Remember that there is a meaning beyond absurdity

Goodbye old blog

2011-10-13T19:20:00.001-06:00

Hey People! I've migrated my blog over to a different email address and location. Weirdly, google seems to be stubborn about letting you change the gmail account that is associated with any of their applications (blogs, google+), so I've taken the matter into my own hands and just dumped everything onto a new blog. Yay!

Come visit: http://bethaneebee-kelly.blogspot.com/

What makes a classic?

2011-09-21T17:30:00.000-06:00

I am reading East of Eden, by John Steinbeck, and it's depressing as heck. It's making me think, though: what makes a classic a classic? And is that enough to make it worth reading? When I'm done reading this tragic story, will I be able to say "I'm glad I've read it"?

After some googling around, the verdict I distilled out of the internet's always-plentiful and often useless sea of opinions was that timelessness and universality are two major criteria for a classic. With having NEVER been out of print, it seems that East of Eden has proven itself timeless. And its heavy drawing on biblical themes may seem to be evidence that it has a universal tale of morality to tell. I'm only half way through so I'm far from drawing any useful conclusions on that front. I'm not sure it's worth blogging about a book half way through the reading process, except that I'm finding it so dark that I just want to throw this out there and get a few opinions.

I mentioned my thoughts to Kerry, who asked me why I just don't quit reading it if I don't like it. I don't know how serious she was about not finishing it (she strikes me as a book-finisher), but all I could say was that I was reading it because it is a classic and I feel like that means I should read it. And if I don't like it at the end then at least I will be able to explain why, having read from cover to cover.

But trying to explain why I will probably finish reading it even though it's an awful, awful story reminded me of a question that my first year university English professor posed to our class. She asked us: why do we read?. It was a truly awkward moment. All of us first years unwilling to speak, afraid to answer incorrectly, and dreading being called on in front of a class full of strangers. She eventually answered the question with her own answer, which was that we read to know that we are not alone. We read to know that we are not alone.

Frankly, I would rather feel alone than know any of the characters that have been introduced to me in East of Eden. In my further googling (c'mon, this is a blog for fun, I can google for sources, right?), the thing I found that seems to fit this situation the best is Italo Calvino's thoughts on what makes a classic. Apparently he wrote an essay called "Why read the classics?" in the 1980s that says "a classic is a book that has never finished saying what it has to say". And then he personalizes it, saying that "YOUR classic author is the one you cannot feel indifferent to, who helps you define yourself in relation to him, even in dispute with him."

Well Mr. Steinbeck, I think we are officially in dispute.

August was august

2011-09-19T15:16:00.002-06:00

Did you know that "august" is a word outside of being a month? I like that about it. Especially since August does in fact tend to be august. Basically it means: inspring admiration, majestic. Among other things.

Anyways, back to the grand recap of our crazy summer. I’m once again behind on this but you know we’ve been busy doin' stuff. So, AUGUST. Or what I can remember of it...

We rode into August on a wedding high, but first took a mini-break to go to folk fest. We just bought a day pass and had a pretty awesome time hanging out with some favourite people: Scott, Geneva, Francis, Kaeli, and my dad. Those kids are the cutest. But those kids outside are even cuter. Every time I hang out with F&G I think my head might explode from all the love and cuteness. The next day I got in touch with the lovely Kerry, who was also in town for folk fest. She was in her usual mid-summer state of pure exhaustion, so I forced her to come take a nap on our new inflatable guest bed that we were testing out for Vancouver. Then I dropped her off at folk fest and she tried to sneak attack me with an extremely final goodbye as she got out of the car. I believe it was something like "I'm never going to see you again". Nerd.

After the ‘fest, we continued the wedding trend all the way down to Southern Alberta for Bri and Patrick’s first instalment of their wedding, which was basically a full wedding sans rings, which were later exchanged at another ceremony in Ontario. It was a beautiful weekend and fun to get down south and see a real life “rattlesnake protection area”. The farm was a beautiful place for a wedding and the party was full of familiar friendly faces. Joel and I had the privilege of driving down and camping with Lisa, which was a TREAT. I always forget that she totally loves rap music and club music. It’s hilarious. But I never forget that she is fun to hang out with.

A highlight of the weekend was when Lisa looked at me and said “you and I are going to dance to the next song together, no matter what it is”. And can you guess what it was? It was totally the Macarena. UGH. Also, DID YOU KNOW THAT MICROSOFT WORD AUTOCORRECTS “MACARENA” TO BE CAPITALIZED? Ha! Awesome.

Returning to Edmonton meant that we had to start facing our reality. You know, the reality where we had to pack up and move our lives to Vancouver? Let me just say that it was a luxury to have extra time to do this, but that consolidating two households plus downsizing them to fit into a one bedroom apartment is a big job. Joel had a three bedroom house that was basically full of stuff that he owned, and I had a one bedroom plus den’s worth of stuff. So that was a heck of a lot of consolidating. Thank you to the kind and generous Lewis, who lived with us all summer and was gracious enough to overlook the chaos.

After a summer of slow goodbyes, we capped it off with an official goodbye party, at the always-stylish and always welcoming home of Dawn and Rick. They saved our butts from major house embarrassment if we had tried to have people over to our place. It was a beautiful summer night and a great way to say goodbye to Edmonton and our friends here.

Then, the last thing we did in August was leave our home of 27ish years each, and drive a van full of our stuff to a new life in Vancouver. I can’t say enough good things about life in Vancouver so far, but I’ll save those for later, because really, right now, I am just feeling a little sad about leaving Edmonton.

July: unexpectedly crazy

2011-08-20T13:39:00.001-06:00

In the weeks leading up to our wedding I kept telling people that we'd have lots more time in July to hang out. I'm here to tell you now that I accidentally lied. This was UNTRUE. We have hardly had any time. Once again, it's been crazy, but still mostly fun. Here is July, in a nutshell.

1) Mexico

We flew to Mexico right after dumping all of my belongings into Joel’s house, leaving a disastrous mess of boxes behind for poor Lewis to live amongst. It was a week full of sun, delicious Mexican food (GUACAMOLE! Piles and piles of it eaten on the beach), hangouts with family and my friend/cousin Melissa and her man-friend, topped off by the wedding of my cousin Lindsay! It was a good time, although poor Joel had to hole up in our hotel room studying for his defense, which leads me to the next major item…

2) Dr. Husband!

We flew back to the airport in Calgary on Sunday night and drove the rest of the way home in a rainstorm. Monday and Tuesday were full of thesis defense prep, and on Wednesday, he/we spent dawn-til-dusk defending and partying. Well, I didn’t do much defending, but I consulted on tie choice (see above), drank coffee (pictured above), waited around, and watched the presentation (which was excellent)…and then I went out to party afterwards. So proud.

3) Vancouver House Hunting

Now that we had the gigantic PhD defence out of the way, we drove out to Vancouver to look for our new home. We left on Monday morning, arriving late that night, and budgeted…ONE DAY to find the perfect home to rent. Ummmm, whose dumb idea was that? Turns out it was OURS! We pretty much did it though, and I patted us both on the back for the entire drive home for being so organized, prepared, and lucky in our house hunt. We found a great place, and although things looked a bit dicey for awhile, it’s ours now for the next year and that’s all that matters for now. The pics above show the tilework at the entrance to our building, and the rows upon rows of lavender growing out front. I think it was meant to be.

4) Rosebud

We drove back from Vancouver right after we signed our new lease and felt confident that we would have no problem driving the whole way to Calgary. But then we realized we left Vancouver at close to 4:00 p.m. Another brilliant idea. So we slept in Golden after a white-knuckle drive through the dark for several hours and woke up early the next day to rush to Rosebud, AB. We saw “Jake and the kid” with my parents, sister and aunt and uncle. Rosebud was just as sweet at my mom has always said.

4.5) Calgary Folk Festing

We went from Rosebud directly to Calgary Folk Fest, which froze us out via miserable rain, and then eventually cleared up enough for us to enjoy. We met up with Kerry and Leanne at various points, and stayed with Melly.Tasting a maple bacon donut (pictured above, bottom right) at "Jelly" is an part of the weekend that should not be overlooked. Fun if you like donuts, which I do. As a donut-appreciator, I am always surprised how many people don't like them. I think at least 60% of people who say they don't like donuts are just telling themselves that so that they aren't tempted to eat them all the time for every meal. Donuts are delicious.

5) Birthday and Garage Sale

When we got back from Calgary it was my birthday the next day, so Joel made a delicious dinner of pork tacos with homemade tortillas for me and my family. So fun. Then we got down to business and prepped for our upcoming garage sale. We cleared space in Scott and Heidi’s garage and loaded all of our crap over there to make sweet moolah. It was SO WEIRD the things that people bought. So if you are ever having a garage sale and wondering whether to include an item...DO IT. Someone will probably buy the thing you least expect them to. Also, it was fun to hang out at their house all weekend and we made a decent profit, which we used to buy ourselves a new couch! But more on that later, as it is sitting flat-packed in our basement right now.

6) Dave and Jamie's Wedding

And then, after all that, Dave and Jamie got married! Those are two fine people and they put on a great wedding. It could not have been more perfect for them. Beautiful day, thoughtful ceremony, and ridiculously awesome entrance into the wedding being carried by their friends on custom-made wooden platforms. Oh, those two.

All in all, a good month.

June in a nutshell

2011-08-09T12:41:00.006-06:00

After a month-and-a-half hiatus from my regular life, I decided to pop up and populate my neglected blog with a new post, since I can’t see life returning to anything closely approximating regular for quite some time. At the rate we have been going, I am thinking I might start to unwind sometime in January 2012.

That’s fine with me though. Life is good and fun and exciting and we are still young enough to keep up. I’ll start at the beginning of the chaos and do a little whirlwind update. I originally planned to do it in one giant post, but I think I’ll just start with June for now.

