I went to a costume sale last weekend where a bunch of vintage clothing sellers, and movie costumers were selling off old stock. I expected to find a few wedding related bargains, and boy, did I ever!
I came home with a lovely old antique kimono that I’m going to wear when I get ready – vintage boudoir style! It is bright green, with pink lotus flowers painted on it, and a bright pink silk trim on the inside, that coyly peeks out (it doesn’t seem to photograph so well, unfortunately – at least not with my crappy little iPhone camera!). It’s much brighter than I originally pictured, but I’m a pretty bright person, and it matches my bedroom – so I think I could probably hang it up in there as art when I’m not wearing it (double score!).
It was – get this – 30 bucks! And it’s real, direct from Japan! The idea of vintage clothing – clothing someone else wore once – sometimes creeps me out a little, but I love the idea that some little Japanese girl once wore my kimono – maybe to a happy picnic under cherry blossoms!
I still need to figure out some sort of belt for it – I was thinking of going a non traditional route and buying one of those metallic bow belts from American Apparel. But if I find an more appropriate obi-like solution, I might go in that direction too.
My parents recently got back from a lovely vacation in Greece and Turkey, and brought me back (along with Ouzo, Turkish Delight and olive oil soap) something I’ve wanted for quite a while:
A pouf!
It’s not the fanciest pouf (it’s large, unembellished and a plain off-white) but it makes the perfect ottoman for my vintage velvet club chair…
And a good cat bed on occasion.
The best part is it comes unstuffed, so it didn’t take up a huge amount of room in my parents luggage, and it was TEN EUROS.
Which, if you’ve ever looked at purchasing one on this continent is about 1/10th the price you find them for here.
Haven’t done one of these in a while, so I thought I’d dump some of my recent fave, really sweet online finds for DIY wedding projects here. Hopefully I’ll have the time to implement a few at my own wedding (but the DIY projects are already piling up around here!).
My engagement party dress was a liberty print, so obviously I’m a sucker for the stuff, but it’s also such a sweet idea to sew a tie for your groom, and groomsmen! And easier than you’d think.
We had a great long weekend. An especially nice day was had on Saturday, as we took a trip to Kensington Market and popped into my favorite little Mexican grocer to pick up some exotic, fun ingredients. This is part of my vow to make this summer the Summer of the Burrito, in this house.
I always get stuck in a rut come the hot months, cooking my house into a humid, hot mess (soup? in August? What was I thinking!) when I should be eating foods that require little to no cooking! So the Summer of the Burrito is my way of combating that. They can be stuffed with lots of fresh ingredients, grilled meats, and if I want to make rice and beans ahead of time in the cooler parts of the day, they’re pretty self contained in a pot, and they re-heat super easy! And all I need to have around to make it happen is lots of tortillas, which keep much longer than bread does (which is an an issue in house of only two people – you can never finish the whole loaf before it goes stale).
It’s a pretty ideal plan, actually.
What did I get in the market? Wonderful fresh tomatillos, a poblano pepper, 4 ridiculously cheap limes, a few delicious sodas (made with cane sugar!) and a bar of mexican hot chocolate – man is that stuff good! I’m actually wondering if it would taste good chilled over ice, but I also enjoy a little hot chocolate in the summer sometimes too. It reminds me of my grandparents, who used to let me run through the sprinkler in their backyard, but then would wrap me in towels and give me hot chocolate afterwards.
The tomatillios found their way into a salsa verde, of course. I’ve been making a lot of my own condiments recently because, well, I kinda have this thing for them. My fridge is crammed full of condiments. So I’ve vowed, rather than let the fridge burst at the seams I’m making more of my own. And salsa is a great place to start it’s so easy, and – with a little salt and citric acid to preserve it, it will last for a couple weeks (in the fridge of course). Best of all fresh homemade salsa is soooooooo much better than the bottled stuff!
Salsa Verde
1 pound tomatillos
1 onion
2 cloves garlic
1-3 dried chilis (or preferred hot sauce to taste)
1 tbsp lime juice (+ zest if you like!)
1 tbsp cilantro paste (or a small handful of the fresh stuff)
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp salt
1 tsp citric acid (available in the spice aisle)
Put everything into a blender or food processor and blend!
I have been searching for old fireking mugs, for pretty much as long as I’ve been thrifting – and I’ve been hitting the sally annes and charity shops for a very long time (I did grow up in the nineties, after all). I only ever find ugly orange and brown seventies ones, or McDonald’s branded eighties one. Ideally, I’d like the pretty primary coloured fifties and sixties ones.
There is a beautiful diamond patterned set my family shares up at our cottage, in all 4 colours (red, yellow, turquoise and dark green) still in great condition… But of course I can’t just take those. They belong to the cottage.
Finally, a few weeks ago, while thrifting, I ran across this old beaut! He’s not in perfect condition, but he’s charming nevertheless.
Most mornings now, I fill him up (rather triumphantly) with some good South African rooiboos.
