Me myself and I

While visiting my Father over Christmas I was able to make a quick stop at my favorite fabric store , we used to live in the area where my Father now lives so it was nice to visit a familiar store that I am no so lucky to have near by where I now live. BB Bargoons , now called "in VU' , they have a beautiful selection of fabrics & I am a sucker for seersucker and stripes this is the best of both .

I saw these two fabrics and I thought of a clients daughters room , wouldn't it be perfect with classic white painted furniture , the room already has the lilac walls . I would use the floral for drapes and the stripe as a band along the bottom for detail , maybe some pom pom trim , it is so pretty great for a little girl with lots of staying power. I would pull out the green for pillows or sheets to temper the lilac . I was able to get a couple of swatches as this is quite a drive , but obviously worth it .

I have already packed up all the Christmas gear , and I am happy to say my rooms feel larger and fresher again , I fret at dusty holiday decor , I enjoy it but the clutter gets to me very quickly, or maybe its the work involved in tucking these treasures away that I dread , perhaps all of the vacuuming and lugging of boxes is why I could easily put it off , but that is not my style at all , if I can do it today and complete it , that is what must be done , chop chop.

For instance I have been waiting to make myself a real workable room , I asked my children to buy me legs for Christmas , that is all I wanted . My husband was taking the kids out and I knew he had forgotten all about them , even though I had printed out a photo for a gentle reminder , and I begged my girls like they do me , I really wanted this and only this and I knew it was an out of the way trip to Ikea that he wasn't planning on making but its Christmas and my pleading worked. Well I have had the table top in my garage for months, I have been patient. I had decided it was best considering the state of this room { the rough unfinished state} to get these stylish , adjustable , and most of all affordable at $30.00 a leg , how can I go wrong , perhaps when this room is finished I may come up with a base that has more storage , but for now this gets me a table and a workroom , I could not be more thrilled with them . Best of all the legs were on sale $19.00 each , that would make my large island height table $101.50 you can not beat that .

So of course I quickly put together my legs and have been waiting to ask my husband and my brother to kindly move this monster or a piece of wood from the garage down into my basement , now I am a sturdy woman but I helped move this baby into the garage and I know I couldn't manage this big move , I have also two little injuries as I impaled my finger with fork tines ,don't ask be careful while closing cutlery drawers! , and my wrist is in awful shape from all the driving I was doing over the holidays.

Tonight was the night and I thank them for their time .

So what do you think ? I have a great Ikea clamp lamp holding onto the joists for great lighting which I always use down there, my lovely Dash and Albert striped rug , two bar stools , it is perfect for now , I can picture it with beadboard white walls . Won't this make a great sewing space , painting space , re-upholstering space, floor planning space , it will keep my messes out of the main floor , I won't feel the pressure to get everything put away during those project steps like drying time between coats of paint.

I will have to find a project to break it in .

I was able to create a little reading spot since all of my design magazines are now down stairs to inspire me and to simply enjoy.

Momma finally has a dedicated work space , from playroom/nap room , to bare space to work room .

Can you imagine how thrilled I will be when this is a fully complete room with walls and a ceiling.

Plenty of pretty

I recently took a test to determine what my style is , they say my style is "romantic" but I would have to disagree , I believe my personal style would best be described as "traditional pretty chic" .
I love time worn pieces like chippy painted tables, I love traditional style mouldings and its all about details for me . Incorporating one of a kind touches , thinking outside the box with colors and details . Like making sure my door handles or pretty to look at and that lighting is special {which doesn't mean expensive} , most of all I love slipcovers for their ease and style , and always liveable wood furniture, painted furniture is key to my look , there are NO coasters here , I don't deal well with fussy or stuffy , windows need to be properly dressed , with simple drapes and color , I am not a big fan of all solids everywhere , there are so many beautiful patterned fabrics to choose , color and comfort are key .

The beadboard trim is so wonderful in this tiny full bath , I would like the same half glass enclosure on my tub , I think it is a great idea .

I am crazy about this low trim work , there are no set rules , adding trim gives a house soul , it helps to make it one of a kind , don't get me wrong trim can be executed wrong , thin poorly installed wood is a big no no , it is all about scale and finishing .