1) Wrapping up the job I’ve worked at for the past three years

In a truly inspired moment, Joel suggested I wrap up work before our wedding instead of after, thus leaving us a bit of time as newlyweds wrapping up our life in our beloved Edmonton --- not kidding about it being beloved, by the way, so keep your comments to yourselves any Edmonton-haters --- before we have to pack up and start a new love affair with Vancouver (that's a lot of endings before we get to the new beginnings). As well, after years and years of work, Joel was almost ready to say goodbye to student life and hello to life as Dr. Kelly (PhD, not MD). But that’s a story for my July-in-a-nutshell post. Basically, we wanted to be able to take maximum advantage of this interim period, because I’m guessing it won’t be often in the coming years when we are both able to be off from work/school at the same time. Anyways, wrapping up was a positive thing. I think they were sad to see me go, which is a nice feeling when leaving a job, and the timing turned out to be perfect, since we had a bunch of chaos (both expected and unexpected) in our general lives, so it has been nice to have the extra time to deal with it properly instead of rolling it all up into a giant ball of overwhelmed-ness and disorganization that we would have to deal with once we got to Vancouver.

The pic above is the Louise McKinney walking bridge looking over to downtown. I'm pretty sure one of those towers is Scotia Place, as it is one of the downtown buildings that you can see from almost anywhere in the city.

2) Getting married (!!!)

Best thing I’ve done. Seriously. I never suspected it would be such an absolute blast to attend my own wedding. We had an amazing time. Our families and friends amazed us with their support and helpfulness. All of our wedding vendors were champs. We were in love. What more can you ask for? After the excitement of the actual wedding was over, my emotions were running so high that my eyes welled up with happy tears at least once a day for twelve consecutive days afterwards. Hilarious. Following that it was about once every two or three days. It was all just so overwhelming and excellent. I recommend it.

The picture above is the reminder Joel set in his iPhone for our wedding day. Ha.

3) Honeymooning

We figured we’d have a lot of time this summer. We were mistaken. This makes me increasingly glad that we decided to getaway for the week following our wedding. We had a super relaxing week full of sleeping in, swimming, bbqing, hiking, canoeing, biking, and coffee. I would not trade that week for anything.

4) Packing up and moving out of my old place

I decided to leave my little apartment basically untouched while we went away after our wedding. It was good not to worry about moving before the wedding, but the major downside to that was that we had to come home and pack and move me in a three and a half day span of time. Whose idea was that? Ummmm. What a whirlwind. I tapped into the most dedicated version of myself and spent a few 16 hour days packing before Joel and Lewis championed my move up to my new home downtown. Thanks guys. Then I returned to clean up and say goodbye. This is a final goodbye shot in the bathroom mirror where Natasha had drawn a sweet heart for us to return home to after honeymooning.

That brings us to the end of June. I'll tackle both the wedding and July later on. And by then it will likely be time to catch you up on August.

House Tour: Part V

2011-06-06T23:08:00.000-06:00

I spent part of Saturday tidying up my house because it has become a pit of wedding preparation. I decided I would focus on my bedroom so that I could post the pics AND run away from the clutter that is all around. Not that I don't LOVE the clutter. I do. It's so fun to have 20 projects on the go all at once. Just...busy and messy.

Anyways, here's my room.

And my giant green dresser/credenza from Goodwill. And on the right a giant "a" scored by Natasha's sister and passed along to me. Oh, and a little ceramic bust of a composer on the bed side table.

My styrofoam and fabric upholstered head board, little library drawers, and my Anthro knock-off bed spread from Target.

This is the view from the bed, into the laundry area that leads to the bathroom. And the chair that me and my mom recovered.

And my jewelery catch-all and little moss terrarium.

And on the other side of the door, my letterpress drawer from my sis, a chalkboard I made out of a thrifted frame, and more jewelery stuff.

And...the finale...MY SUPER ORGANIZED CLOSET. And it OFTEN looks almost this clean. I am pretty stoked about it.

Wedding Guest of the Week Pt. IV

2011-06-04T10:05:00.000-06:00

Lisa, who has asked to be referred to as the wedding guest of the millennium, is a friend of mine from university. We spent hours locked in the newspaper office together drinking fruit and veggie juice and eating subway sandwiches...oh, and putting together the paper. And bonding with Joel. Me a little more than her.

The picture of us here is from a trip Lisa and I took to Montreal where we had tons o' fun doing parkour all over the city. So much fun that when people ask me what I did in Montreal, I can't really remember anything except for the parkour. And the poutine I guess. GREAT DAY.

Here are her answers:

Q: Favourite punctuation mark?
A: The interrobang!?

Q: Favourite chemical element?
A: gin

Q: Chicken or fish?
A: camel

Q: Worst wedding idea you have shared with the couple so far?
A: that bethany knit her own wedding dress. clearly crocheting is far classier.

Q: Best wedding idea you have shared with the couple so far?
A: planking-themed hen party. duh.

Q: I knew it was true love when __________.
A: when joel pulled bethany out of GIS to give her a Safeway sandwich. and then pulled 13 all-nighters with us in the chronicle office.

Q: I am most looking foward to _______:
A: the parkour portraits

And just for a bonus, here is a video of what started it all:

House Tour: Part IV

2011-05-19T00:24:00.000-06:00

I am determined to wrap up this house tour before I move out of the dang place. And by "the dang place", I really mean the place that I love. It seriously has been such a great place to spend my last year of singleness. Whoooo!

We have finally arrived at the living room, where I spend most of my time when I'm home. Usually right in front of the fireplace. Laying on a giant pillow on the floor with my feet almost touching the glass. All basement suites should have fireplaces. I'm convinced.

Below is the view from the kitchen. That side table on the left was a kick ass Christmas gift from my brother. It's a cedar beam shaped into a stool/table and sanded until it's soooo smooth. He also gave me the art rail because he didn't feel like returning it to IKEA. And I love it. Less holes to patch when I move too. I just made those pillowcases for the throw pillows this week. They were bed linens, but the pin tucks and buttons made them a nightmare to sleep on, and I'm not much for decoration pillows on the bed (Along Came Polly, anyone?), so I cut them up and sewed them into something better. The card catalog coffee table was saved from a Lloydminster library by my librarian aunt and uncle, and found its way to me from their garage when they moved to Edmonton. Yay! And finally, on the right, on the bookshelf, is a kickass gift from Joel. A huge wooden ampersand that was the beginning of an accidental ampersand collection. Oops.

Here are my tiny windows, and a giant letter that Natasha saved for me from the sign yard by her place.

And here is the fireplace. Another salvaged letter. And a cork board that I made out of a thrift store frame, covered in postcards from Joel.

And some cute stuff....including a teacup from Joel's mom's side of the family.

And my little bird under a bell jar.

And my tv. Covered in crap in an attempt to make it cuter. Or less obvious. Or something.

And the first gift I ever got from Joel is under the bell jar. A tiny atlas. I liked it then, and I like it now. Just like him. Awwwwww. The striped pillow was originally purchased for a pillow case that I bought in Paris, but I am obsessed with stripes in clothing AND decor at the moment, so I've just been using it as is. Also that is my in front of the fireplace floor-lying pillow.

So that's the living room. You can see glimpses of the other half of the room, which is my crafty area and is a disaster of wedding stuff at the moment...so you'll have to wait a little longer for that one. After that all that's left is the bedroom. I know you are all dying from the anticipation.

Wedding Guest of the Week, Pt. V

2011-05-14T10:43:00.001-06:00

Time for some Kaeli action here on wedding guest of the week. Above she is pictured saving a starfish. What a champ - both as a sister and as a starfish-saver.

Q: Favourite punctuation mark?
A: Definitely Ellipsis...I highly overuse it, yet i don't feel guilty for that because it is highly under-ridiculed and under-criticized! Also... it makes a simple period look sophisticated.

Q: Favourite chemical element?
A: Beryllium & Thorium....if you put them together they spell BeTh (sorry Joel...no elements spell your name)

Q: Chicken or fish?
A: Pulled Porckenfish

Q: Worst wedding idea you have shared with the couple so far?
A: Hire the Canadian Blood Services to Host a combo Bachelor/Bachelorette party with a "Blood Donor" theme. I was kind of serious for two reasons: 1) JK & BB always donate blood when they go on dates 2) If we all donate blood, we will get tipsy faster and you won't have to drink so much

Q: Best wedding idea you have shared with the couple so far?
A: That is debatable. I thought they should have had Frodo for a ringbearer

Q: I knew it was true love when __________.
A: Mr. Joel Kelly used his super powers to have David James Duncan mail Bethany a postcard in Switzerland! ....or the time that JK sent BB 25 consecutive postcards in the mail from Hawaii???

Q: I am most looking foward to _______:
A: moving in with the happy couple for the rest of their lives!

Pretty things on a Thursday afternoon

2011-05-05T14:08:00.000-06:00

I am - once again and SO predictably - drooling over something white and ceramic. Sorry to rave on white ceramics yet again, but this ETSY store has me smitten with their shoes on a wire. Other favourites include the cloud factory, which Natasha owns and has blogged about, and the tree ghost. Oh my goodness.

Wedding Guest of the Week, Pt. IV

2011-05-02T11:01:00.002-06:00

I just remembered that I forgot to post this in the midst of all the finishing up my course madness. And it WAS madness. I've said it before and I'll say it again: group work ruins everything. That thing I said in the previous blog post about being kind because everyone you meet is in the midst of a great struggle, YEAH, that doesn't apply to groupwork.

And by that I mean it probably should have applied extra.

Anyways, here it is. Megan T.'s answers to the wedding guest of the week questions. If you are unsure who Megan is, she is friend and former housemate to me, wife of the other Joel and wedding guest extraordinaire! You may remember them from THIS POST ABOUT THEIR OWN CUTE WEDDING.

And here is an OLD picture of Megan and I at a cupcake birthday party or something.

Q: Favourite punctuation mark?

A: Quotation marks (inverted commas?).

Q: Favourite chemical element?
A: Jesus.

Q: Chicken or fish?
A: I was told pork.

Q: Worst wedding idea you have shared with the couple so far?
A: Lick all the invitation envelopes closed.

Q: Best wedding idea you have shared with the couple so far?
A: Do what you want.

Q: I knew it was true love when __________.
A: Joel left a cake for Bethany.

Q: I am most looking foward to _______:
A: Seeing all the prettiness there will be.

Easter Sermon at FBC

2011-04-25T10:40:00.000-06:00

"Be kind. Everyone you meet is in the midst of a great struggle."

