A couple quick touches

Home Sense is a dangerous, dangerous place.

The new store opened in Ottawa October 1st. I've already been twice. And I don't go shopping very often.

Last weekend with my younger sis who I totally got hooked on the place as it was her first visit.

This past weekend with my older sis who is also not totally hooked after it being only her second visit.

I picked up a couple random things, despite going in with the intention of doing a return only. But...isn't that always the way.

Excuse the crummy colour in the pics-camera's being hormonal again.

First in the main floor powder room:

Cute, non?

And also in the ensuite. The monogram hand towels I got for my birthday , so not totally vain. The brown bath towel I found in the almost exact-matching colour as the monogram thread and, I gotta say-the towel is pretty much the softest towel I've ever felt.

A bit fromage, I acknowledge, but also (I think) pretty cute. It is our master bath afterall, so other than house showings, we're the only ones who see them, and it feels pretty posh.

Thanksgiving Weekend

A few days late, I realize, but as much as I love 4 day weeks, they are bizaaaaayyyy!

So this past weekend was Thanksgiving weekend for my fellow Canucks. Hubs and I offered to host our family dinner on Sunday night with our new place and gigantico dining room. Plus I love hosting and figure my mom's dang tired of it. So the immediate family that was in town joined us Sunday afternoon-7 of us in total, although we easily had food for 12+.

I was pretty much filled up until Wednesday from all the food & treats that we consumed. The menu was:

Appetizers:
Cranberry pinwheels
Cream Cheese w Red Pepper Jelly spread
Pumpernickle bread & spinach dip
Cheese & deli platter

Main:
Turkey (but of course)
Stuffing
Mashed Potatoes
Baked butternut squash
Flat beans
Garden salad
Homemade rolls
Gravy, cranberry sauce, apple sauce

Desert:
Homemade Pecan Pie
Homemade Pumpkin Pie
Homemade Apple Pie
Homemade personalized sugar cookies

Whew! I'm full just writing it all! Of course I can't take credit for it all-it was somewhat of a potluck, so everyone contributed at least one dish.

Friday night prior, I spent many more hours than I a) expected b) care to share creating a pinecone wreath I found on U Create.

For a little extra seasonal decor. There were many more pinecones than I needed, so I glued some hemp around a vase Thrifty Decor Chick -styleand tossed in the extras for a little fall in the main bathroom.
My younger sister has a bit of extra time on her hands lately and felt motivated to share some table setting ideas with me, namely, this one:

Which we slightly adapted from the LCBO magazine.

All in all, we were definitely try-hards with the table setting, but I think it looked great for our first big holiday family dinner:

To end the night off, and to help digest a bit of the massive quantities of poultry and sides consumed, we played a little Guesstures (fave game of all time), and of course some Beatles Rock Band:

Overall a very exhausting, but very nice and fun day!

Happy Belated Thanksgiving!!!

Fall-ified

Since last week saw the first official day of fall, I decided to Fall-ify our home. (And if you're in Ottawa...hoo-wee is it ever feeling like Fall).

I started with candles, candles and more candles,




Added some fall 'florals':



Sewed some less green throw pillow covers (apparently I CAN sew!):

And some seasonal decor:

And I even picked up an unintentionally-seasonal piece of art last weekend that fits right in:
You can't tell, and my camera's not good enough to get a good close-up, but they're all individually pressed actual maple leaves (or marijuana if you're my guy friends, and no, they're not 18). I really, really like it, and love it in our formerly-bare front hall.

I also switched up some linens, tissue boxes and other accessories to have a bit less blue, green and bright and a bit more neutral, warm and fall-y.

I thought I'd go overboard, but I think it's subtle overall and I really like it (hubs does too). I figure, it's our house until it's sold, and you might as well stage it seasonally if you're going to all that trouble anyways. (And yesterday's open house visitors all seemed to very much approve).

How do you fall-ify your home?

Fall Decor

I need to think about something else, and leave it to Style at Home to send their newsletter today featuring fall decor. [Enter angels singing].

I love fall and I love decor.

Some of my favourite tips, must-haves and accessories to bring in the fall?

1. Candles, candles, candles

I love these 2 festive ones from Bath & Body Works, and wish I'd picked them up when I was in Toronto a couple weeks ago:

And these Gourmet Apple Pie scented candles from Pier 1:2. New pillows & throws.

Or at least, recovered pillows. I plan on recovering a couple of ours if I ever look up how to sew a zipper, so I can remove it in a nice (coincidentally) fall-coloured fabric I picked up a while ago. Others I like include these 2 from, you guessed it, Pier 1:

3. Candle Holders, Centrepieces & uncheesy Decor:

I'm sorry, but I don't like too-literal fall decor with cornucopias overflowing with squash or hay or stuff like that. And yes, I have been to homes where they're all around. Although-I have been known to have some hokey decor on the 2-3 days surrounding Hallowe'en. Hey-sometimes it's just fun!

I love the centrepieces that the Thrifty Decor Chick has been posting on her blog. Seasonal, warm and still very pretty.

I don't at all mind, and in fact even have, some ceramic pumpkins and other squash. But they're subtle and I think pretty, and I do love me some florals. All are older or from HomeSense, so I can't have pics of them without taking some, but here are some other items I really like (conveniently, all from Pier 1-sorry, I just love it there and they always have good stuff):

And just for fun, how cute is this to give out your Hallowe'en candy from?

Birthday List Revisited

I'm a lucky, lucky girl. This I already know. I was reminded yet again over the weekend/this week throughout my birthday festivities that I'm lucky and have some very thoughtful and generous people in my life.

Enough with the sappy stuff...here's my (huge, wonderful) haul.

If you'll recall from late July, I posted a birthday wishlist in the absence of anything else to post. Since very few people other than my family read my blog, I'm told it gave some ideas.

