Thanksgiving Weekend Recap

The house still smells like turkey. Turkey soup made from Sunday night's leftovers to be exact. What an incredibly fantastic weekend it was, and it was exactly what I needed to make me get back to my old self again. Surrounded by so many wonderful friends and family, we enjoyed doing so many fantastic things.


On Friday night after work, B and I met up with his parents and their friends who arrived from Massachusetts that afternoon, after spending a couple days in the Niagara region. We went out to dinner and spent Friday night just sitting around together chatting and catching up. Saturday morning we had breakfast at our house with B's parents, before picking up their friends from a nearby hotel (unfortunately we don't have that much room for guests at our house). From there we headed to the Distillery District for lunch and some strolling...

Lunch was at the Mill Street Brew Pub, and B and I each had to get a taster tray. I recommend the 4 Seasons tray. Delicious!

Followed by... more strolling....

Lots more pictures, and a great day... followed by a wonderful evening at home. Dinner with friends, and an extremely enjoyable game of Cranium. What's better than a Saturday night filled with family, friends and laughter? Not much in my book! 

Sunday was the big dinner... and I had some help with the table top! B, his Mom and his God-mother all pitched in, and here is what we came up with...

Since the dining table and most of our dishes and flatware are black and white, I went with a neutral table cloth and then we injected colour using gourds, as well as some Mums and leaves that B and his Mom grabbed from the backyard.

When it was all said and done though, the most important part was not really what was on the table, but rather, those who were sitting around it...

Monday was a lot more laid back. After we all got a chance to sleep in, and eat a late breakfast we got ready and B's parents friends came over around 1. We dug into left overs for lunch, and then headed out for a walk by the lake, just down the street from our house...

Of course, there were a ton of gorgeous fall colours to take in...

It really was a gorgeous weekend here, and I hope that it was for you as well! Whether you were celebrating Thanksgiving or not, I sure hope you felt as blessed and loved as I did all weekend long! I know that this feeling will carry me through this coming work week.

How was your autumn weekend?

Quick Guest Breakfast

It's Thanksgiving Monday here in Canada, and we still have B's parents and family friends visiting for the holiday. While we're off entertaining them, I wanted to share a quick recipe from Joy of Baking that I discovered last year and turn to when we have guests dropping by early in the day. I've made them once for myself and B, once for Mother's Day Brunch and then yesterday morning for breakfast with B's parents. They are Cream Scones and are they ever delicious! 

You get the website photo... because we ate ours so quickly there wasn't a chance for me to snap one!

Here's what you'll need....


2 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 cup granulated sugar
2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/3 cup cold unsalted butter, cut into pieces
1 large egg, lightly beaten
1 tsp, pure vanilla extract
1/2 cup whipping cream or milk


As long as you have everything, you should be able to whip these up relatively quickly...

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees and place the rack in the middle of the oven. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper
2. In a large bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder and salt
3. Cut butter into small pieces and blend into the flour mixture with a pastry blender or two knives. The mixture should look like coarse crumbs
4. In a small measuring cup combine whipping cream (or milk), beaten egg and vanilla. Add mixture to flour mixture. Stir until just combined. Do not over mix. (The dough should be sticky)
5. Knead dough gently on a lightly floured surface. Roll or pat the dough into a circle that is about 7 inches (18cm) round. Then, using a 2 1/2 inch round cookie cutter, cut the dough into rounds.
6. Place rounds on the cookie sheet, spacing a few inches apart. Brush the tops of the scones with a little cream. This helps to brown the tops of the scones during baking
7. Bake for about 15 - 18 minutes or until nicely browned and a toothpick inserted into the centre of a scone comes out clean. Remove from oven and transfer to a wire rack to cool
8. Serve with Devon Cream or softly whipped cream and your favorite jam

Definitely one of my favorite things to whip up on a fall morning for a quick bite, with some delicious homemade jams! I hope you'll try them out to... along with all of the other delicious recipes from Joy of Baking! 

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Fancy Friday Love

Happy Friday Friends! We're gearing up for a long weekend here in the great white north; Thanksgiving to be exact! B's parents are in town, along with Brett's Godmother and her husband. Sunday we'll be hosting the four of them along with my parents! It'll be a big dinner for our little home to take on, but I always love a challenge! I'll be back next week with some details.