The sermon wasn't really about that, and he said it as more of a passing comment. But I liked it. Because he meant it.

Wedding Inspiration Pics

2011-04-10T00:50:00.002-06:00

I've saved a whole load of photos of other beautiful weddings as I've been tracking some of my favourite wedding blogs: Style Me Pretty, Ruffled, Grey Likes Weddings, and Green Wedding Shoes (among others). Here are some of my faves, all mashed together, and that have a feel that I am sort of going for with what I've been pulling together for my own wedding. Sort of. But not really. Don't come to my wedding expecting this or you will be disappointed. UPDATE: As Joel Shmelly said in the comments already: EXPECT EVEN MORE AWESOME!

Wedding Guest of the Week Pt. III

2011-03-29T18:44:00.000-06:00

Although I have made it clear on several occasions that Pencil is not, in fact, invited to the wedding, she insisted on nominating herself as a wedding guest of the week. Ummm, did I just anthropomorphize a dog? I think I did. UGH. I am gross.

If you can handle cutesy dog crap, then read on my friends...

Q: favourite punctuation mark? Pilcrow

Q: favourite chemical element? Sulfur.

Q: chicken or fish? Both, preferably mashed together.

Q: worst wedding idea you have shared with the couple so far? Your shoes will look better chewed up.

Q: best wedding idea you have shared with the couple so far? Volunteering to carry a pillow on my collar as the ringbarker.

Q: I knew it was true love when __________. Joel pet my tummy and let me sleep next to his head.

Q: I am most looking foward to _______: Sleeping in the car after the wedding.

A reasonably attractive robot

2011-03-22T18:00:00.000-06:00

So, I shut down my trusty old Xanga account this morning.  I figured it was time.  I couldn't help but save this post though...

* * *

today walking around in joel's new neighbourhood, we made a friend when he struck up a conversation at the crosswalk...

guy: do you go to university?

joel: yes
guy: does your girlfriend go to university?
joel: no, she works
guy: OH, so she supports you
joel: yeah.
guy: so what do you take?
joel: science
guy: genetics?
joel: no
guy: nanotechnology?
joel: errr, no
guy: oh, well, i'm not worried about dying because they can make you live forever now.  you know, like take your DNA and put it into an attractive robot
joel: an attractive robot??
guy: well, a reasonably attractive robot.  see you later!

Three simple steps

2011-03-17T22:13:00.000-06:00

1) Take any random object. 2) Cast it in white ceramic. 3) Watch me drool.

I'm not kidding here. I have it bad for these white ceramic farmer's market baskets, originally spotted in Anthropologie, but apparently from Jayson Home...

Wedding Guest of the Week Pt. II

2011-03-14T15:28:00.000-06:00

And the self-elected second wedding guest of the week...Kerry! She has also graciously offered her gift (a.k.a. carefully refined skill) of floral arranging to our wedding. Super nice.

Here is a picture of Kerry looking happy. I think it's a cute picture. I think she was dancing or something.

Q: Favourite punctuation mark?
A: The semi-colon.

Q: Favourite chemical element?
A: Death.

Q: Chicken or fish?
A: Vegetables!

Q: Worst wedding idea you have shared with the couple so far?
A: I only have good ideas.

Q: Best wedding idea you have shared with the couple so far?
A: My demand that they have a reasonable explanation for cutting the cake, since it's such a weird and inexplicable tradition. I accept Bethany's rationale.

Q: I knew it was true love when __________.
A: When "Love is Hell" (the Ryan Adams album) led to love, not hell.

Q: I am most looking foward to _______:
A: Playing an interpretive duet with Leanne at the reception. Yessssss.

House Tour: Part III

2011-03-10T12:29:00.000-07:00

If I don't get cracking on this house tour I won't manage to show it to you all before I move out again. I'm sick today, so now that I am finally up and have cleared the fog in my head a bit, I decided I would post this and make the most of this bit of free time. Oh well, it's more important that I have been enjoying my little reverse penthouse, right?

To recap: Here is the place before I moved in, the entrance, and the bathroom

Now the kitchen. Joel and I painted it together before I moved in, which was a vast improvement over the yellowed-over-time look that the paint had before. As well, I am obsessed with this vintage aqua colour, so it was fun to finally be able to slap it up on the walls somewhere.

It's a pretty big kitchen for a one-bedroom place, although not a lot of counter space. Below you can see the stove, with the fridge to the left of it. The door to enter my place is further left from there.

And here you can see my little window, which looks out on a view of underneath the deck! Ha ha. Oh well, it's surprising actually how much light gets in there.

There is another, bigger window over by the table, so that's nice. Here you can see my mix and match chairs paired with a table that I scrounged from my sister in law. It actually was one of the farm tables from my mom's side of the family, so that's fun to have. And to remedy the hideous 90s light fixture, I suspended three IKEA paper lanterns around the fixture so obscure the view of the glass and metal track light. Works for me, although Joel is constantly hitting his head on them. Good thing they are paper and don't hurt.

A zoomed in view of the table...

And another view that shows the sink and the amazing pantry to the right!

And here are shots of two of my favourite finds for my kitchen. These canisters have a little chalk board label that is pretty much adorable. I found them at Winners downtown on my lunch break. I got there a lot and it's always a crapshoot whether you are going to find anything cute. I think I like that about it because it sort of feels like thrifting. Even though it's totally not.

And these cute little caddies are thrift scores. I found them at Value Villages in different cities, but they were these identical wooden boxes painted dusty pink. I painted them white and now they are adorable and useful. I have no idea what they are for, but I use them to hold jars of oats, brown sugar, quinoa, rice, protein powder, etc. And I have a few ideas of how to use them for wedding decor.

So, that's the kitchen. And it only took me 8 months!

Featured Wedding Guest of the Week

2011-03-07T14:23:00.002-07:00

In a stroke of brilliance during a skype chat, Natasha and I decided I should have a semi-irregular blog segment called `featured wedding guest`. Mostly because we thought it would be fun to post a dumb Q&A. Like most ideas we have during skype chats, I`m not exactly sure where this one began, but see below to find out where it ended.

Featured Guest: Natasha, friend and wedding guest extraoirdinaire
Age: 27
Status: Single, and a real catch as long as you like diet coke
Location: Seattle
Friends since: The year 2000. Happy 11th friendship anniversary Tash
Other things of note: Very generously has donated her artistic abilities to our wedding invitations. Because she is artistic. And wonderful. And attractive. And available.

Question and Answer

Q: Favourite punctuation mark?
A: The ampersand followed closely by the asterisk.

Q: Favourite chemical element?

A: Uranium.

Q: Chicken or fish?

A: Chicken.

Q: Worst wedding idea you have shared with the couple so far?

While I can't think of any at the moment I know Bethany will come up with many. Oh wait, how about the 'thank you' photo idea I posted on her wall?

Q: Best wedding idea you have shared with the couple so far?

Get married before you're showing, ha. Wait, kidding.

Q: I knew it was true love when __________.

Joel put on a face mask over his beard to get in on our girl's Spafather night.

Q: I am most looking forward to _______:
Busting moves to Justin Bieber at the wedding.

And i was like "baby, baby, baby oh"

2011-02-24T00:03:00.000-07:00

I feel busy. Maybe I'm not as busy as you, but I just feel busy. Hence the blog neglect. I took off for four days this weekend though, to visit dear Natasha in Seattle. We did a few Seattley things, like going to the Pike Place Market, eating at the Athenian (and making sure to "oooh" over the Tom Hanks stool on our way past), eating other good food, shopping a bit, and walking around Green Lake with NO COATS ON. But in the evenings, we hunkered down and watched tv like a pair of nerds, with the shows punctuated by viewings of this Glee version of a Justin Bieber song. I never thought I would like a song by him, but I do.

Can't help myself. Those moves are sweet.

champs, for various reasons.

2011-01-31T14:48:00.000-07:00

About a week and a half ago, I got a call from my friend Kerry at 11:30 p.m. There was all sorts of noise in the background and she sounded frantic, demanding that I HAD to send her the criteria and instructions for the cleanse BEFORE breakfast the next day. This was a matter of life and death, as she had eaten too much sugar that day and somehow I was the one responsible for fixing that fact in a timely manner. So, I rallied myself and got the task done. Before breakfast as I had been instructed.

So, I texted her today at lunch to ask how the cleanse was going and got this interaction:

Bb: How is cleansing going?
Kp: Cleansing? What?
Bb: Dude you called me at 11:30 p.m., demanding the directions for the cleanse before breakfast, and now your response is "what?"
Kp: In our friendship contract, one of my explicit responsibilities is to keep your life interesting. Just fulfilling my end of the bargain.
Bb: You are ridiculous. I am blogging this.
Kp: I demand royalties.
Bb: Cool. When I get a book deal I will give you a dollar.
Kp: Contract says 15%
Bb: Friendship currency is priceless

High drama with Kp. She is right though, she keeps me entertained. Also, now I get to feel smug because she flunked out of the cleanse, and we, on the other hand were TOTAL CLEANSE CHAMPS. And, as predicted, it totally had its expected effect of sparking a new wave of interesting and better home cooking. Seriously, worth it just for that. Favourites included: homemade hummus, quinoa salad with zuchinni, tofu baked in braggs and sesame oil, delicious soups, and chili-lime pan-toasted almonds.

The Cleanse

2011-01-19T13:29:00.000-07:00

I've been doing a 12-day cleanse for the past 7.5 days. "Cleanse" is sort of a pretentious word, but whatever. I've done this one a few times before (once-a-year-ish) with various combinations of friends, and this time it's with Joel, Lori, and Rebecca. Yay. Doing most things is more fun with company, and this is definitely no exception.

Say what you will about cleanses, but this one's not that strict or crazy (no cayenne-lemonade juice fast) and it's not really a weight loss thing either, at least in my experience and opinion. And the best thing is that both times I've done it I have benefitted just because it forced me to cook almost all of my meals at home and put a lot more thought and effort into eating healthfully...with the eventual realization that it's not that hard and *can* be delicious. To state it simply, the rules are: no sugar, no dairy, nothing fermented (like vinegar), and no flour (of any kind).

