Those close to me are convinced I can’t go six days without buying a new vase. I can appreciate their concern, but really, vases are one of the basic building blocks of interior decorating. And as long as you’re mixing them in with boxes and books and objets and art, you should be able to avoid visitors mistaking your home for a vase museum.

Out of my most recent batch of home decor purchases, less than a third are technically vases, my critics will be (un)pleased to know. I’ve been pounding the pavement on One Kings Lane with increased frequency and found this vintage Mexican abalone box during my favorite Tastemaker Tag Sale of the Fall, curated by designer Darren Brown.

Brown offered some kooky, California folk art vessels shaped like bearded Jesus-lookalikes in the collection as well, which didn’t quite seem like they would’ve worked in my home.

But Jonathan Adler’s reversible king/queen vase referenced the same 70s, fuzz-faced vibe in a subtler and less psychedelic way, and for four hundred dollars less.

With the Adler vase, the abalone box, and the metallic paint-splattered pot I found on Etsy, I’m seeing if a hit of retro, hippie-commune chic can add some unexpected and eccentric echoes to the otherwise genteel tablescapes of Tudor Mansion.

“Ryan Phillippe loved the Stretch Cotton T’s from Santa Monica-based brand Dune A4 that he bought one in each of the line’s 95 colors.”

Or.

“Gwyneth Paltrow is such a fan of the ultra slimming Dario jean by Dan & Ann Tan that she bought an 8th house in London for no other purpose than to store the 7,000 white pairs of the denim that she swears she was born to die in.”

It seemed gratuitous and wasteful and also sorta boring to purchase (and then wear) any clothing item in such bulk-like quantities. And, for a long time, any time I ever loved something enough to buy even a second version of it – just a year or two later I’d be on to some different fit, fad, or aesthetic mission and feel like I’d wasted my money not just once, but twice or, oh God, thrice.

But now that I’m older, and sorta smarter, and more settled in my self and style, more and more of my wardrobe is made up of reliable repeats that I love wearing in any and all of the colors/sizes/styles I have them in.

Most of my multiples are cheap and chain store-ish, but I suppose that’s what cheap, chain stores are really best for. (Although the Levi’s Vintage 1950s T’s run a pricy $90 per pop, which seems expensive even for a CW tv celebrity; but the fit and fade is so yesterday that I can’t help having a ton of them today.)

After all, guys are about twice as persnickety about clothes as gals, and when you find a piece that you find yourself slipping into Sunday straight through Saturday you know you’ve officially found your sartorial sweet spot. And it becomes quite sensical and not too In Style-ish to stock up on such items and build up a stable of staples.

I’d still recommend not to ever go all Phillippe on any one item though. Three or four wardrobe repeats seems sage still, but beyond that you’re just begging the fates for boffo buyer’s remorse somewhere down the road.

But their drying-blood color and futuristic fighter-pilot shape feel fresh and forward-looking, which is what this time of year is for, when it comes to one’s look. They combine with the rest of what I’m slipping into these days, and yet quietly clash as well.

That’s just sorta how we Olsen Twins always do things.

Even I, a born Brit half raised by soap operas, was unsure if I’d take to the upstairs/downstairs drama of the haves and have-nots at Downton when I sampled season one over Christmas. But the series is so warm, well-cast and witty that none of its characters come off as stuffy and not one of its scenes ever feel stale.

Like in real life, every turn in the story twists about in ways which are thoroughly unpredicted yet instantly feel pre-ordained. Three episodes in and you feel you’ve known Lord and Lady Crawley and their three spit-firey daughters your entire life. And that they, and their sweet and scheming servants, are as much your family as they are one another’s.

Season 2 crosses the pond this Sunday onto PBS and marches its characters into the fateful call of the first world war. (Oh, Heavens!) Since everything’s bound to be so different for everyone at Downton now because of that, having already screened season 1 shouldn’t at all be considered a prerequisite for tuning in this weekend and enjoying the story. In fact, I’d think a light haze of confusion might make the war-torn drama go down all the more effectively.

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And, for the record, I don’t actually know much about the Kardashians, but Kelly was and Taylor, I guess, now is my favorite Housewife. (I like ‘em leggy and un-lucid, apparently.)

One of the pieces I’ve been most excited to install was the above bust portrait from Russia. The image is originally off a postcard I retouched to eliminate needless negative space, and I threw in a free nose-job for the old Soviet while I was at it. I shaved a good 10 years off his schnoz in under a minute, that’s how deft I am with digital knives.

The abstract water color I commissioned from my very own artist-in-residence, M. Hurlburt. Over the course of six or seven nights I had Hurly render similar pieces in endless shades and shapes – and in the end, drove him to madness and myself to giggles by choosing the very first one he’d completed. When it’s right, it’s right, but sometimes you don’t know that until you first go way wrong. (For, like a whole week.)

The colorized photo of this sun-streaked courtyard had been sitting around, unframed, for at least three years. Probably more like four. I wasn’t ever sure whether to go modern or antique-y with it, so in December I finally decided to not really officially decide, and just jam it in a twenty dollar frame that wasn’t up to any good anyway, and call it a day.