I love the creamy shade of the perimeter cabinets and the pale aqua shade of the island and marble and don't forget the chandelier , now thats pretty .

I love this ceiling but I think it would be even more special if the walls were a deep cream , it's a bit matchy , I am thinking of painting my kitchen ceiling in the palest shade of blue , against all of the white it will be a pretty addition , it needs a coat of paint so why not a tint of color??

Having a happy busy Christmas

We have been enjoying our girls , I am happy to say that we stayed in our pj's almost all of Christmas day , just as I had hoped for .

We woke at 8:00 to these two faces and proceeded to open gifts and laze around . We bought the girls a video game for their xbox , it is called "your in the movies" can I just say that that was money well spent , the game includes a camera to film you and friends and act out scenes as well as play games , oh it is a barrel of laughs as well as great exercise . They played from 8:30 am to 10:30 pm , non stop fun , we even gave it a try ,I nearly peed my pants while playing , great family fun.

We have put many miles on the car in the last few days , we all get so tired from all the driving , but it can't be avoided , can't get there any other way . We saw most of our families and enjoyed all of the visiting time .

We encountered a sudden storm a white out while traveling, very slick roads and many many accidents but we took it slow going , funny we left piles of snow behind , I mean neck high snow piles , hit snow storm , later hit rain and tons of rain and very mild temps that melted most of the snow all in three days , welcome to Ontario don't like the weather , wait a minute it will change!

I just realized I did not take out my camera even once because I bought a new video camera , so I captured much on video , now to figure out how to transfer them onto the computer ??? That will come soon.

I just finished watching the sound of music , what a great movie now back to work tomorrow for a few days, sad :( about that , but life goes on .

A well laid plan , so they say , what do they know ?

I was inspired to make my annual sugar cookies , I was going to skip this because it is a big deal , it is a long haul ,and a big mess . Normally I do it on my own and my family enjoys my labours, I am not good at the excess mess , but my kids are getting older and I thought I should pass on my tricks and the fun of icing sugar cookies .
So here is how it went , "can we do it now ? ", followed by "is now a good time to make the cookies ?" and so on and so on , all while I was trying to take a little break , oh I love having the MOST impatient child on the planet earth, oh her name is MASON.
While waiting for the butter to soften to room temp I measured out all of my ingredients , it is a very simple recipe .

1 cup of butter {room temp}

2 cups of sugar

4 cups of flour

2 eggs

1/2 tsp salt & 1 tsp baking powder

2 tsp of vanilla

Cream together butter and sugar and then beat in eggs.

add in flour mixed with salt etc and vanilla until all combined , it will be quite a crumbly mixture .

Mold into two balls until it comes together well with your hands and flatten out into a round onto tin foil , wrap tightly place into fridge and chill for 15 to 20 minutes until firm .

Chillin' in the fridge.

Roll out quite thick for softer cookies {which most prefer} 1/4 inch thick approx. maybe a touch thinner .Bake 15 minutes at 325.

Then cool completely.

Prepare royal icing {best to use a hand mixer or whisk } separate 3 eggs and use only whites, add confectioners sugar slowly over time until you get a good thickness , lift up your whisk and when you get a slow flow you have got a good consistency .

I suggest you use disposable piping bags , as this is a messy product to clean up , I use a wide mouth glass to fold the bag over the edges and to make the filling of the bags easy as pie.

Have a handy spot to put piping bags while in use , air is the enemy , I wet a bit of paper towel and place it in the bottom of a tall glass for the tip to rest into .

I used disposable elastics to help the kids keep more air out , remember "air is the enemy"

Cut if the tip for easy icing application . Aren't they focused, there hair is wet because they went out and shovelled the side walk ,the little darlings!

When using more than one color , apply the largest color first , then walk away , leave it to set for about an hour , mix up next color and apply that color and so on , add sugars and sprinkles to wet icing , time is of the essence, you see why I left the kids out of this up until now , this is not for the faint of heart or the impatient.

Here are Mason's snowmen ,aren't they cute.

And Sophie's , also adorable.

This is mine , the kids thought mine were boring , whatever! I like them with out eyes as well so simple.