We went for a walk through the neighborhood yesterday, and came back with a really good haul. We got slurpee’s, a copy of “My Aim is True” by Elvis Costello on Vinyl for eight bucks, and a little pink harness for the kitties to share.
We’re planning on spending lot’s more time outside this year, and even though we’re very big believers in having indoors cats, we don’t want to begrudge them a little bit of (highly supervised) time in the sun.
We spent the rest of the afternoon out on a fuzzy blanket in the backyard surrounded by our kitties. It was pretty much perfection.
My friend (and bridesmaid) Amy’s doing the hundred mile diet, and it’s sorta my fault (long story).
It was Friday afternoon and we had invited her over to dinner that night, when we realised this. Ooops. We couldn’t just show up at the grocery store and grab whatever’s there…
Thankfully, we live in a delightful little neighborhood that happens to have little local and organic butchers, bakers, cheesemongers and green-grocers – all within a 1 block radius of each other.
We picked up some local sourced pizza dough from the Brick Street Bakery, some organic local sheeps-milk gouda from the Leslieville Cheese Shop, some asparagus from my parents backyard, and took it all home where we made it into a pizza blanco with some butter and my home-grown, sun-dried heirloom tomatoes (from last fall’s garden).
It was, hands down, the best pizza I’ve ever had.
There may be something to this whole hundred mile diet thing…
Just like any children we may have someday we love all our kitties equally – but Flora is the cutest, and the most fun. She just is. She works for it. She’s obnoxious at it.
She turns every moment into a chance to either play a game, or be admired for her adorability. She deserves it as a title – Kitten Princess of Cuteness and Fun!
Some mornings she does this thing, where she gets up on our headboard and goes backwards and forwards above us, under the quilt we have on the wall. She peeks out at us from under it, gently swatting at our fingers if they poke her from underneath. She literally goes backwards, her little butt first, her little paws frantically reaching behind her for the next foothold.
Have I also ever mentioned that constantly forces you to kiss her on the top of the head? Or that she snuggles by force?
It must be this weather. Things have been cool and rainy – positively temperate. It’s like living in Vancouver, or something… Or maybe it’s just spring. Yeah, spring, I know, what’s that?
Which is to say, we don’t usually get such such long luxurious springs around here.
And so, what with the ludicrously verdant world around me, I’ve been itching to get in the garden.
We started our heirloom tomatoes weeks ago, but I felt like this was the week for me to start seriously considering my garden options.
My first purchase:
This gorgeous geranium. Funnily enough, it’s called “Vancouver centennial.” The flowers are going to be wee, but neon red. The leaves are fuzzy and fragrant. I’m excited.
Liam got laid off last month. Which I’ve stayed mostly quiet about, but it’s not really as big a deal as it sounds I guess. Or we’re not making it out to be a big deal anyways. We’re actually having a lot of fun, working on projects, and spending a lot of time with each other and the little kitties.
One such project was getting our attic office/studio up and running. That meant finally getting our little mac mini to go along with our sleek flatscreen tv/moniter that’s set up in front of our daybed. Now we’ve got the perfect little quiet area to relax, play some wii, work on some writing, or designing and watch a movie. Or take a nap. Or maybe have an overnight houseguest!
It’s actually probably been the thing that’s made this the easiest. Having a new delineated space to hang out in and get work done makes having two people around the house all the time a lot easier.
I’m a sucker for a good mystery. I have been known to watch, well, most of the better “detective” shows on TV at any time. House, Bones, Monk, Psych, Numbers, CSI… Yeah, it’s pretty much an addiction. But I think there is an amazing amount of innovation that can be accomplished, even within the constraints of an hour long mystery – one only need take a look at how many Emmys Dr. House and Mr. Monk have between them to see proof of that.
My latest little addiction is The #1 Ladies detective agency (an HBO/BBC co-production – and folks, it doesn’t get any better than that).
It just contains so many elements that I adore – Jill Scott (yes, the amazing singer), Africa, intrigue, humour, great performances, impeccably colourful production design, delightfully illustrated credits, and large quantities of bush tea drank out of dainty teacups.
It’s definitely worth checking out. Even the kitties liked it.
I bought the May 2006 issue of British Vogue while I was stuck at the airport during a particularly nasty lightning storm, waiting for my mother in law to arrive. I used to read British Vogue all the time, as it’s editorial attitude was much more fun than American Vogues (that changed soon after – now they’re largely the same, unfortunately).
But this issue.
I picked it up particularly for a certain photo-shoot inside:
It drew me in. It captivated me. I loved it. I had to have it (even for rather expensive import magazine price of ten dollars!).
A few days ago a fellow blogger posted a few scans of it online (click through the image to see more) and I was reminded of it’s vibrant beauty – and realized that some percentage of the inspiration for my wedding was sublimated somehow from it – even though I had forgotten about it. That whimsical, faded, colorful, thirties thing? Well that could certainly also describe my wedding.
And it’s made me decide, that I think I’m going to need to have balloons, certainly.
I was worried they’d look a bit like a kids birthday party, but this has proved to me that the can instead look quite, well… couture.
the Sis on 