Take it outside

It's pretending to be April around here (in Rhode Island) ... but they are predicting a nice weekend (and we are holding them to it).

Here's an idea for you if it's nice where you are, too. Grab a dining table and bring it outside. And chairs, tablecloth and real dishes, too. Set them up in the middle of your yard (or under a tree or on a patio, garden or deck).

Add a few throw pillows, maybe even a blanket from inside and drape if over a chair in case it gets cool.

Add a string or two of electric lights, candles or even LED lights. If you've got a tree, hang them in it. Then at dusk, have a few friends over for drinks or for dinner.

There are all sorts of weather-proof items available today, from rugs to lamps, but there's something slightly decadent about using indoor items outside. It's more festive, more romantic, more fun.

Just be sure to check the weather forecast before deciding whether to bring everything back in right away....there's nothing festive, romantic or fun about finding a bunch of soggy stuff in your yard the next morning.

A Snapshot: I had no choice

Check out the bookends I picked up the other day. I saw a pair like them at the Newport Showhouse Guild's 14th annual Designer Showcase a few weeks ago and loved them. And they were only $12.

A Snapshot: Hanging out in the yard

Wouldn't a few of these suncatchers look great hanging in a tree in your yard? They are handcrafted stained glass and available on Etsy.

Please don't tell my neighbors

Here's one of my favorite things: It's dusk. I'm a passenger in a car, driving through a neighborhood. The homeowners haven't gotten around to pulling their shades yet...

...and I get a peek (at 20 or 30 mph) at how they've decorated their homes.

If that's also your idea of a good time, you're going to want to know about The Providence Preservation Society's 29th Annual Festival of Historic Houses on Saturday.

Buy a ticket and you can get a really good look inside 10 historic homes in the Fox Point neighborhood of Providence, RI.

All the homes were built in the 19th century. I've been in one of them, where I worked on interior redesign. (That's the foyer of the house in the photo above.)

I'm not going to tell you where the house is...you're not supposed to know any of the details until you pick up the map at Brown University’s Maddock Alumni Center, 38 Brown St, Providence.

But I can tell you that it's got wonderful millwork, five fireplaces and beautiful gardens. I'm sure the other houses are fantastic, too.

So buy a ticket ( $30 in advance and $35 on the day of the tour). The self-guided walking tour runs from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m., with the houses within about a half-mile loop.

The best part: You won't have to yell for your husband to slow the car down so you can get a better look...

I double dog dare you

Was talking to a friend the other day (Hi, Elisa) about color, and we got around to the topic of painting only one wall in a room. (OK, technically painting all the walls in a room, but three of them white, or perhaps off white, and the fourth a color you really love.)

Unless you've got a really good reason for doing that, I don't recommend it.

If you love a color, go for it and paint all four walls. Think the color will be too dark and make a room seem small? Nah, it'll make the room seem dramatic. Think it'll be too bold? By the time you bring in the furniture, the artwork and accessories, you'll see far less of it than you would imagine. Concerned you'll be overrun with color? Then make your other color choices in the room (the drapes or couch for instance) a bit more tame.

Are you thinking you want to paint only one wall to highlight a fireplace or a bed, for example? Rather than painting all the other walls white, paint the highlighted wall a slightly darker or lighter color than your main color or choose a different color that you also love.

Go ahead, do it.

Color me convinced

My 5-year-old son did a little experimenting with color the other day. Using a few tubes of paint - red, blue, yellow - he diligently recorded the colors he created: purple, orange, green, aqua, grey...

He had a lot of fun...so I thought I'd pass along a tip if you like playing with color, too.

There are a lot of online tools out there where you can check out colors and color combinations in virtual rooms before you head to the paint store. (Never pick a specific shade strictly by using this method. Your computer monitor may not be showing the exact, true color. But this is a great jumping-off point.)

Give them a try:

• Benjamin Moore's Personal Color Viewer
  
• Sherwin-Williams' Color Your World
  
• HGTV's Choose Color
  

All of the fun of playing with paint...none of the scraping it off the tiled kitchen floor later.

Room makeover, a before & after: More comfortable than sitting on English muffins

Everyone loves nooks and crannies, cozy spaces great for talking on the phone, reading a book or sipping a cup of coffee.

Sometimes it's just relaxing to have a space like that...even if you don't use it much.

And it's possible you have one of those spaces and don't even know it.

Take this house, for instance. A bump-out in short hallway that led to an addition was largely ignored, save for a bookcase.

I added a bench, just wide enough to slip comfortably into the bump-out, and a few pillows and lamps and the client had a great - and unexpected - new space.

Take a look around your house. Do you have an underused window seat? A little extra room in a hallway or a foyer?

Could be an opportunity awaits...