Unfortunately though, I was unaware that a certain sister *ahem* had forwarded this blog to my best friends for ideas. I hadn't updated my wish list because, well, that's silly and also because hubs and my siblings are the only ones who read this blog who may be inclined to give me something for my birthday and they all know what I've already bought myself and more or less what I have (we're a very close family and see each other very often). So...my friends went off and, using my wish list and my current obsessions with all things cake decorating and got me these wonderful things:

A turntable/lazy susan, a cake/cupcake carrying case (the very one from my wish list), some silicone cupcake liners (fantastical) and a lovely glass cake pedestal. Great gifts, non? Do my girls know me or what? However, I already have the carrying case and a pedestal, so I'll be exchanging them for some equally great gifts.

Aforementioned sister still did very well though, and true to form, gave great gifts. Specifically, some Bumpits (somewhat of an inside joke) and some bookends:

From my other sister, I got a lemon zester, a very nice metal (and thus chemical and yuck free) water bottle and some totally cute monogrammed hand towels (an A and a J are embroidered in brown). And we all know how much I like my monograms.

And hubs...well, hubs is getting very good at this gift thing. He pays a lot more attention than I give him credit for, I'll say that much. So he had originally bought some lovely metal bookends (almost identical to the ones in my wish list) and a car cell phone charger. Apparently I let my phone die constantly and forget to charge it...and apparently this is a problem :P However, since sis already got me bookends, which I opened Sunday at our family dinner, he had an errand to run and instead got me this:

A bread maker, which I initiated last night. Seriously. Phenomenal. How have I not had one of these in my life before? With less than a minute of effort and a little bit of patience (3 hours for last night's loaf) I had fresh baked homemade bread. Although I was a little eager and didn't really plan too well (wanted to get it going as soon as I was home), the bread was still very soft and fresh this morning, and last night at around 3 am when I was up for a bathroom break, our house smelled ah-mazing! I can't wait to try some other recipes, like cinnamon rolls, cheddar jalapeno bread, banana bread, etc etc. Yum yum--good work hubs!

And I can't forget my parents early birthday gift, which we use almost daily. Our wonderful BBQ! They also gave me some restaurant and store gift certificates which will be put to very good use.

And a similar idea from my in-laws-they got us central vac back in February that covered a whole lotta gifts and occasions.

And you can never underestimate the appeal of money and gift cards. Some birthday money from my Oma got me my very first item of lululemon clothing, the groove pants (which are definitely as amazing as everyone says, but also ridiculously overpriced, which is why they were my first purchase)-thanks Oms!

Also, a HomeSense gift card from my bro & his gf will be welcoming some fab accessories either to this home or our next one if I can wait that long. And a Pier 1 gift card from hubs aunt which will also bring in some lovelies. A cheque from my other in laws as well as some booze from several friends are all such great, appreciated gifts.

Wow--isn't that ridiculous?!?! When you list it all out like that, I feel like a spoiled little brat. Which, apparently I am. Thanks everyone---love you all!

How about you? Any birthdays or occasions lately that make you feel so blessed and maybe even a little guilty?

August goal 4-YAHOO!

Phewf! I was starting to get embarassed about my August goals..thinking the only shoo-in (weird word when typed!) was #9. Fortunately, however, we've made a bit of progress otherwise.

I picked up some Ikea Merete drapes and some Lummig rods last week and we finally got around to getting them up last night. Yay!

So, just so you understand what exactly we were dealing with, not to mention the relative "urgency" (obviously not really urgent) of improving on our ghetto window covers, here are the before pictures, which have been exactly like this since January 30:
Please note 2 different throws flanking the bed. Although they match each other fairly well, they are certainly different (1 fleece, 1 cotton) and certainly not drapes. You will also note 1 (one) set of drapes hung on 2 (two) separate large windows, clearly way too short to even attempt to pass as actual drapes. All 4 of these coverings were being held up with miscellaneous nails and tacks. Lovely, non?

It's amazing what you learn to live with, and what your eyes and mind just accept. Looking at them in the photos, I can't believe we didn't change these immediately and I can't believe we showed anyone this room after 6 months of them looking like this.

Anyway, despite their former coverings, they really are gorgeous windows that deserve to be showed off. Here they are sans coverings and with all our new drape stuff spread out (not to mention a curious feline checking out what all the fuss is about):
Unfortunately you can't tell with these photos, but the lighting is phenomenal with no drapes, or if we had been able-open drapes. Seriously it's so open and light in there we had to just sit back for a moment to enjoy what we had no idea we were missing.

So after washing, drying, measuring and iron-hemming them, we hung them all up. Which, unlike our nailed-in-place, ghetto previous coverings, can be opened to let all that gorgeous light in (when it's not raining during this crummy "summer"):
Honestly, though once they were up I was kinda disappointed. Obviously INFINITELY better than the before, but they just weren't what I was hoping for. I guess I was so stuck on getting drapes with grommets/eyelets, I didn't consider that I may have preferred something a little softer, like these (which, of course, happen to be significantly cheaper): Also, I love him, but hubs hung the rods so we couldn't have the drapes wider than the window frame. I'm going to play around with them tonight to see if I can put a grommet on either side of the support to remedy that rather than have him re-do them all though.

And as a final kicker, they're so flippin' long! After washing and drying them (in order to account for shrinkage, heh heh) I measured one, assuming they'd all have shrunk the same amount and hung them. Wishful thinking on my part I guess, because some of them were perfect, but some of them look like this:
Which isn't working for me. So, I'll have to get in there tonight and re-hem them and measure them each individually...ugh. Oh well, better to get it right in 2 nights than adjust to another set of blinds that don't measure up (pun intended).

Still much better though, don't you think? And certainly overdue.