I made the poor choice of scheduling this one over my sister's birthday, but I did okay and managed to fly under the radar. She was accommodating and made sure the meal was mostly cleanse friendly. The most epic cleanse fail (saying "epic fail" was for you there, Kerry) so far has been soymilk. Last time I did it I drank SO MUCH SOYMILK. Even though it says to have it in moderation. I assumed that the "plain" soymilk was unsweetened, but this just reinforces that you always have to check. It's sweetened with cane sugar. FAIL. I haven't been drinking hardly any this time around, but relished the thought of having an occassional soy latte. So much for that.

The best thing we did so far this time around was have a meal all together on Sunday night and a "soup exchange" at the same time. Eating together and hanging out made it feel less deprived, and going home with three or four different dishes to eat through the week made it so much less of a mental obstacle. I hardly have to think about what I am going to eat for the rest of the week, thanks to Lori and Joel's soup and hummus, and Rebecca's curried chickpeas. We should do this all the time.

Belated Resolution

2011-01-07T13:29:00.000-07:00

My resolution for 2011 is not only belated, but also sort of unoriginal, since I posted about it in November. But, if you know me you know that I like to keep my resolutions manageable and realistic. Although sometimes/often even then I don't end up fully accomplishing them. Ones that come to mind where I had only partial success include: drinking more water, wearing out my yoga mat (took two years instead of one, but I just now realized that I did actually wear it out and had to buy a new one. GO ME.), and reading all of the unread books on my shelf. That last one is probably my most impressive failure, because in 2010 I managed to re-read more than 32 books that I own and have read more than once already instead of tackling my stack of unreads. But, you know, I read mostly for fun, so I don't want to beat myself up about it too much.

On to the unoriginal resolution....

Use stuff up. That's the umbrella that my resolution for this year is falling under. And in general, I am trying to develop it into a life habit. But I don't only want to use stuff up, I want to use the things that I already have as they are meant to be used, and make sure that I stop to consider the necessity of a new item before I purchase it.

So, in light of that goal, I gathered up all of my accumulated post-it notes from my desk at home, chose a few stacks of the ones I liked the best, and brought all the remaining ones to the office to use at my desk. I am waaaaay more likely to use them here.

Other successes including beginning to use up my collection of cotton balls and qtips, old make up, and hair products. Also shoes. But that's a hard one and I am working myself up to that. Oooh, and food/dry goods.

I have also decided, as an amendment to last year's resolution on books, to seriously evaluate my desire to read the unread books that I have. If I don't want to read them and have owned them forever, AND don't think that it will be worth it in the end to force myself to do it as an enrichment exercise, then darn well I am going to march them over to the wee book in and exchange them 2 for 1 for books that I WILL read. I'm thinking The Flying Troutmans, The Book of Negroes, and I'm not sure what else yet.

The additional motivation here is to ease the great merging of belongings that will be happening between Joel and I when we get married. We have a garage sale in the works for this spring, so I am saving some of my best castoffs in a box in my storage area so that our sale doesn't stink.

So, there you have it. My resolution. Maybe next year I will pledge something a little more exciting, but for now I'm good with the practicality of this one.

Keychains, Oh Brother

2010-12-15T19:27:00.000-07:00

I'm pretty sure everyone has had at least one collection, intentional or otherwise, at some point in their life. I've had the beginnings of a frog collection (regretttable), an owl collection (trying for it not to be regrettable), a doll collection, a stamp collection (incredibly brief), some Lion King trading cards, marbles, pogs, and probably a Monchichi collection.

Most of those collections listed above were when I was a kid. The owls were also more recent, but in that case I was hyper-aware of keeping it from becoming a collection, lest I become known as the owl collector/enthusiast and start getting it all the time for gifts (note: if you have given me an owl gift I probably liked it, so don't feel bad). My current accidental collection is bell jars. I am obsessed. I just can't get enough. They will be the worst things to move, so I might have to slowly start detaching myself from at least a few of them.

Anyways, after an unfortunate discussion that I had with my dear friend Kerry as I dropped her off at the airport on her way to London, wherein I demanded that she bring me a souvenir and that it not be a keychain (I was joking, but also serious, but mostly joking), she decided to start me a keychain collection. I think it was in large part to teach me a lesson about being bossy or demanding gifts. She pretty much bought me a keychain from every major tourist attraction in London (and probably spent at least $40 doing it). Apparently it was hilarious at the time. And apparently it is still hilarious, because the joke has unfortunately not died.

I have recieved keychains as part of at least two Christmas gifts since then, and random keychain giftings in the interim, including a very dissapointing but still funny package I got in the mail about 2 months ago, with like four keychains inside and a note that said "I'm just house cleaning ". Super dissapointing and also props to Kerry for a good joke.

I'm both sorry and not sorry to say that the London keychains did not make the cut when I moved over the summer. Sorry, Ker. It would have been great if I had them to include in my keychain collection photo below. But, mostly I just wanted to remember the story.

Keychains pictured above include: Camp Evergreen carabiner, two identical Maligne Lake keychains, a zombie zebra (flashlight mouth), my beloved and much-used (partly due to obligation) ear-ring, a TODD SPENCER orange foam surfboard (which will henceforth be for my spare keys), and a Camp Evergreen lanyard (for spare car key). Not pictured are the keychain versions of Big Ben, the crown jewels, a double decker bus, a phone booth, and a few more things I have forgotten. UGH. Enough already, Kerry.

On the other side of collections, you know, the fun and not maliciously revengeful side, artist Lisa Congdon is coming to the end of a year of documenting her various collections. Some of the ones in the early 2010 were really beautiful. I haven't followed much since then, but it's kind of a neat idea. Visit her Collection a Day blog: http://collectionaday2010.blogspot.com/

Shortbread: Courtesy of the Hospitality and Information Service in Washington D.C.

2010-12-09T23:44:00.000-07:00

When my mom was 25 she married my dad and they moved away from rural/small city Alberta to Washington-freaking-D.C. to live the life of diplomats. Now that I am 27 that really puts things in perspective. At this point my mom had been a diplomat's wife living in Virginia for two years. Ack. It's pretty neat, though, that they did that and it was a super interesting time for them to be there. They stayed in the Watergate hotel when they first moved and were getting settled, and it was RIGHT after the Watergate scandal had broken. Crazy times.

Anyways, one of the many things that my mom did there was learn how to host a mean cocktail party. This involved gathering some party tricks and crowd-pleasing appetizers and other good things. So, she invited Kaeli and I over the other night to pass down her scottish shortbread recipe, and to tell us the story of where the recipe came from. It was a cute night. And the shortbread was delicious. I'm not going to post the recipe but some of the pics are worth sharing for sure.

This shortbread started with me purchasing glace cherries, which I have never liked because they remind me of fruitcake. But Joel loves them. He figured out long ago that my mom always has some in the door of the freezer and whenever he used to come over he would go find them and sneak a few. I ratted him out, but only because I knew my mom would think it was funny and would like the fact that he felt comfortable enough to help himself. I like that too. Anyways, he's eaten them all so I had to buy some new ones and bring them over.

I also brought some Christmas coloured smarties thinking we could use them to make the little holly berries instead of the glace cherries, but we ate them all before we even started baking. Who was I kidding, I knew we would not have any left to decorate with. Pshaw.

Here is my mom kneading expertly, as she tends to do.

And here I am crammed up in my favourite spot on the kitchen counter. For some reason Kaeli and I like to cram ourselves between that pull-out cutting board and the cupboard. Always have, always will.

Mandatory lay-on-the-floor break.

And while I did that the shortbread magically got finished! Okay, so I don't have pics of cutting them out or doing the glace cherries. My mom did all the cute little holly berry cherries.

But it turns out, after all these years, I finally decided that I like the darn cherries. But only baked on to tasty shortbread.

And finally, a sweet photo by dad.

The Thrill of the Crayon Box

2010-12-09T11:17:00.002-07:00

The Pantone colour of the year was announced. Honeysuckle is the shade for 2011.

pic from ApartmentTherapy.com

It's like a reddish-pink that I would group as a relative of the coral family, which my friend Natasha recently informed me is one of the most flattering shades for people in general, as in blondes and brunettes alike (and a host of people with other colourings) can pull it off.

If you got to Apartment Therapy you can read the full post with more pictures, but I copied part of the rationale over here for you...

...Honeysuckle is a captivating, stimulating color that gets the adrenaline going – perfect to ward off the blues. Honeysuckle derives its positive qualities from a powerful bond to its mother color red, the most physical, viscerally alive hue in the spectrum.

I can dig it.

Every year, when I see the Pantone colour announced, I realize that I have been seeing this trend popping up sporadically on blogs for a while. It sort of builds slowly and once it's announced the design bloggers go nuts. Being on trend with colours might be a quixotic pursuit, and sort of futile, but I can't help feeling like colours are still fun. The thrill of the crayon box in adult form.

I can't think of colour trends without thinking of the scene from "The Devil Wears Prada" where Meryl Streep's character bashes Anne Hathaway's character's cerulean blue sweater.

You go to your closet and you select... I don't know... that lumpy blue sweater, for instance because you're trying to tell the world that you take yourself too seriously to care about what you put on your back.

But what you don't know is that that sweater is not just blue, it's not turquoise. It's not lapis. It's actually cerulean.

And you're also blithely unaware of the fact that in 2002, Oscar de la Renta did a collection of cerulean gowns. And then I think it was Yves Saint Laurent... wasn't it who showed cerulean military jackets? I think we need a jacket here. And then cerulean quickly showed up in the collections of eight different designers. And then it, uh, filtered down through the department stores and then trickled on down into some tragic Casual Corner where you, no doubt, fished it out of some clearance bin.

However, that blue represents millions of dollars and countless jobs and it's sort of comical how you think that you've made a choice that exempts you from the fashion industry when, in fact, you're wearing the sweater that was selected for you by the people in this room from a pile of stuff.

And of course, I can't think of the colour cerulean without thinking of April from Gilmore Girls, who we love to hate, and who loves the colour cerulean.

Life Lessons

2010-12-06T15:04:00.000-07:00

When I was in high school I spent part of one summer volunteering at a sort of resort-camp for teenagers, and had to fold a lot of fitted sheets. They are a pain in the butt to fold. The supervisor showed us a pretty good way to fold them, but they are still a pain in the butt and never look as nice as you want them to.

