My favorite lifestyle and decorating author is Alexandra Stoddard. I bought her book, Living a Beautiful Life, many years ago when we lived in California. It is the epitome on how to live graciously in a frantic world. Of course, there are lots of decorating tips in the book, but for the most part it is just about living life. Or as the cover describes it: "500 Ways to Add Elegance, Order, Beauty and Joy to Every Day of Your Life." And it keeps that promise! I absolutely adore it and have even found some old copies since it was published in 1986 and given them as gifts. I believe the women who have received a copy from me have love the pleasures it offers inside the covers.
Another of her books called, Creating a Beautiful Life, which I also enjoy immensely, is described as "From starting fresh to freshening up - inspiring ideas to help you turn your house into a warm and welcoming home. I suggest you try finding them to read as you'll not be disappointed. I try and live my life graciously and it shows in my home.
Here are the 2 books. It looks like 3 but the Living a Beautiful Life has 2 different covers as I discovered when looking for more of these books.
The illustrations aren't in color but I've colored mine. I relax when I color and this seemed the perfect thing to do to this particular book.
I am also a "marker" of books. I use different colored pencils or markers to highlight thing I want to remember or go back to. She encourages this in her books. She also leaves room at the end of each chapter for "Grace Notes." Plenty of space to add your own grace notes.
Another page I colored and marked on the other side.
Ah, but this little book is something special. It's a grandmother's remembrance book. "A Book of Special Memories for the Family to Share." It all bright pink with beautiful green leaves on the cover and all the way through it also. I did one of these for my son and my daughter, but this one I've had for a very long long time waiting to see what I'd do with it. Well, the time has arrived that a woman I know is expecting her very first grandchild soon and it's to be a girl. So this will be her special prize. She's going to have to read this post to know it though. I can't wait till she finds out. But she is a painter of roses so I know she'll love it.
