Guest Room Update: Summer Camp

Awhile back I had blogged about painting the Guest Room. It has taken me this long to get it "together". I painted the room a chocolate brown color because I liked the contrast between the brown and the stark white (Dunn Edwards, Whisper). Other than that I had no real plan. I use my house as a sort of laboratory and change things around frequently....especially in my office. A Guest Room is easy to use for experimenting....no daughters complaining that their room smells of paint. This is the latest incarnation.

The rooms in my house have a tendency to resemble my senti-"mental" images of summer holidays I have taken with my family, present and past. Perhaps it is that ever present longing to be on vacation? Whatever it is....I love spaces that invite me to relax and daydream.

This room, somewhat unintentionally, became my trip to one of the Mammoth Lakes, Lake George to be specific, where my Dad would take us every summer when I was growing up. We would stay in a small cabin on the Lake, and fill the days with hiking and fishing. We would lure little brown and white striped chipmunks into the cabin with peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, much to my mother's horror.

There is also a bit of my trip with Tim and my daughters to the Olympic Rain Forest where we stayed at Lake Quinault in the Lake Quinault Lodge.( Add it to you Bucket List if you have not already been....hauntingly beautiful, seemingly from another time.)

The vintage twig furniture, grass matts, my wicker hampers, bird prints, the well worn concrete balustrade lamp and antique bamboo table and felted wool army blanket all say "summer camp".....and you occasionally will find me laying on the bed daydreaming about my own camp days. (I just discovered through a google search that the camp I went to has resurfaced after a bit of a hiatus....you cannot imagine how happy it made me! I think a visit is in order. Truly the best camp EVER).

I hope summer is treating you all well, and that you are fitting in some time to daydream.

camp 1- noun - a place where a group or an individual is lodged in a tent or tents or other temporary means of shelter

camp 2 - noun - something that provides sophisticated, knowing amusement as by virtue of its being artlessly mannered or stylized, self-consciously artificial and extravagant, or teasingly ingenuous or sentimental