Then in university, I was friends with one or two guys who lived in a house full of boys, and I have a really distinct memory of hearing them tell the story of learning how to fold a t-shirt in an amazing way where it works almost perfectly every time. Apparently one of the roommates had learned and was showing the rest of them, and they were all so amazed that they were practically cheering at the results. Five or six guys cheering over a folded shirt is a sight I would have liked to see. Here is a video showing the way they were doing it...

Anyways, when I came across this video I had to share. Partly because I want to be able to find it again when I need it. I hate the way that fitted sheets are always bunchy on my shelf.

It's December!

2010-12-03T14:05:00.000-07:00

Since it's December I can freely post Christmasy things, right? Just came across this Coldpay video of their song "Christmas Lights". It has a cute "Finding Neverland" feel to it, as well as a few fleeting moments where it sounds/feels like a church song (especially when Chris Martin starts raising his hands). But mostly it's just Coldplay goodness with a Christmas theme. Enjoy.

Free Fashion Challenge

2010-12-01T14:14:00.000-07:00

I like clothes. I like reading The Sartorialist and other fashiony blogs (I admittedly visit Olsen's Anonymous from time to time). I work near a mall. I have friends that like shopping. Because of these things I end up with too many clothes. Last year, my new year's resolution was to have a new rule: ONLY buy things that I love. I can't say I have succeeded fully, but it definitely saved me from a few purchases that were unneccesary this year.

That's why I'm always interested when people do things like the Free Fashion Challenge. The tagline is "15 Fashion Addicts Worldwide Stop Buying Clothes for 1Year", which is very dramatic for what it really is. Which, to me, is a bunch of people who shop too much and have way too many clothes deciding to make do with their plentiful wardrobes for a year. But at the same time I can appreciate that it would be limiting and hard to give up the shopping habit, especially for people who think of their clothes as a part of their self expression. Choosing to participate in a challenge like this is a good way for them to be able to channel that into a new task, and might help diffuse the void that is created by cutting out shopping cold turkey.

picture borrowed from freefashionchallenge.com

The Daily Good had this to say about it:

For the past few years, Buy Nothing Day has served as a quiet rejoinder to a day (and a season) marred by the worst of consumer culture. Even if Black Friday isn't the year's biggest shopping day, it is a nice occasion for staging a widespread effort of non-participation. But what happens afterward? Might there be a better way to transform our shopping habits?
Indeed there might. Back on November 11, a group of unlikely anti-consumers launched the Free Fashion Challenge, in which 15 self-described "fashion addicts" pledged to refrain from buying clothes for an entire year. For the next 12 months, participants will blog about their experiences, hold swap parties, and engage in all sorts of "assignments" online.
Whereas Buy Nothing Day's (non)participants are generally predisposed toward counter cultural trends from the get-go, the Free Fashion Challenge involves big spenders, meaning their actions are fairly life-altering. Clearly, the abstinence of 15 former shoppers won't put a dent in the impact of the global industry, but it will serve as an object lesson for everyone who visits the site. Seeing as the garment industry is notoriously wasteful, guilty of widespread labor abuses, and built on planned obsolescence produced by fickle trends—and seeing as we all need to clothe ourselves—we should all take note.

Perhaps one day we'll brag about how small our closets are.

Goodbye, NaBloPoMo

2010-11-30T10:27:00.000-07:00

A month of posting every day wraps up with this very post. It's been a fun challenge and I'm glad I did it. An added bonus is that my daily readership has more than quadrupled since I started the challenge, which isn't saying much because it was only sitting at about 6-10 readers daily. Ha ha.

I supposed that depending on who you ask I didn't quite suceed. I faltered due to Harry Potter with only 6 posts to go. I didn't clue in that going to the 10 p.m. show meant that I wouldn't be home in time to blog before midnight. I did blog before bed that night though, so in another way I think I suceeded. Depends how letter of the law you want to be about the whole matter.

A few of my reader friends have been asking what I'm going to do with my blog now that it's over, and I'm not exactly sure. Hopefully I can just ride on the momentum of this past month and post more regularly. We shall see.

One thing that blogging every day has made me realize is that I don't have very many friends who blog, and those who do don't do it regularly. It's a bummer. I like reading the blogs of my friends. I read lots of random people ones but it's not the same. I have blogs of my friends on a reader and every time I logged in in November it was always Kerry's posts because nobody else was posting. It was nice that Kerry was NaBloPoMo-ing it up as well though. And she actually succeeded I think, so WAY TO GO KER. Also to Nicki. Whooo. It was much more fun knowing you two ladies were in it with me.

Lost my Jane Austen Groove

2010-11-29T19:42:00.000-07:00

"It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife."

That's the opening line of Jane Austen's "Pride and Prejudice". I read it for fun in early university and loved it from the moment I read that sentence. Her satire and wit took me by surprise. Classics can often be epic, beautiful, important, well crafted and worth reading, but a lot of them are far from being entertaining and cheeky.

I think I read P&P as a follow up to the dry, uneventful and humourless Robinson Crusoe (I'm sorry, I know that I am supposed to love it and respect it, but I just can't. Maybe resepct, but never love). That book is the equivalent of talking to the most boring person I have ever met. Boys always seem to like it though, so...sorry guys for bashing your favourite novel.

After reading P&P I went on to watch a lot of the Jane Austen movies, old and new, and we had a good thing going for a while. Lots of watching the multi-hour epic BBC version of P&P, loving Colin Firth as Mr. Darcy, having a short-lived crush on a boy I met in Michigan who QUOTED THE FIRST LINE OF PRIDE AND PREJUDICE TO ME when I told him I had read it recently, etc. etc. etc. You nerds know what I am talking about.

But then all of a sudden I lost my groove. Her novels sit unread in my "to read" pile, and this is the second time I have tried to read Sense and Sensibility. It's going ok, but definitely not great. What happened? I am bummed out.

Girls Girls Girls

2010-11-28T23:33:00.001-07:00

This weekend has been girl, girl, girly. I spent the weekend with my friend Natasha and Pencil the lap dog who is also a girl. She was in town for the Royal Bison art and craft fair and stayed with me. But it turned out her sister came to town as well and ended up staying with me too. Then her other other sister and mom came over to hang out, as well as our friend Megan. So basically to top off the girl fest we watched Little Women with many many people crammed on to my couch hide-a-bed. It always feels like the beginning of winter and Christmas when I watch that movie.

In this picture we are actually watching the Marcel The Shell (with shoes on) video that I posted a few weeks ago.

This morning, I went to breakfast with some high school girlfriends and then back to the Royal Bison, only to dsicover that Tash, her sister and I all showed up wearing striped cardigans with brown curly hair. Three of us in a row behind Natasha's booth. People started asking us if we were all related and then eventually a girl (sweetly) asked us what our deal was "are you guys like, best friends or something...what's your deal?". It was super funny.

And tonight was the swap. Or, SWAP-O-RAMA, as we fondly call it. I predict that Kerry will expand on this in an upcoming blog post, so I won't say a whole lot about it yet, but to whet your appetite I've posted a picture below of the climax of the event. Kaeli is wearing like 80 items of clothing.

Royal Bison, Lap Dog with Reindeer Antlers on, Royal Bison, Lap Dog, Lap Dog

2010-11-27T21:27:00.001-07:00

Today was day 1 of the Royal Bison Art & Craft Fair. My friend Natasha of Pretty Sketchy drove up (with her little dog, Pencil, and her sister and friend. I usually sit at the booth with her. Sometimes I sell some stuff, other times I just sit around and hang out. It's a good time.

This time I'm selling a few pairs of earrings I made from the jewels off an old chandelier and the last pair of fabric flags from last time. Tash, on the other hand is selling a whole bunch of great stuff. Postcard packs, limited edition prints, adorable printed tea towels, necklaces, stationery sets and cards.

The show was pretty busy for most of the day. We snuck in Tasha's little dog friend Pencil after we finished setting up and she slept in a box under the table. I used to say I hated lap dogs, but I'm not so sure anymore. Pencil's pretty cute. We spent a whole lot of the weekend doing stuff with her and for her. Like...

Tucking her into Kaeli's high-waisted pants. Like a marsupial pouch.

Altering a cat costume that I bought at the dollar store to fit her little head. The cat costume was too big for her. Note Becky's one-piece PJs. With footies.

Here is Pencil wearing the completed reindeer costume.

We spent half the day doting on her and letting her sit in our laps while we worked at the Royal Bison

And letting her sleep wherever she wanted. Even on the price sheet. Come hang out with us tomorrow and bring us chai lattes if you want.

Bathroom Pics, House Tour Part II

2010-11-26T12:23:00.000-07:00

I like having my own bathroom. It's pretty sweet. As I mentioned a couple of posts back, I have been working through all the random bathroom products I own and have acquired, and having my own bathroom has definitely helped me to focus those efforts because I know that everything in there is mine. It's enabling the crazy.

It's a really small little space, but it's all white and pretty cute. There is no vanity or countertop since the sink is mounted on the wall so I mounted a little shelf on the wall to hold some of my stuff. Hair elastics and bobby pins go in the little teacup, and the clock keeps me on schedule in the mornings so I'm not late for work, right? right?

The cupboard above the toilet is totally awesome and holds a ton of stuff. And the little baskets nailed to the wall are a storage solution from my first little place that I lived in years ago, which was a small room in a tiny attic (servant's quarters) apartment in a mansion overlooking Groat Road in Edmonton. I had almost no closet space, no storage, and no space in the shared bathroom to put anything, so I nailed them to the wall and became strangely attached to their functionality.

Two of my other favourites are the bath mat and the shower curtain. I hate bath mats that show footprints on them, because they always look sort of used and dirty even if they aren't really. Plus I can't get enough of stripes so this bath mat won me over right away.

The shower curtain is a terry cloth one with a grid pattern. I loooove it. Also, note the lavender shampoo that smells amazing but unfortunately doesn't work very well. Dang organic shampoo.

And that's my bathroom.

