Botanic Bleu

06/16/2024

How to style your home like a French chareau may sound too grandeur for your style. It may suprise you to learn there at least four distinctive styles of chateaux that range from stark minimalism to the expected opulence of the Loire Valley. Resd the article from my French Country Home magazine to see examples of four chateau style with ideas about how to incorporate the style in your home.

https://myfrenchcountryhomemagazine.com/how-to-style-your-home-like-a-french-chateau/?utm_source=Klaviyo&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Style%2520Your%2520Home%2520like%2520a%2520French%2520Ch%C3%A2teaux%25202&_kx=GliYuZZmnYdNTZ9p6CHUKXKyz0Mf7SUzhD8aXBt9QXbGdtXEs43HsvS7GMkw06WS.MWCDwG

06/07/2024

2024 Olympics Opening Day Ceremony will have athletes arriving by boat on the Seine River and disembarking across from the Eiffel Tower.

The countdown is on!

05/26/2024

June will be here in a blink of the eye and with it, Father’s Day. Daddy was an inspiration by the way he lived.

A handwritten note on the back of an original 1970 insurance envelope is a treasure worth far more than money. A testament in Daddy's own handwriting of the important things in life...

A comfort to us during the time of fresh grief of losing our brother...

An unexpected reminder from our daddy of our daddy's love for our mother, our family, his fellow Christian, and a reminder of his life of service as an elder in our home church congregation.

Details about Daddy’s Inspiring Dear Heart Note are in a blog post published in March 2018. To find it on the blog website, look at the Blog Archives that list every post written.

05/21/2024

Hydrangea blooming season has arrived. Are you wondering why your hydrangeas are a different color this year? Or, are you wondering why you have no blooms, just a bushy leafy plant? Read my blog post How to Get Hydrangeas to Bloom (May 2017) for answers to both those questions and more.

Pale blue is my favorite color for hydrangea blooms, but I love all hydrangeas in whatever colors they bloom. Nonetheless, I follow in my late mother's footsteps and try to get my hydrangeas to bloom the beautiful shade of blue like this one that came from her yard.

05/20/2024

French Country style can be learned by studying photos in French decorating magazines, in travel photos showing French scenes, and in blogs written by bloggers living in France. One of my favorite bloggers writes My French Coontry Home.

One thing I’ve learned from her is true authentic French Country decorating style uses vintage pieces collected over a lifetime or inherited. Most of the items shown in my photos of blue are several years old. Also true to authentic French Country decorating style, beautiful inexpensive pieces are mixed with treasured antiques.

For more ideas of how to create French Country style, read French Country Style in Shades of Blue (May 2021) on my Botanic Bleu blog.
I can’t include a direct link to it because Facebook thinks I am doing something bad with my blog links right now.

05/19/2024

Botanic Bleu was inspired by Quilted Heart and the Brownstone Village in Arlington, Texas. Way back in 2012 I wrote about Botanic Bleu Beginnings as my second blog post on my new blog withe same name, Botanic Bleu. I can’t post a link to the blog because Facebook thinks i am doing something bad. If you would enjoy reading about how and what inspired Botanic Bleu, you can find it in the September 2012 posts.

05/16/2024

Wild Alabama blackberries, blue hydrangeas, and my mother always come to mind as we approach June each year.
Mother died in June 2015, and i wrote a tribute to her entitled Wild Alabama Blackberries after returning home from her funeral.

I invite you to read the tribute to see why blackberries remind me of Mother.

https://www.botanicbleu.com/2015/06/wild-alabama-blackberries.html?m=0

05/16/2024

My French Country style sunspace is a favorite room in my house with everyone who comes to visit us. Why? The view out the windows overlooks our backyard and naturalized woods.
Last December we realized one of the windows was damaged beyond repair.
Read the latest blog post for a Sunspace Windows Update on how the new windows are a little different from the original windows shown in the photo.

https://www.botanicbleu.com/2024/05/sunspace-windows-update.html?m=0

04/02/2024

Plumbing is not an exciting topic, but was a primary and unique part of our upstairs bathroom remodel in 2021. The most recent post on the blog shows the plumbing challenges we faced going into the remodel and the solutions we found to those challenges.

https://www.botanicbleu.com/2024/04/upstairs-bathroom-remodel-plumbing.html

03/24/2024

Bluebonnets, Easter bunnies, and French Country…. for spring decorating.
While I love seeing collections displayed on buffets, in open pine English hutches, and on shelves, my decorating style has always been simpler.
As in this grouping of three items on the pine chest at the end of the fireplace.
What influences my style? Limited funds, limited storage, and limited cleaning. Staying within the modest budget of a school teacher over the years did not allow for large collections for each holiday. No basement or large attic spaces means no places to store large collections not on display. Not covering the entire top of the chest of drawers or filling shelves to capacity allows for easier cleaning of the display area and less cleaning for a small number of objects.

01/24/2024

The AFTER photo of the upstairs bathroom remodel is the walk-in shower with handheld shower head and grab bars inside and outside the shower.

Replacing an original raised tub with a walk-in shower was the most important part of the 2021 update of our upstairs bathroom. Indeed, installing an American Disabilities Act (ADA) compliant shower was what started the update.

The BEFORE photo shows the original raised tub the new walk-in shower replaced in the same space as the old tub.

Read details about the new shower at https://www.botanicbleu.com/2024/01/upstairs-bathroom-remodel-shower.html

01/21/2024

Angels are year-round decor in my opinion. Not just for Christmas. Each year I create special one-of-a-kind French-inspired items for the annual French Country Christmas Event. This past Christmas I embellished plain handmade papiér-mâche angels with gold-colored wire, gold-colored charms, and gold wax to create unique angels, each with its own personality.

They were loved! All sold!

Read all the details at the latest blog post.
https://www.botanicbleu.com/2024/01/handmade-paper-mache-angels.html