Rest in Peace my beautiful Mother

We are burying my mother today. I've talked a lot here about my father over the years, but not as much about my mother. As with many mother/daughter relationships, we often find ourselves annoyed by things that it's possible we see in ourselves. But when the time of life runs short, the old annoyances become cherished foibles and the good memories are what's truly important.

My mom died during the early hours of Thursday morning. She'd spent a week in the hospital for respiratory distress and pneumonia and other things, and then about a week and a half of an anticipated four weeks in rehab. Last Tuesday night, I had dinner with her and said good night at 8:00pm. They called my around 3AM to say she'd been sent to the hospital in respiratory distress. I was by her side shortly thereafter. My eldest brother arrived a while later and my middle brother flew in from Colorado by midnight Wednesday night. Throughout that long day and night, one of us was always with her. When my Dad had a heart attack the year before he died, she and I spent a night at the same hospital, in the same room, when we thought we would lose him. She was 79 at that time and no matter what, she was not going to leave him alone. My Dad was the love of her life. We three kids knew that while we were everything to them both, they were each other's core. And they are finally reunited.  The photo above was taken at the Spaulding Rehab Hospital (then Rehab of the Cape & Islands) when my parents volunteered there after they helped get my Dad back on his feet after a debilitating stroke. But it was Mom who made sure that he had a wonderful quality of life for the rest of his days.

Mom and Me: 1962 - 2013 (photo taken earlier this year on her 85th birthday)

I wrote this on Facebook last Thursday:

My beautiful mother Dorothy Costello Merrill passed away early this morning after a brief illness. We shared not only a face, but a home for the last couple of years. She was a true lady in every respect of the word. She was elegant and intelligent and earned a bachelors degree in English Literature at a time when it wasn't the norm for women. She taught me how to sew and to entertain. An early devotee of Julia Child, Mom was a gourmet cook and continued to try out new recipes from Ina Garten which she would look up online and print out herself. She adored our family above all else. She's with our Dad now and we're cheered to know they are reunited in faith and love. 

Her full obituary is here if you're interested in learning more about her. 

After the funeral, we've invited attendees back to the house for lunch. We'll be serving a delicious Provencal Vegetable soup that my Mom made and froze just six or so weeks ago. It will be warm and nourishing, just as she was. 

I will be returning to the blog next week sometime. I'm missing it, but there's much to do. Meanwhile, if your Mom is still with you, give her a hug from me. Happy Thanksgiving. 

Designers Should be a Resource for their Clients

In this world there are "holders" and there are "connectors." Holders treat their resources, time and materials like precious metals that need to be saved for "best." Connectors, on the other hand, are great at making introductions, offering resources, referrals or other services simply because they can. If knowledge is power, the Holders believe it needs to be carefully dispensed in order to be effective and the Connectors think its importance is derived from how far it travels.

Read more on Williams-Sonoma Designer Marketplace.


I'd like to give another shout out - this time to Traci of Beneath My Heart Blog for including three of my project shots (including the image above) in her Favorite Pins Friday post.

I hope everyone has a great weekend. My mom is still in the hospital, but is getting a little better each day!

Thanks to An Urban Farmgirl and the power of Pinterest

I wanted to share a quick shout out to Mary of Urban Farmgirl blog for pinning two of my portfolio images onto her Pinterest page, sharing with her 62,000+ followers! I received hundreds of hits on my portfolio site in the last couple of days.

 

These are pics of a seaside community garden house I did in Duxbury, Massachusetts a couple of years ago. The clients live in a high end senior community (when they aren't in their Cape Cod beach house or winter home in Mexico) and have an amazing collection of art and antiques. Truly so much fun having worked on this project, turning a large but bland garden unit into a comfortable showplace for their treasures! You can see the enitre project here.

Just a pretty, pretty pic and an update

My mother is experiencing some health issues and I've unfortunately had to cancel my Art & Design lecture with artist Rick Fleury. All the team - Rick, his manager Sharon, our location host Danielle of Snow & Jones and I had worked so hard pulling this together in a relatively short period of time. The slide show looked fabulous and we were excited to be showing Rick's beautiful paintings along with his new print collection, as well as my design ideas. However, we will be rescheduling for early in the New Year, so please stay tuned!

Meanwhile, just have time for a pretty pic I saw on Pinterest today, courtest of While Living.

Hope everyone is having a good week! In addition to being with my Mom, I'm also in the starting phase of a great new beach house design project!

Art in Interior Design

Due to a family health issue, these lectures have had to be canceled. But, we will be rescheduling for early in the New Year, so keep an eye out for details, or email me to let me know your interest and I'll notify you when they have been rescheduled. Thank you!

I wanted to share a quick reminder to local peeps that my lecture on incorporating fine art in interior design is coming up next week! Painter Rick Fleury and I will be sharing our thoughts on the important place that art holds in the decorative process and how it brings true life to our homes. We'll be speaking in Norwell on Tuesday, Nov. 5th at 5:30pm and Saturday, Nov. 9th at 10:30am. We've been hard at work putting together our talk and we're going to heave some great giveaways! I'll be giving away two gift certificates for a design consultation, Rick is offering two of his fine art prints and our host Danielle at Snow & Jones will be offering a fabulous Moxie shower head by Kohler. And there will be snacks too!

Below are different schemes I've created around two of Rick's paintings that will be on display at our talk:

"Perception" by Rick Fleury with a modern, masculine design scheme.

"Respite" by Rick Fleury with a beachy, feminine design scheme

All the important details and registration information is here. I hope you can join us! (Now, if I can just get rid of this cough!)

Have a great weekend friends!

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