Eames in progress

2010-11-26T01:17:00.001-07:00

Well, I officially failed Nablopomo. But sometimes, you just have to eat chicken and go see the new Harry Potter Movie. Sorry folks. Go easy on me. I even had this post drafted and almost complete. Ha ha. Oh well, it's sort of like I posted it for November 25 because I haven't gone to bed yet...

I posted before pics of an Eames-style (authenticity undecided) lounge chair that Joel creatively acquired this past spring. It's not done yet, but we did have an intense weekend of working on it a while back and it's getting close. Perhaps Joel's roommates, who have been watching it sit in a relatively untouched pile on the floor lately, can attest to the fact that a) it's looking good, and b) that there is still a bit of work to be done.

We got the (off-white, buttery soft) vinyl through our designer friend Dawn of Dawn Stiles Design. We wanted a high-quality almost-leather feel but weren't sure we wanted to pay for leather since we were going to tackle this job ourselves. It would be much more tragic to ruin an expensive piece of leather than an only moderately expensive piece of vinyl.

We thought about getting it done professionally, but that's not nearly as fun I don't think. So, after ripping it apart we set out to put it back together again. In a lot of ways, it was as simple as tracing the pieces of fabric that we had removed on to the vinyl and cutting them out. We chose to get buttons made by a professional upholsterer because we figured they would look waaaayyyy better and they only cost about $2 each.

So, after cutting out the vinyl, we punched holes (with a hammer and a nail) into the vinyl where the buttons needed to be threaded through. Now the tough part...we had to thread the buttons through the thick layers of foam and batting and out the back of the chair, but we didn't have an upholsterers needle. At first it seemed impossible, but eventually with the help of a chopstick and a lot of grunt work, we managed to figure out how to get it through.

This is what the shells looked like after the buttons had been threaded, but before we started stretching and stapling.

After the buttons were in place, it was time to stretch and staple. The first thing we stapled was the strings on the buttons so that they would be nice and tight.

We were careful about our first staples because if we stretched too much on one side it would make the buttons off-center. We stapled opposite corners all around, continually checking to make sure the buttons were centred. We bought an electric stapler for the job, which in the end worked out ok, but at first caused some troubles. Mostly because the staples got loaded in the wrong way and are now forever jammed in the handle. Because of the malfunction I insisted that we wear eye protection. This is me in Joel's 3d glasses, making a cranky face to communicate the wayward-staple anxiety that I was having.

After I got over it, the electric stapler worked like a charm and nobody got staples in their face, eyes, or fingers. After centering the vinyl and stapling the straight edges we worked on the corners. They were probably the trickiest but Joel was a champ at folding them evenly.

Each chair has a rim of piping around the edge of the wooden shell. It's hard to visualize without seeing the chair, but basically you staple the piping to the wooden shell and then the cushion fits in overtop. This is nice because the sewing is fairly straightforward. I haven't worked with piping on cushions before and I don't think it would be my idea of a good time. I like sewing but I'm far from meticulous. So this is me sewing the piping.

And here is the cushion alllmost ready. At this point Joel and I were still speaking and on good terms. No major DIY blowouts yet. It's one of the ways we are testing our relationship before the big day. Ha ha. Just kidding. Sort of.

When our friend Dawn saw it she sighed with relief and told us she was so worried it wouldn't work out, but doesn't it look good so far?

Using stuff up

2010-11-24T16:38:00.004-07:00

Living in a house with roommates moving in and out over the years meant that a lot of stuff got left behind. Especially things like post it notes, pens and pencils, stationery, lotions, sunscreen, bath salts, extra shampoo, soaps and sometimes kitchen spices. I have a hard time just throwing things into the trash when there is nothing wrong with them, but all of these items would just sit around not being used because I already had my own stuff.

Over time, I developed a...um, dedication to using this stuff up. I think it started because I have a really vivid memory of my friend Kerry, junk purger extraordinaire, becoming really dedicated to using up all of her old journals and pens, even ones that she hated. For some reason, that really stuck with me and the obsession was transferred over (I have a stack of empty journals that I have received or purchased that I am working on using...)

I became practically obsessed with using up all of the old products that were floating around at the farm house. For two years I worked away at a cupboard full of mushroom soup (????) and a big box of pasta, as well as a bunch of teacher gifts that my sister had left behind. Pomegranate lotions, grapefruit lotion, bath salts, shower gel, body butter. I put a personal ban on purchasing any items that I knew I already had. It was tough slogging, and a few items definitely got tossed when I moved this summer (although not all), but I am finally reaching the end of it.

Too add to the crazy, I decided that I would help Melissa de-clutter her bathroom by stealing/demanding she give me all of her bathroom products that I want and that she never uses because she has purchased multiples or new onese that are better. Best acquisitions so far include mineral powder from Sephora, straightening balm for my hair, and dry shampoo.

Last week at work I finally got to toss a thing of grapefruit lotion that I had been using at my desk for almost a year in favour of a new one that my friend Karen gave to me that I was soooo excited to start using. Yay for small victories.

To the right you can view a dramatic photo of the two lotions.

I just have a few more bottles of lotion at home, a pile of sticky notes, a whole bunch of scrap paper, about a million pencils and pens, and about a bath's worth of bath salts left. I am racing to get it done before June 18.

I realize this is all ridiculous, but at the same time it's helping me a) not be wasteful, and
b) not spend money on unnecessary purchases.

And it's basically on the reusing/recycling spectrum, so that's a good thing. Small victories, people, small victories.

cheater post!

2010-11-23T22:44:00.000-07:00

I haven't done many cheater posts yet for nablopomo. But this is totally an unabashed cheater post. Hopefully the hilarity of cookie monster's SNL audition is enough to tide you over. I never really watched Sesame Street as a kid, but have been really enjoying it lately in my adulthood. Anyways, this one's pretty okay.

Sarry guys. I was too busy having a nice time with my family (Kaeli totally schooled Joel in a wrestling match) to set aside a bunch of time for blogging, and I would blog about what happened today at my day job, but I'd like to keep it, so stay tuned for my tell-all novel. Kidding. But not about Kaeli vs. Joel.

Soleil

2010-11-22T11:44:00.000-07:00

I hate weekday mornings. Waking up has always been a torturous thing for me. Even as a little kid, I was specially exempt from naptime at pre-school because it was so hard for me to have a quick nap and then get up again. As I aged, I became notorious for my ability to sleep until eight minutes before school started. My mom tried everything: singing me good morning songs, being gentle and encouraging, beign stern, yelling up the stairs, but nothing worked. She used to holler up to ask if I was awake and I would sit up, throw the covers off, yell back "I'm up", and then lay down again and fall back asleep. This is a legacy I'm not sure I will ever be able to shed. Even for my birthday this past summer, my mom got a real kick out of buying me a coffee mug that says something about hating mornings.

Now that I am on my own, I do the best I can. I try (and almost always fail) to get to bed on time. I set my alarm for earlier so that I can snooze it without making myself terribly late. I make my lunch the night before so that I have less to do in the morning and can sleep a few minutes longer.

I have noticed that it is markedly harder for me to rouse myself in the winter months, when daylight comes only after I have to be up and out the door. My latest attempt is based on an alarm clock I heard about that is designed to simluate the sunrise, thereby tricking your body into gently waking up instead of having to be jolted by an obnoxious alarm clock. It starts with a gradually brightening light that begins before you have to wake up and continues to brighten until eventually an alarm goes off.

So, not wanting to buy a large, ugly, and possibly expensive gadgety alarm clock, I decided to buy a lamp timer (like the ones people use when they go on vacation) and set it to turn a lamp on across the room about 1/2 hour before my alarm goes off. After a few false starts, I finally got it to work today. It was okay. But seriously, I still hate mornings. That's probably not going to change.

Thrifting Uglies

2010-11-21T21:35:00.000-07:00

After the successes of last weekend't thrifting, I wanted to balance it with some awesome ugliness that was encountered.

This scary, scary doll was actually a lamp. For reals. I almost yelled in fear when I caught a glimpse of it.
My favourite thing is the green price tag slapped on her cheek.

Bag o' Barbies!

And just for some on-theme fun, we made sure to check out the wedding dress section. I came up with a new game by asking Megan: "ok, if you made this into a strapless dress and put it on the hottest person you know, would it be okay?". The answer for this one was no.

The answer for this nice buttercup yellow one was also no. Turns out the wedding dresses at Goodwill aren't that cute. Go figure.

Pushing Those Almost-Sisterly Buttons

2010-11-20T16:01:00.000-07:00

My friend Kerry loves hockey. We are good enough friends that I feel like it's ok for me to be open with her about the fact that I really don't care about hockey, and that I'm not super interested in her telling me all about hockey. This might sound a bit mean, but she is one of my most vocal and prone-to-obsession friends, so I feel it is somewhat justified for me to stay strong in the face of her vocal obsessions. You can get a bit of background on our hockey dynamic by reading the second half of this blog post by her.

As much as I don't like or care about hockey, I do always think of Kerry when I see an Oilers game on tv because she has been so enthusiastic about her love for them. This happened last night when I was out at the bar with Joel and some of his grad school peeps, so because I have known her for a long time and know how to bait her and push at least a few of her buttons (in an almost sisterly sort of way), I thought it would be suuuper funny to mess with her by sending her strings of text messages as if I cared about the Oilers. Mimicing actual texts that I have received over and over again from her in the past.

Here is a transcription of her totally falling for my tricks...

BB 8:22 OMG Edmonton is beating Phoenix!

KP8:22 As if you know that! What are you doing?

BB 8:24 Omg! Dustin Penner is so dreamy! #46 just pushed someone! Ahhhh 3 to zero!

KP 8:25 3 nothing? THe stupid internet cut out! Who scored the third goal? 46 is Zach Sortini! Is this Joel?

BB 8:25 Aw shit! Dubnyk just let one in.

BB 8:26 Nope! it's bb all the way. I have no idea who scored.

KP 8:28 Darn it! But seriously 3-1? Because my internet died!

BB 8:28 Yep. 3-1. Now there is a fight!

KP Why are you watching? Where are you?

KP Penner scored #3. Why are you watching?????????

BB 8:30 I looooove hockey!!!!

KP 8:30 Plllllleease tell me. You win. You have driven me crazy.

KP 8:31 stooooooopppp. My stupid internet! Why are you watching? Please just tell me!