Really/obviously, I’ve been thinking, and perfecting, and waiting too long on all this. Hand me the hammer, and let’s just nail these things.

And this sparkling vintage cricket ball!

My household Santa rejected this box of Elephant brand noodles as an “official” Christmas present, so I was handed it, unwrapped/unceremoniously, early on the 24th as a reject gift. But its packaging was so cheery and charming, it’s earned “official” status in my heart.

I don’t drink soda pops all that much anymore, but I still have a super strong sweet tooth for unique, extinct, or international soft drink (bottles). We’ll see what this CocaCola branded, coconut water-colored Limca goes down like.

After departing India, Santa’s sleigh must’ve stopped in England somewhere along his journey to my house to pick up this vintage postcard book featuring the small town in England in which I was born. Although it was a gift for me, it was my Mom and Dad who most enjoyed flipping through the photographic reminders of the first place they called home as husband and wife.

Santa didn’t forget to Buy American this year though, and these Thurmoc Slippers from Hickorees are not only puppy belly-soft, inside and out, but they’re packaged in the greatest, grandfather-ish box.

Kris, Kelly, and Sabrina showed up on Christmas too…

With a 34-year old piece of gum and a sticker of Kris on one of her earliest cases.

Petrified, deadstock chewing gum is quickly becoming the hipster sweet of the year, if no other blog’s told you so just yet.

All is now glistening and glowing here in our little house we inaccurately (but affectionately) call Tudor Mansion. The year we moved in I found a bucket of deeply discounted garland in citrusy sherbet colors during a Boxing Day sale. And so ever since then our home’s holiday get-up has strayed from the red/green grind of Christmas tradition.

Our house is already outfitted in faded, sea-glassy colors the rest of the year, so we simply tint our Christmas in the same sorts of hues, adding in Whoville-like pops of bubble gummy pink and key lime green.

Many of the pieces have been handed down to us from German Grandmothers or Church Crocheting Club members over the years and have become some of our favorite items for the warm sense of history they bring to our set up.

And everything else we try and keep silvery or sparkly or fuzzy or felted.

I try and find one or two new things to add to the arsenal each year. We ordered a dozen boxes of white bubble lights for the tree back in November, but they were back-ordered and only arrived a few days ago.

Next year, though, we’ll bubble up for sure.

Many out there may whine about how early it gets dark the end of December. But I can’t wait for the sun to fall out of the sky this time of year so I can flick on the tree and watch our non-Mansion shine.

Lately though, I’ve been brainstorming ways to insert some kooky quirk into the look of the place, scanning the whole wide world for irreverent pieces that playfully modernize the mood – without veering into plasticky kitsch.

I recently found these little footed bowls from India on-line and they’re just the oddball oomph my living/dining/every room could use.

Hand-carved in marble, the bowls’ classic material grounds them in a museum-worthy timelessness. And yet there’s an irreverent wit about them due to their sly, bisected shape. Their overall look whispers ancient Aztec Teletubby statues severed in half by a lunatic art star.

I’ve found that, with or without a plant potted inside, even one of these sly little guys kicks up the crazy/cool quotient of an entire room.

But when I finally come across something like this $8 bottle of Master Spice, which looked to have been sitting on the store shelf since 1979, my crazy quests instantly prove to have been really, really worth it.

With the holidays just around the corner, it’s time to get Treasury headquarters looking its best before guests arrive.

I tend to stock up on art, objects, furniture etc. and then put them into play in big-ish waves. Every addition or insertion affects everything else in a room, or sometimes a home, so I find it somehow quicker and cleaner to (re-)design using bigger, bolder, broader strokes.

The only thing preventing me from finding the perfect wall or hall to hang any of the three above works is knowing that two additional pieces will be finalized and framed in just a few days.

And so my stash expands…

Combining extracts of Lemon, Bergamot, Geranium and Eucalyptus, swiftly refreshing your personal space with one of these Agua de Colonia packets during your holiday travels would instantly make any dreary layover or traffic jam as spiffy and spruced-up as a Mr. Ripley thriller.

Any day now it’s gonna be snow sport season across half the globe, so speed-screening the 1969 flick Downhill Racer is just the trick to slicken any stud’s winter style up quick – on the slopes and off.

In Racer, Robert Redford does his usual stoic-dick brand of schtick as Dave Chappelet, the newest member of America’s then-uncelebrated ski team.

From his dead-end hometown in Colorado to various mountaintop hamlets throughout the Alps, Chappelet’s wardrobe centers simply around sporty, proto-70s basics.

The powder blue chambrays and sherpa-lined overcoats of Chappelet’s farmboy past pair up effortlessly with the showier swank of his jet-setting future, through high-necked sweaters and mirror-lensed shades.

Essentially, as long as you stick to Chappelet and his teammate’s main palette of navy, red, and white, you’ll whip your winter look up to top speed in record time.

True champs will dare to go that extra mile and get their frostbitten hands on some old-school aftershaves, a perwinkle period van, and a Swedish snowbunny or two to slide around the slopes with.

Get ready ‘n set all like that and Coach guarantees your style’ll earn imaginary medals all winter long!