Well the Tarpon cottage has really come along.  We painted the entire place (save for some touch up in the bathroom) and have all the furniture in except for this rug still on order.   It was supposed to ship the end of Sept and is now delayed until mid-Nov.  I will be pretty fired up if I wait this long and it winds up being canceled so I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it's just a delay.

I'll show the pics I took this weekend and then describe what is still to be done.  There's quite a bit but fortunately I will be working on it during the week at home in Tampa and not trying to fit it in while down in Matlacha.

Here is the front room, i.e. second or spare bedroom.  The doorway is to the left of the first picture.  We will move the fishing poles when we start to rent this out.  I think we may also paint the futon frame white or maybe espresso.

The fabric hanging is what I have on order to make curtains.  I'll hang 2 skinny panels to hang between the windows (to the left of where the fabric is in the pic).  They will be mostly for decoration but will function to cover the windows if desired.  Also those large dark fish on the floor will become wall art once I get the hanger things for them.

The flamingo picture is too small; we will get a larger one and/or fill in w/ other art.  There will be a mirror hanging over the desk.

The desk and chair are now in the garage waiting for primer and paint.   I am torn between a look like this

orange desk, white chair, turquoise and white fabric.

OR

white desk, orange chair, this for the seat (only on the reverse side where it's white w/ orange dots).

Onto the great room.  Still missing the above referenced rug, the pictures need to be hung, and I'll probably add another set of throw pillows on the couch.  I reupholstered the ottoman this weekend though and I'm lovin it!  Also didn't show the part of the room by the door as it was messy.  The table behind the couch is pending a new piece of glass and there is a plain board on it to hold things.  Also....I have to find a new light for over the island if I can't find replacement covers.  They are currently cobalt blue and while they don't bother the husband, I am way too AR to see past them in this color scheme.  In a perfect world I would have more neutral tile in the kitchen and bath too (or maybe I would have planned my colors around what is there, but that would have been too easy).

And the bedroom - the footstool is not upholstered yet i just have the fabric laying on it.  A few more pictures and there's really not much else to do in there.  Actually I take that back.  The more I look at these pics the more I want to see some fabric behind the bed.  The wall is small enough that maybe I'll hang curtains across the whole thing.

I might need to paint the wooden frame around that window white.  There's also no way to center the bed on the window and have a reasonable amount of room to get in/out of bed on that side.  So off-center it is and AR be dammed.

I got a new camera today - the Canon G11.  I am so excited and anticipate future pictures will look much better.  They better, anyway... that's how I sold the camera purchase to Chris :)

We bought the dog

We closed on the property on Friday.  We were supposed to close two weeks ago but some miscommunication about dates and urgency was recognized and everyone was happier moving the date out by 2 weeks.  Since it was all done remotely (other than notarizing our signatures) it was somewhat anticlimactic....we had already celebrated signing the lease paperwork and sending in our initial deposit, then celebrated taking possession Aug 1, then celebrated opening the store, then celebrated the fact that it was a Friday, etc. etc.  It is a little sobering to see the drain on our bank account.  I was enjoying the warm fuzzy feeling of a 6 figure bank account (not including cents this time :).

And in a timely coincidence, the Pine Island Eagle did a story on us last weekend that went to print this past week.  It definitely brought a lot of people into the shop this weekend and we even had our first framed photography sale!  See the article here.  Thanks to Kathy Jones for coming out and taking the time to share our story!

Here is the picture that sold from the boutique.  It's called "colorful boats on a painted dock" and is in an awesome driftwood frame.  I hope its new owner loves it!!

We're listed on Flipkey - with reviews an everything!

It's official - we have a vacation cottage for rent.  While it was officially "for rent" before now, it took this long to get it listed somewhere.  Flipkey had a free 60 day trial while homeaway.com wasn't returning my calls or emails (turns out the guy who had declared himself my contact was away on leave; his replacement just called me yesterday).  Here is the link!

http://www.flipkey.com/matlacha-cottage-rentals/p325479/

Upcoming Change in Hours

We will have to be closed this coming weekend - 10-15 and 10-16 - we will be up in Virginia for a family wedding.  I can't wait!