BB 8:38 3-2! shit!

KP 8:39 I hate you. And Ray Whitney.

KP 8:39 Why haven't you cracked? This is mean. Although my internet is up again. Were you a little interested in what was going on?

BB 8:39 Mua ha ha ha

BB 8:40 I was a lot interested in your reaction to what was going on. I feel awesome and powerful right now! New favourite game!

Beezus & Ramona

2010-11-19T15:16:00.001-07:00

Yesterday, on Kerry's repeated and high-pressure recommendation, I watched the new(ish) Ramona movie, “Ramona and Beezus”. As a kid, I read the Ramona Quimby books. They were, and still are, classic stories about little-girl-hood and sisterhood.

The movie was totally adorable and basically took all the highlights from the books and wove them into a movie plot. It was a really great remake of the books and it was actually kind of amazing to watch the scenes and be taken back to being 10 years old and reading the stories for the first time. They created them just as I had imagined. It was almost eerie.

For those of you who have read the books, the part where Ramona goes to try out for the part of the princess in the Royal Peanut Butter TV commercial and ends up making herself a tiara out of burrs from the park outside was perfect. As was the early scene where Howie and Ramona are jumping out of the hole in the back of the house as it is being renovated. Or the one where she tries to crack her hard-boiled egg on her head, only to discover that her dad forgot to boil it. She ends up with egg running down her face right before class pictures.
Another big draw is that Aidan from SATC is totally the dad. And Ginnifer Goodwin is the adorable Aunt Bea. Their little family is so sweet.
The most interesting part of watching the movie, though, was realizing that as a kid, and again now, I strongly associate Beezus and Ramona with my childhood/lifelong friends Kerry and Kim. Kerry being Beezus, and Kim being Ramona. Seriously. I don’t know why I didn’t realize this sooner. I'll be interested to know if those of you who know them agree...

Winter came late, but Christmas decorations are coming early

2010-11-18T21:34:00.000-07:00

Joel and I just had a 'lively debate' (his words) about Christmas decorations. He has a strict no music no decorations until Dec. 1 policy. Whereas I like to decorate and bust out the Roger Whittaker and Amy Grant's cleverly titled "A Christmas Album" whenever the mood hits. Which usually happens sometime in late November and often coincides with a mega snowstorm. If you wait until December, then it's pretty much over before you even get started.

Confession: I pulled out some of my Christmas decorations today. I couldn't help it. I was home and it was snowy and it just felt right.

I guess it could be argued that this is too early, I am celebrating the change of seasons more than the actual holiday in all of its meangingfullness. But I can't help myself. Being able to enjoy winter as a legitimately wonderful season is what keeps me happy living in a place like Edmonton.

As for commercialized signals that Christmas is coming, there are a lot of them that I like: the red Starbucks cups and the egg nog lattes that go with them, the twinkly lights on Jasper Ave, the anticipation of a break from work and time with family, yummy treats, shopping and gift giving. I like that stuff. It adds a little romance to what can sometimes be a bleak season. So I say bring it on.

The search for the perfect type of exercise

2010-11-17T22:48:00.000-07:00

As a female, it seems like the obvious choice when thinking of taking some sort of exercise or wellness class is...yoga. Always yoga. And I can see why. Especially for someone like me who sits at a desk all day and often is hunched over editing documents, opening up and stretching has a lot of benefits. To that end, I've tried different yoga classes over the years but usually end up annoyed when I have to pay 16 bucks a pop to go do yoga in a room with a pretentious instructor and a bunch of clones in lululemon gear. But, if exercise isn't fun, or at least a bit lighthearted, I lose interest pretty quickly.

Joel and I went to classes together at a couple different studios and I almost busted into a fit of laughter as the instructor made a poor attempt at describing super-scientifically what the yoga was doing for our bodies. Being a real scientist makes it hard for Joel to let fake science talk slide. Other studios were so unwelcoming, boring and serious that it made me want to flip out. I know that different people want different things from classes but I also know that serious and pretentious is not for me.

This led me and my friend Rebecca to try boot camp. It was a hoot. Yeah that's right, I said hoot. We listened to music from The Bounce 91.7 (Katy Perry etc.) and did all sorts of hilarious stuff. Boxing drills, cardio circuits, relay stuff. It was a good time, and we lucked out because our instructor definitely had a sense of humour about it all. Then Rebecca had to take a hiatus from it all, which led me to...

Moksha yoga. I was skeptical when I decided to try Moksha yoga. It's a type of hot yoga but it's not bikram. And I totally like it. Go figure. It markets itself as being welcoming and they actually are for the most part. And their studios are totally sweet. They're newly built and have gorgeous change and shower rooms. As someone who rarely sweats, even when I am exercising pretty hard, it's a new and strange experience to be somewhere so hot that my shins and inner ears are sweating.

Latest addition to the random fitness attempts is KARATE AQUASIZE. Does it get any more hilarious than that? I didn't think so. It's totally great.

Anyways, writing this post has helped me conclude that the big draw for me with exercise is to do something different and possibly ridiculous, amusing, or embarrasing. Or, to put it scientifically for Joel

hilarity + intensity / embarrassment ^ 2 = success!

House Tour: Part I

2010-11-16T23:22:00.000-07:00

I promised long ago on this blog that I would show you some pics of my little place when it was done. The trouble is that with me it's never done. I am always changing something. So I decided to tackle this one space at a time. That way I get like four NaBloPoMo posts out of it instead of just one, and I can focus on more details in each room. So, to start...the makeshift enterance way!

There are three doors into my one bedroom place, so I blocked one of them off with a chalkboard. There's not much to say about the entrance, but I thought it would be a good place to start.

Horrifying things about wedding dresses and one or two good things

2010-11-15T22:24:00.002-07:00

One of the interesting and challenging things about wedding planning so far has been trying to find a way to indulge my desire to have a fun and memorable wedding without buying into the ridiculous culture of bridal and wedding indulgence. I want to vomit when I think about the huge trade shows like “Bridal Fantasy” and was floored when I saw an ELEVEN THOUSAND DOLLAR engagement and wedding photo package. I know it's important to value the services and equipment that a photographer provides, but my head about exploded when I saw that.

There is so much pressure to plan a wedding that is totally beyond our means, and in a lot of ways I feel like the wedding dress embodies or symbolizes the crazy insanity that weddings can become. I was apprehensive when I started looking for a dress because I feel so uncomfortable with a lot of the things that are attached to THE dress. Because of this, there were some things that I absolutely hated about dress shopping, but thankfully there were also some positives and things worked out almost better than I could have hoped in the end.

The first thing I took issue with, as alluded to above, was the price. Oh my word. I had budgeted a maximum of $1,000 with a goal of spending waaaay less, and when I would go into stores and be up front about my price, a lot of the stores were unhelpful, even though they totally had dresses for under that price point...they just weren’t all that interested in showing them to me. I think every consultant I met asked me "do you have any wiggle room in your budget?". So I would tell them that it wasn't that I couldn't spend more, it's that I had made a decision that I WOULDN'T spend more than that. On top of that, almost every store told me it was impossible to find the kind of dress I was describing for less than 3 or 4 thousand.
The next lame thing is the sizes. For some cruel reason they make wedding dresses to fit small, so you can count on having to buy one that’s at least one or two sizes bigger than what you would normally wear. Way to make someone feel good in a white dress. Jerks.
Just as I was getting used to shopping for dresses, I ran into people at a couple of the stores who reminded me forcefully that you have to order your dress way in advance because ALL of the dresses come from China. They went on to emphasize how timing is an issue because of Chinese New Year when all the shops close down for an extended period of time. The sales person who told me this was acting personally affronted that those jerks in China would dare close down their businesses to celebrate a national holiday.
Now on the positive side I eventually learned that not all dresses are actually made in China. There is a line called Mikaella that makes gorgeous dresses right here in Canada (outside Toronto). I probably would have ended up with one of those except for the price, which was reasonable for a wedding dress but still out of my price range.
Enter: Bridal Consignment. This is basically the best thing ever. Dresses worn once sold for half the price. I was sceptical at first and thought that it might be a nice idea in theory but feeling doubtful that I would actually find a dress that fit me while also being better than what I had seen in stores. But, I did. I found one I liked, tried it on, it fit great, I loved it, it was pretty much what I had been describing to people so I bought it and walked out with it that day. No ordering 6 months in advance. It was so easy, and now I basically get to feel good because I am recycling.

And finally, just to make this post more interesting for you all who might not care about the ins and outs of wedding dress shopping, here is a sketch done by Joel. This is what he thinks my dress will look like.

*Untitled Ink on napkin, 1/1, Artist: Joel K. Date: November 2010. Price: $200

Virgin Mobile and Perfect Day, Part II (or should I say perfect weekend?)

2010-11-14T20:37:00.004-07:00

Well, this post was going to just be about the outstanding customer service at Virgin Mobile, but then I had Part II of the perfect day, which basically turned it into the perfect weekend, so I figured I'd throw these together.

First off...

Dear Virgin Mobile,

You have been nothing but wonderful to me since the day I met you.  Your affordability, excellent customer service, ridiculously short wait times and sympathetic customer service have me swooning.  I will recommend you to everyone I know.  

Love, 

Bb

Seriously guys, they are amazing. My cell bill is always low, they fix everything pronto, wait times are like 30 seconds when you call with an issue, and the person on the other end always treats you like they have a personal vested interest in making sure you are satisfied with you service. It's almost disconcerting, but we love them for it.

And now, part II of perfect weekend. You know how yesterday we were going to go to Sugarbowl but then we didn't? Well, we went this morning instead and ran into our favourite Dieters! Kevin and Reba just decided to bring little Mabel out for a trip to the sugs and didn't call us to join them, although they claimed they considered it. So, there we were enjoying our breakfast when our Dieters walked through the door. It just so happened that the big table was free (when does that EVER happen at Sugarbowl?) so we all moved over there and had breakfast with them. Amazing.

And then Joel and I went glasses shopping and found him some ~~cute~~ ~~nerdy~~ ~~sciency~~ ~~hipster~~ manly glasses to replace the ones that must have been rolled up into someone's quilt at quiltfest and have not been seen since.