No Martha Stewart I am not! , but they were fun , and some are better than others .

A couple of left over bits of dough they get baked too .

These are the ones the girls chose to keep for themselves the others we will serve at our Christmas Eve gathering.

Ok , this is a long activity , it took 4 1/2 hours from start to clean up , I know that is a lot of work and yes I can understand getting bored of it , I know I did , the fun part is the icing and decorating , and I assure you this is worth the effort , I have been getting compliments from people who ate my cookies last Christmas , wow , talk about a lasting impression huh !

I will have to guard these cookies from my husband the most , or there will be nothing left for tomorrow , Christmas Eve woohoo , I am so excited to finally give my kids there gifts {just pj's Chirstmas Eve}and to see my family , I love it when my house is full of family and food and drinks , there is no better occasion , I hope you too have a wonderful Christmas , Cheers !

I am gonna take a couple of days off to spend with my wonderful , silly, crazy and yes sometimes totally annoying crew.

Spring summer catalogue

Is it just me or is this strange?

Up early and go go go

After returning from my early cuppie drop off I just kept going and going , I have had there Ikea brackets since the summer I had intended on installing them at the base of my kitchen cabinets but couldn't figure out hoe to make them work , I didn't want to loose the full curve and install them to the base of the cabinet , but recently I bought a tile but , so when it came to mind today nothing was to stop me , they are there to stay never to be removed at least not by me .

What do you think , good choice?

I used those little round sticky on one sided wood veneers and painted them white to conceal the screws. click on the photo to see in detail.

I know a lot of you out there have this same wire two tiered rack as I , it was sitting about my dining room and this clever idea came to me , place it over the vent and use it for drying wet winter mitts and hats, it has worked perfectly . Now that is thinking outside the box, and it is much prettier than those over the vent dryers made for mitts .

I found the perfect wrapping paper , it even matches my tree decor , it was made to be.

This has been a very busy weekend for my cupppies business , I had a 2 doz reg plus 20 mini's for one order, the next day a 60 mini's order, this is quite a busy bakery these days , but I love it .

Christmas themed mini's, dark green with little white balls , like little snowballs .

We have had two back to back snow storms , I can not believe how much snow has fallen . My dream of an easy green Christmas is definitely out , driving in this stuff is a nightmare.

Mason has been able to profit from all this snow , she has been offering to shovel driveways and the dreaded snowed in driveways created by the plows , she had a friend working with her and they raked in $37.00 each in two days , what trooper , shovelling is HARD work .

I had a party recently , a candle party , I had no plans of buying any as they are pricey and I can not tolerate smelly candles , but after the sales were calculated I was able to receive over $100.00 worth of items, I chose these luminaries , they have such a nice detail , they are hollow and I have a little tea light inside so they will always be this pretty , perfect for Christmas , but lovely for always. Aren't they pretty ?

Merry Christmas .

Putting some miles on the old faithful sewing machine

Sophie brought home this lovely work of art , I was blown away , I framed it immediately , what a great addition.

I spent many hours sewing these drapes , I used the cast off faux roman from the bathroom , pulled it all apart and sewed it onto the bottom , just for a detail .

When I picked up this paisley I didn't know how well it would match the stripe , I just knew I loved it I knew I would find a good use for it , as well it was buy one get two free .

It works very well in my bedroom with my shabby chic bed linens , I tried to do a darker look for winter but I couldn't handle it , too masculine , I need my crisp white and blue bed with green , fresh clean and pretty , I think in the spring this room will get a long over due proper makeover , which will include lighter walls , new trim work , hopefully crown moulding and panel moulding in some fashion perhaps just on the bed wall , I love when that is made a real feature.

Today we are waiting for a big storm , it sounds like we might get buried , all the school buses are cancelled , lots of schools are too , my kids wanted to go to school you know last day pf school before break is always fun and no work , pj day for Sophie , 6 more days till Christmas , are you all ready ???

I will be a baking fool by the end of Sunday , many cuppies are in my future , let's see I have 2 1/2 doz plus 20 mini's for one order and 60 mini's for my second order , fun fun fun . I love the smell that fills my house when I bake , and there are always left overs .