Making Life Sensuous

Living a Beautiful Life: 500 Ways to Add Elegance, Order, Beauty and Joy to Every Day of Your Life by Alexandra Stoddard (Random House: $17.95).

Alexandra Stoddard appreciates the little things in life: turning the bathroom into a sensuous “idea room” where thoughts are simultaneously soothed and fired, making the inside of the refrigerator “a feast for the eye,” using fresh flowers to “nourish a home” and much, much more.

She even makes a ritual out of turning mattresses once a month and switching the head of the mattress to the foot on odd months; it’s just one of her many tricks for adding peace, comfort and possibly ecstasy to her life.

If you tend to think of tea sipping as a purification ritual or believe that arranging assorted colors of Post-It notes into a color-coded system can be “enormous fun,” this is the book for you. As Stoddard puts it: “Enormous enjoyment can be gained from turning necessity into a sensuous act.”