A Stop in Wine Country

Last weekend we stopped into a few wineries on our Beamsville adventure! It always amazes me how unique and different each winery is. Here are a few of the ones that caught out eye:)

Angels Gate

Peninsula Ridge

This one definitely wins most beautiful. They have a fancy little restaurant inside as well that looks like it's worth checking out!

Thirty Bench

This guy was my favourite, the grapevine wreath on the side of the barn is my new phone wallpaper!

Hapy Friday! I'm hoping to get to some Christmas decorations up this weekend:)

Inspiration Wall

I have been collecting fancy china plates and platters for a few years, and although I use them for displaying baked goods like here and here, they spend most of their time locked in the buffet. I yearn for the days when I own my own home and I can hang all of my platters on the wall. I love the look of plates displayed on the wall, I have pinned a couple recently like this one and this one.

When I was at the Good Earth Food & Wine Co on the weekend, I noticed this lovely wall. It was a combination of prints and plates and made me smile!

Handmade Market

On Saturday I made my way to Beamsville with one of my best pals. We had a great day (despite the frigid weather), and I was able to get a few things knocked off my Christmas shopping list in the process. Here are some pictures of the day!

I loved the soy candles in the vintage crown jars of course!

Les and I devoured the apple twist with caramel drizzle, and the apple cider was delicious!

Loved the cutting boards made out of wine barrel tops!

DIY Black Friday Cart

On Sunday I decided to finally tackle our office. We don't actually use our office for anything more than a storage room and a place for the cats litter and food. I vowed to make the space more functional and after a good clean, a full bag of trash and one for goodwill, I found we had plenty of room to work with! I really wanted an ottoman like piece to pair with the large leather office chair, but didn't want to buy anything new. When I was taking something out to the garage , I noticed the cart!

Chris brought me home this cart last summer. I loved it, but didn't really have a place for it, so it stayed outside acting as a patio side table. I know it's not beautiful, but it has great bones! The first step to improvement was painting the frame, I went with black to match the chair.

The next step to improvement was flipping over the top, discovering a great unfinished surface and staining it a few shades darker! I love how the wood turned out (it never usually works that well for me) :)

The finished product:

Happy Friday, hoping you have a great weekend. I'm off to the Hand Made Market in Beamsville with my good friend on Saturday. Should be a good day!

If You're Looking For a Cat

You can search high.

Or you can search low.

But he'll usually be right in front of you!

Hope you all have a great Wednesday!

Sugar Cookies and Sprinkles

I love making sugar cookies. For some reason they remind me of my Grammy Forsythe. She always used to have some on hand, some iced with sprinkles and some with just sprinkles. My Grammy was always good for sprinkles. She had a cupboard full of them, all different colours. She rarely mixed her colours but she did have these multicoloured round ones, they were always my favourite (some things never change)! I made these on Saturday for a potluck we attended.

The recipe I use is similar to this one, and it freezes and doubles really well. I typically freeze the dough in two portions and then just pull it out of the freezer a few hours before I want to bake!

Happy Monday Everyone!

DIY Friday: Grain Sack Table Runner

Last weekend I finally got to a couple of long overdue sewing projects. I bought this linen sack on labour day weekend with Chris' mom. I paid $5 and decided it would be an awesome table runner.

Store Crashing: West Elm Toronto

As you know from my last post, I discovered the West Elm store in Liberty Village this week. Thanks to a 3 hour wait on Monday night, I had plenty of time to scope out some of their wares! For anyone interested, yes they have a sale section. we were kindly escorted out of said section while waiting in line, but they did give is a 15% off coupon to use before December 31st! Here were some of my favourite things that I just may apply my coupon to:

I loved these pillows with quilt applique...definitely DIYable!

Left: Inspiration for Old Window use...I'm in love and thinking headboard!

Right: Loved the barn door and different texture bed linens.

The galvanized bucket on the vintage pop crate was beautiful, also love the large woven baskets

This is a pic for my friends Shaun & Sarah- West Elm carries wool blankets that look pretty vintage!

Hope you enjoyed the sights as much as I did, will definitely need to make my way back there soon!

Meeting the Petersiks!

I was beyond excited to hear that John & Sherry from Young House Love were coming to Toronto for a book signing at West Elm. On a second note, I was doubly thrilled that Toronto has a West Elm store (more on that later in the week).

 

My awkward shot, just in case they ended when they said they would!