Before I jump into all of my fancy stuff, I just wanted to quickly apologize for being a bad blogger and commenter this past week. Things have been a little crazy for me, and I haven't been feeling quite like myself. I'm hoping to shake it over the weekend and get back to my old self by hanging out with some great family and friends! I appreciate all of you still stopping by and commenting, even if it is just on some silly old post about fleece sheets! You're all so wonderful!

With that out of the way, let's check out my fancy finds from the past week! See you all after my turkey overload!

Loved this beautiful farmhouse kitchen renovation found on frugal farmhouse design.

Head on over to the blog to see more, but I think it looks absolutely beautiful! Bonus: the whole thing was done for UNDER $1000! Now, that's my kind of kitchen renovation!

A recipe for Homemade Marshmallows over at Beantown Baker!

Yeah, this was posted on Monday and kicked off an entire week devoted to Smores recipes! How awesome is that!? Head on over and check out all of that delicious marshmallowy, chocolately, graham crackery goodness! 

How sweet is this DIY headboard that Lindsay put together for the daybed in little Oscar's nursery?

Lindsay's blog was one of the very first I ever read, way back when I got into the whole design blog thing! I'm pretty sure that this is actually the very first post I read, when her and her husband were first working on this room. Now it's a lovely nursery for their beautiful little boy! One of the things I love about design blogs, watching spaces evolve!

It's before and after's like the one below, that was featured on the blog Pink Wallpaper, that remind me what I love so much about renovations and interior decorating!

It really goes to show that with a great vision and a little creativity and planning, any space can really shine! I'm loving the old beams on the ceiling, the tile backsplash over the stove and that incredible island! This was just the transformation I needed to see to get my inspirational juices flowing again. I literally felt a switch flick when I saw it.

Short list, I know... I guess that's what happens when you're in a bit of a slump. Regardless, I'm wishing you all a fantastic weekend, and to my Canadian friends and readers, I hope you have a very Happy Thanksgiving!

The Boys

Today is flying by at top speed! Never thought I would say it, but I wish it wouldn't! However, over stuffing a sandwich in my face at lunch hour, I was happy to receive a little invite in my inbox to attend a taping of Steven and Chris!

I was pretty excited for a number of reasons!

1. Back in the day I used to watch their first show "Designer Guys" with my Mom! It was probably one of the very first real design shows I loved watching.
2. They are Canadian - enough said!
3. Chance to meet MORE incredible bloggers (and see some I've already met before!)
4. Not having to travel far from my home to be a part of this wonderful event
5. I have a feeling the producers watched the reactions to the Nate Show, and probably learned the good, the bad and the ugly about what went down!

I'm super excited to see what they do with this, and the funny thing is - yesterday afternoon when I was home laid out feeling awful, I managed to squeeze in watching their show (for the first time since it's usually on while I'm at work), and they are just as hilarious as I remember! This should be GOOD!

Now, who else is attending? I've heard from great news from Jennifer, Janice and Vanessa - anyone else? I'd love to set up something up for us to meet before hand or after hand in this beautiful city of ours? I'm also interested to see if anyone will fly in the way they did for the Nate Show. I read on Michelle's blog that she may be coming as well - guess we'll see!

The Switch

This past weekend we started to notice the dreaded occurring.... the sheets were freezing when we climbed into bed at night! Don't get me wrong, we both love sleeping with the cool air swirling around us and snuggling up under the blankets, but I detest climbing into a cold bed at night. Last fall we came up with a solution when we purchased a set of fleece sheets from Costco. Yes, you read that right, Fleece - not Flannel!

Source

They are the best sheets, ever, especially at this time of year when we're not quite ready to turn the heat on, and still enjoy sleeping with the windows open. The only downside is that it makes it extra hard to get up on those days that you already don't want to.

On the other hand, they were great last night when I arrived home from my drafting class with the worst migraine ever, and woke up with it again this morning. I slept right through the morning enjoying the warm cuddly feeling of my fleece sheets. 

I wasn't too sure about them when I first saw them last fall in Costco, but it was love the first time we put them on our bed and climbed between the sheets at night to find them warm and cuddly. No more cold sheets for us here!

So what are your thoughts when it comes to fleece sheets, yah or nay? What is it that you're loving most about autumn right now?