However, when we return I plan to start opening on Fridays.  So look for that starting October 21st!

Business is booming

Ok, not quite booming but we did have a great weekend.  Almost 3 times the sales we've had compared to prior weekends.  A large chunk of that sales figure was thanks to our friend Lesa who was buying some gifts for friends.  Between the contribution to our sales and the help she and Rich gave with painting the Tarpon, I am beside myself from how lucky we are to have the friends we have.  Including the ones who have been feeding us when we get home late and tired on Sundays (thanks to Stacy, Jodi, and Mark x 2).

Our wonderful friends decided to help us knock out the majority of painting to be done in the Tarpon.  I had completed about 70% of the front room (which will be used as a 2nd bedroom/office) a couple of weekends ago and wanted some additional opinions on the color before moving forward.  I had chosen "Aqua Glow" by Valspar. 

The consensus was it was a great color so we went for it.  Between the 4 of us and a few ladders we completed the front room and the kitchen/living room.  We were down to the last drop of paint otherwise we would have started the bedroom too.  It looks SO great.  Best of all now we can start hanging some art including this awesome rope picture from Ambient Light!

We also added another pottery artist this weekend - Apholz Pottery.  I didn't have a good camera with me but here is a cell phone pic of the display with his work.  AND, we had our first fine art sale of one of his pieces on Sunday. 

Sunday we had a great sale just as we were closing.  The guy who made our signs came in with his girlfriend and announced they were getting married tomorrow (today) and she needed a dress to wear!   I was so thrilled for them, and so excited that they came to us to buy a dress.  They picked out 3-4 to try on and she chose a beautiful silk chiffon sundress with a watercolor-ish pattern in blues and white.  It was perfect.  She also went home with a pair of aqua blue crystal earrings to wear with the dress.  I can't wait to see pictures!

Next Decorating Tasks

The Redfish cottage is completely done and ready for rental.  We took a small breather with getting the store up and running, and that is doing well....so now it's time to get back to work on decorating the Tarpon.

We've moved the furniture in and put some decor around, but have been keeping it simple in order to get paint and some bigger decisions in place.  Last weekend I started painting the front room, which will be used as an office/2nd bedroom.  While I love the color, I'm not convinced it's not a touch too green.  I want a light aqua, but was afraid of going toward something that would read as pale blue.  I think the color looks great in the room it's in, but may be too much to use in the entire house.  Some phone pics:

So I don't know.  In trying to avoid "robin's egg blue" I may have gone into "Seafoam green" territory.

In addition to this or whatever other color I choose, here are a few other elements going into this cottage.  I hope this one will look as good as the other but it's a bit harder because I am working with a lot of existing elements and trying to "make them work" vs. starting from scratch as was done in the Redfish.

I think in the aqua room above I will add another seagrass/jute rug like we have under the dining room table here:

I love the look and it's pretty inexpensive for a rug.  The aqua room above will also have a painted desk and chair.  I will probably stick with white paint since the room will have so much color on the walls, and use one of these fabrics for the seat cover:

This room also has a large dark wood entertainment center not pictured.  It will mostly act as an amoire for anyone using that room as a bedroom.

The living room has our older tan couch and chair.  I plan to add this rug:

Along with pillows (already made) in these fabrics

and maybe this or something like it (not made yet)

Next to the couch is the kitchen counter and I bought these 2 ghost stools to sit under the counter and blend since they probably won't be used that often.

And I may reupholster our leather ottoman with something like this:

Then the bedroom is all dark espresso furniture (this bedroom set)

with all white linens and accent pillows from the fabrics above.  I have a turquoise lamp and some orange decor.  The room is pretty small so there is not much else to add.  It only has one tiny window over the bed, so there aren't any window treatments.  In fact, there are no window treatments anywhere since the windows all have the gorgeous white shutters.