your home. Notice if your area is square shaped, then it’s great for authority and perfect for an office environment, but your home may need more inspiration and creative flow. Open up your area, creating a flow by rearranging furniture to smooth and remove restrictive angles.

What’s wrong: Is your home shape rectangular? Shaped like a question mark?

Let’s make it right: It’s perfect for a hallway, but do show curves and add a bump-out, such as a small shelf in the middle of the space, or console to communicate you are relaxed and in control.

What’s wrong: Does your room show you’re not focused, and your life is a whirlwind of indecisiveness?

Let’s make it right: Take the swirl out of things and stabilize with anchoring the corners of your room with structure and form. Do add furniture and plants, and watch your foundation grow.

What’s wrong: Are you tense? Do the colors in your home soothe and relax at the end of the day?

Let’s make it right: Blue is beneficial for new thoughts and expanding new horizons. Do add soft blues to evoke serenity.

What’s wrong: Is your body on the mend?

Let’s make it right: Do add pink for healing and wellness, and yellow for good cheer.

What’s wrong: Problems in the bedroom?

Let’s make it right: Let’s add purple -the color of the heart of the flame- to inspire passion.

What’s wrong: If you’re in a studio style apartment, do you take work to your passion area: The bedroom?

Let’s make it right: Do set boundaries no matter how small the space is, subdivide the space with a plant on one side of your bed, and a lamp on the other side. This will create, so to speak, an indent optically without quartering. Subdivide your space like this and create warmth and intimacy for the bedroom area. To the living area, remember a small couch with a mirror overhead, reflecting art on the opposite side can inspire promotions and wealth, as well as invite friends over for gossip and socializing. Do remember your home is meant for fun and friendship. Create a nurturing home for yourself, and welcome others within.

What’s wrong: Do you find your lighting is all bright or all dim?

Let’s make it right: Do remember there is a difference between task lighting and creating a soothing atmosphere. This doesn’t require a dimmer! Instead, task lighting should be on a three-way lamp control with 3-set bulbs, and then bedroom or living rooms can be set with soft pink bulbs on three-way lamps to create a soothing environment.

If you have any questions or comments, please leave below. I’d love to hear what’s going on in your kitchen.