I had read on their blog  that the lines were long for their book signings, but I really had no idea what to expect when I walked into West Elm, given this was a Canadian stop. Turns out we Canadians love us some Young House Love because I stood with my 500 new best friends for just over 3 hours to get my book signed! I don't think I have stood in line for anything that long (including the first Lululemon warehouse sale in Toronto)! On the plus side, I made friends in line and we were treated to some yummy hot chocolate and cookies all night long!

It was certainly worth the wait because John and Sherry are exactly how you would expect them to be when you read their blog! They stayed well over 2 hours beyond their event time and didn't lose one ounce of energy (probably due to their midnight DIY routines)! Sherry is just as loud, bubbly and wonderful as she is in her pinterest challenge videos, and John cracks jokes with just about everyone and clearly adores his wife. It was lovely to meet them, and gives me hope that all the bloggers I read are as real as they appear to be!

Thanks for making your way to Canada- love you guys!

Fab Find Friday: Wedding Dress

Sorry about the lack of a post last Friday, turns out I have a very exciting Fab Find to share, but I can't show you any pictures for obvious reasons...I found my wedding dress last Thursday night! I just wasn't feeling 100% about the jeweled numbers that were my top favourites from my shopping experience here. I liked how the gowns fit, but thought they were just a little too glitzy!

So, Tricia met me at Ritche bridal in Toronto on the Thursday night, and we went at it again! My consultant was Stephanie, and she was fabulous, a woman on a mission after my own heart...she had even been to Frenchy's in NB! Although I originally pegged Ritche as a little too fancy for me, they were hosting their Fall Sale, and the gown I ended up choosing was on sale! It does need some alterations, so I am currently looking for an affordable experienced seamstress (the store quoted $500!!!), but the bones are just right:)

This is a big check off my wedding list, and it feels good to have found something so lovely, and to have saved a little money in the process!

Sweet Gift & Vintage Prints

My sweet friend Sarah gifted me two doilies from her late grandmother to add to my runner that I still need to see together. I was very touched that she thought of me, and can't wait to share the other gift she gave to me when the time is right.

As you know I have taken to seeking out great fabric at thrift stores. Typically the best vintage prints come in the form of bed sheets. The top sheets usually stay in pretty good shape over the years. I've even got my mom searching now. Here's two of my favourites that I found on my most recent trip east! The pink would be gorgeous as a valance or pillow covers in a little girls room and the blue could be a great table runner. I'm trying to figure out how to incorporate these two into wedding decor without cutting too much so I can reuse! If I were in a cutting mood, what wonderful bunting the pink would make! As you can see the kittens also took to the prints (I thoroughly enjoy that Boy-Cat preferred the pink and Missy preferred the blue!

Hibernation

hi·ber·nate

  [hi-ber-neyt] 

verb (used without object), hi·ber·nat·ed, hi·ber·nat·ing.

1.

Zoology . to spend the winter in close quarters in a dormantcondition, as bears and certain other animals. Compareestivate.

2.

to withdraw or be in seclusion; retire.

3.

to winter in a place with a milder climate: Each winter finds ushibernating in Florida

We've been really busy lately, between travelling, holidays, work and wedding planning, it feels like i've been running on empty for a few weeks now. I've made a plan to "hibernate" for the entire month of January. We already have commitments lined up in November, and I know December will be busy with the holidays, I have planned to do absolutely nothing in January. I got a head start on my hibernation when I found myself with a free weekend...the only problem is that I don't really know how to hibernate, it's not in my nature. 

Here's what I accomplished this weekend when I was trying to hibernate:

• I failed at making bread not once, not twice but three times. I tried two recipes from Edie at Life in Grace and one from Michael Smith. The results were not impressive, one did not come out of the pan despite much greasing, and two were far too moist despite very dark outer crust. Almost the entire reason why I have a stand mixer is to make bread. My grandmother makes bread every single week, and   even with a full recipe and having shadowed her a number of times I still can't master the recipe or technique. I am seriously thinking of joining a bread making course!

• I successfully cooked:

• Homemade Pasta Sauce
• Sausage & Pepper Penne
• Best Ever Beef Stew
• Homemade Chicken Stock
• Corn & Potato Chowder
• Best Ever Chocolate Chip Cookies
• Cinnamon Raisin Cookies

• I caught up on my television shows:

• The Bachelor Canada (Guilty pleasure, and I'm a proud Canadian)
• The Voice
• Nashville (I'm in LOVE with this new show)
• The Big Bang Theory
• New Girl

• I switched my summer and winter clothes now that it's starting to get cooler
• I went to Yoga class
• I found the cupcake carrying case at Winners. (i've been coveting since I was introduced to it by Francine in July)

The only thing I didn't accomplish was starting my sewing projects, I guess there's always January!