Weekend Recap - Fall Home Show

Happy Monday everyone! We had a busy, but enjoyable weekend around here. On Saturday afternoon we headed to the Fall Home Show, with some particular projects in mind.

As I mentioned previously, B and I are planning a complete renovation for the front entrance of our home. Part of that renovation will involve getting a new front door, as well as a new storm door. At one of the previous home shows we visited, we came across Metalex Security and Screen Doors, and B and I instantly knew we would one day have one installed on our own home. 

The Metalex doors allow you to have the added security of a steel door, with the beautiful look of an ornamental storm door. As the rep mentioned at the booth, it would also give us the piece of mind to have this additional security on our home, especially at times when I'm home by myself.

We spent quite a bit of time speaking to one of the reps in their booth, and looking over the different styles, colours, contruction, etc of the doors. At this point, we are almost positive we will purchase a storm door for the front of the house, and possibly even for our back door in the future. We were most struck by the Wilmington design...

The company seems really great to work with and they have all kinds of additional options, like customizing designs as well as door sizes, and the option to have their screen door locks keyed to match existing locks on your home. Talk about accomodating!

We weren't quite ready to order a door on site, as we'll be looking at spending close to, if not over $1000 for one of these bad boys. We do, however, hope to have one installed by next spring.

We also made a brief stop to check out Wrought Iron Man. I was drawn to his display when I saw the free standing wrought iron mailboxes he was displaying. The mailbox we currently have is your run of the mill, wall mounted, top open mailbox. Unfortunately, everytime it rains anything in the mail box gets soaked and we have to air dry all of our mail for a day or two. Not good. We loved that we could get a free standing mailbox that we could bolt down, to keep our mail dry. The added bonus is that you get a key, making all of your mail secure. Despite my love of the mailboxes, and a really great price, we walked away empty handed, as we knew we weren't quite ready to make this purchase for our home when we still have the entry renovation ahead of us.

Overall, we found the Fall Home Show helpful in looking for things we were interested in for our upcoming renovation. For those who didn't attend this year, if you are interested in renovating or making relatively large purchases for your home, I would definitely recommend the Fall Home Show. It's a great place to price things out and talk to different contractors and suppliers!

Thanks again to Anne-Marie from 10 Rooms for the tickets! It was a great way to spend a cool Saturday afternoon with B!

Fancy Friday Love

Wait sorry... is it ACTUALLY October already? We're quickly approaching the end of 2010 and there seems to be nothing I can do to slow time down, even a bit. Fancy Friday is always my time to sit back and reflect on all of the wonderful moments and finds that I stumbled across. Here's what I wanted to share for this week...

One thing I didn't get a chance to post about was my birthday gift from my wonderful B! My birthday was last Saturday, but with so many other things going recently, I got my birthday gift the Wednesday before! I was thrilled to open a box to find the Kate Spade Classic Noel Medium Serena in Brown.

I've been eyeing this beauty of a hand bag for quite some time, and B was oh-so-sneaky, sending his Mom back to the store following our trip to Boston in late APRIL, to pick it up for me! I can't believe he's been storing it all this time and keeping it a secret from me! I LOVE her! (I also got a very cute brown wristlet that I adore!).

Since I'm also catching up a bit on last week, just had to share this lovely Fall Harvest Brunch that was shared on the Sweetest Occassion last Thursday. I would love to throw something like this at our house... maybe when life seems a little less hectic (does that ever happen?).

How cute is the nursery that Sharstin put together for her little N? So beautiful for a teeny tiny girl!

Was so inspired by these adorable pieces that were featured on Deliciously Organized.

You can buy your own at at sarah & bendrix, but I may try to DIY one for myself... we'll see if I can find the time.

Kate Spade's Holiday 2010 Lookbook is out! I'm sure a lot of you have seen it, but there were a few pieces in particular that really caught my eye...

I want both the glori (top) and didi (bottom). If only I could justify spending nearly $700 on two pairs of shoes. If I were forced to choose... I would have to pick the didi! It was love at first sight!

My weekend ahead is equally as fun and busy as the week that just past! I'm looking forward to some late birthday celebrations with family and friends that I didn't get to celebrate with last weekend. We'll also be hitting up the Fall Home Show Saturday or Sunday (Thanks to Anne-Marie from 10 Rooms!) Will I see any of my GTA bloggers at the show this weekend? If so, would love to meet up!

Hope you all enjoy this first weekend of October!