To top it all off, I called Virgin Mobile about a mediumly minor issue with my phone and they were all "sure we'll fix it for free because we love you and want you to be happy". And that's why I wanted to post about their wonderfulness.

A perfect day?

2010-11-13T23:58:00.014-07:00

My fabulous non-obligatory cousin friend came for a visit this weekend. She is also my second bridesmaid (other than sister Kaeli). Usually, we have a great but predictable weekend. Shopping, Sugarbowl, drink, shopping. This weekend, for some random reason, we ended up doing slightly different things and having pretty much a perfect day. Reagan-ing, if you will, for those of you who watch 30 Rock.

When she arrived on Friday night I was in my bed fighting off a nasty headache, so Kaeli, Joel and Mel made nachos and caesaers while I lay there being pathetic. I managed to get up and we had a nice evening anyways, but then the next morning I slept in while Kaeli and Mel cleaned my kitchen from the night before.

We almost went to Sugarbowl for our traditional breakfast, but we called Joel and he was all "hey what about the Elm Cafe and the Christmas market downtown?". So we went to the teeny tiny Elm Cafe and were about to order breakfast sandwiches but then the owner, Nate (who is also going to be our food-master at our wedding in June and we are soooo excited), told us that they had lunch sandwiches that were about to be put up on the board and one of them was a pumpkin sandwich and the other was pulled pork. Delish, and pretty much created with Joel in mind. So we tried them and stood along the bar (there are only two stools along the window bar). It was so crammed in there with the four of us that the fun conversation we were having was echoing off the walls and amplifying to be a DOUBLY FUN conversation. Joel chatted with Nate about food plus science, which I think they both liked. I never thought another Edmontonian could have a similar fascination with the chemistry of food as Joel does, but I think he's met a kindred.

*shit, I just lost my whole post with only three minutes to spare. Part I of perfect day will have to suffice for now. UPDATE: I rewrote it to finish the post below but left this in to mark the spot where it changed...

Then we dropped our vehicles off at Joel's house so that we could go to the winter market at Churchill Square, but first we went into Joel's house to pee and had a nice/hilarious conversation with Nay-Nay, who hadn't seen either Kaeli or Mel in a long time. Then we walked over to the square to check out the market. It has been so wonderfully and unseasonably warm and dry and I have been appreciating it. It's like a little reward for the not-so-warm summer we had this year and that early bit of crap weather this fall. Yay Edmonton.

At the square we came across the Eva Sweet waffle truck at the square and Joel bought some waffles for the ladies. If you go to their website, you can read that "The story of Eva Sweet is a story of international intrigue. It is a story that involves love, drama, family, loss and a dream coming true. It is a tale of crossed borders, migrant workers, secret meetups, family tragedies, forced separations, and bittersweet reunions. More importantly, it is a story about waffles. If you yearn to know more, we just might tell you over a waffle and some coffee." And it's totally true. The guy gave us free coffee and told us how he was the top waffle seller in Brussels (think delectable Belgian waffles) and moved here when he married a Canadian woman, although the waffle truck is named after his sister Eva, who passed away and whose son works with him in the waffle stand. This guy's legit and his waffles are great. Go buy a vanilla one and talk to him.

After that, we browsed the market and bought a bunch of great stuff. Joel's backpack was so heavy and stuffed with frozen meat that it was hurting him on the walk home. And as a bonus, the market's also in City Hall so I saw Mayor Mandel getting on the elevator. He looked sheepish, or at least like he didn't feel like being recognized. Ha.

Mel and I split off for some hard core craft supply and thrifting shopping after that. We found everything we needed so that Mel could make a Christmas wreath, and had some EPIC thrifting luck. We found great stuff at Goodwill and Value Village, but also came across a legit thrift store where every single item was $1 or less. I found some awesome vintage metal milk crates. For a buck each. I was buzzing from the thrifting high. Seriously.

Then at the thrift store we ran into Heidi (my sister in law) who invited us over for dinner. They fed us and Mel got to see their house and the cuties (niece and nephew) and then we came home and crafted up a storm. LOVE IT.

Thank you Mel, Kaeli, Joel, Heidi, Thrift stores, Edmonton, and basically everyone, for a GREAT weekend.

Back alley chairs

2010-11-12T13:27:00.000-07:00

Joel loves mid-century modern chairs. He has been collecting them at every opportunity lately and often manages to acquire them in creative ways. I think he sort of looks at is as a rescue mission for under-appreciated iconic chairs.

A few weekends ago we finally decided to tackle the crowning glory of his mcm chair collection...an Eames-style lounge chair found in a garbage pile! He caught a glimpse of it as he was driving past and sent his dad on a recon mission to get it the heck outta the garbage and the rain, and into the safety of the shed.

It might be a knockoff, but it definitely screams Eames with its curved wood shell, so we decided to relieve it of its hideous 90s upholstery and give it a new life with some buttery white vinyl.

All it took to take it all apart was a few tools, some good tunes, and a whole lotta patience. There were tons of staples that had to come out.

Below you can see the top pieces of the matching cordurouy ottoman. Ewwwww.

The cotton and foam underneath was clean but it's still gross to touch old cotton and foam that used to belong to someone else...

And here's the vinyl! Our friend Dawn helped him pick it out. She's a designer with excellent taste.

It's not done yet, but there are in-progress pics to come!

A temperamental artist and a small lap dog walk into a bar...

2010-11-11T13:09:00.001-07:00

November and December mark Natasha Lawyer's third art show at The Sugarbowl in Edmonton. Aside from being a favourite friend, she is also a favourite artist of mine even though she turned American and moved away and left me here to eat chicken caesar salad alone. She drove from Seattle through the night (maniac) and showed up at my house around noon on Saturday with tons to do before we hung her show at 6:30 a.m. the next day.

We ran around trying to find a place that would do a rush print job on watercolour paper of some last-minute prints for the show. Tash ended up calling the guy at one place a pointdexter because he was being letter-of-the-law and refused to print them for her. Don't cross Tash when she's tired. Below you will see a picture of her smiling like she would never dream of calling anyone a pointdexter. Don't be fooled.

While she was in Edmonton, she thought "why not pick up a puppy?". Well, actually it was slightly more intentional than that - her sister Melissa decided to fulfil Tash's dream of having a little yorkie friend as an early birthday present. So we went and picked up the tiny, hypoallergenic, and fabulous PENCIL. I proceeded to take a series of glamour shots of the two of them and gross Tash out by referring to her as Pencil's mom.

Then we had a pricing bee on my kitchen table. Tash (with a little help) had collected about a bajillion vintage frames and painted them all white to frame her illustrations. Her show this time around is crazy different than the last one. It's very architecturally inspired and has some amazing paper weaving and metallic thread details.

My kitchen was so full of art, and is not very big anyways, so I had to improvise when I was dishing out the CCS (chicken ceasar salad) for our dinner. If you look below you will notice a plate of salad sitting inside of an open drawer.

Pencil likes art. These are the aforementioned typewriter prints on watercolour paper. They are adorable and come in 9 different colours! Awesome! They are framed and selling for just $45 each, so they would make an excellent Christmas gift. The text on the paper in the typewriter says "I want to take you to all my favorite places".

Joel liked Pencil and came to help us with some last minute framing. I think he was sort of enjoying scaring poor little Pencil too. He was mostly nice to her but couldn't resist pushing her timid little buttons.

And then we went to bed at like 3 - which was actually 2 thanks to daylight savings time - and had to get up at like 6 the next morning. But we slept in a little and ended up being late and leaving poor Megan at the Sugarbowl alone. Here is the classic temperamental artist shot with Tash scrutinizing the placement of the pieces. She wasn't actually very temperamental, but it still is fun to tease. Or maybe I'm just adjusting to the temperament. Anyways, this picture shows off how sharp the white frames look on the brick wall.

Because of us being late and her being early, Megan was already pretty perky by the time we got there. No fair that she looks so cute. Here is a glamour shot of her hammering a nail.

We had breakfast at the Sugarbowl after the show was hung and then went to my house for a nap. And then we finally got to hang out and chill out. We took tiny Pencil out for a walk in the ravine by my new digs, and she kept running in between our legs and getting kicked by us by accident. She seemed unfazed but I felt awful. Right after I snapped this pic she ran between my feet and I almost crushed her little four pound dog body. It took some fancy footwork to avoid it. Worth it for the pic?

Overall, fantastic weekend. Tasha's show is up until the end of December so GO TAKE A LOOK. Pieces have already sold.

We're still high fiving and I want to keep it that way

2010-11-10T14:28:00.001-07:00

I haven’t really blogged about much to do with my wedding yet. I am (we are) finding the planning process to be pretty fun (with dashes of stress here and there). Lots of times, weddings seem to spin out of control and become stressful. So, one of my main goals is to make sure that as much as possible, this process remains FUN for us and focused on creating an end result that is a meaningful day topped off by a superduper party. What's the point in planning a wedding together if it makes you want to claw each other's eyes out?

We've already had a couple of spontaneous high fives as we were chatting about planning. One of them was in a cande-lit corner of Culina Mill Creek. Not exactly a high-fiving kind of atmosphere, but it didn't matter because there was just too much awesome to not high five. I believe the other high five happened early on in the planning process as we were riding our bikes down the middle of an empty street late at night and chatting about wedding stuff. That's right people, we can ride bikes and high five at the same time.

We're just over 3 months in to planning and we have almost all of the big details in place: church, officiant, reception venue, caterer, flowers, photography, an almost-finalized guest list, my dress, his suit and a few other things. We'd be patting ourselves on the back if we weren't too busy HIGH FIVING EACH OTHER. Just sayin'.

Anyways, I'm keeping my fingers crossed that we are able to keep things fun (I know life's not entirely about fun, but I think that a very large chunk of it should be) most of the time. Oh, and also that we won't buy in to the ridiculousness that says we have to spend our life savings and take out a 2 million dollar loan in order to have a nice wedding.

Bahn Mi

2010-11-09T22:55:00.000-07:00

Two years ago in Calgary, a friend took me to Thai Tai for a vietnamese sub, also known as Bahn Mi. It's just a little chain fast food restaurant but it was so delicious. Since then I have been wanting to eat it. All the time. But I didn't know where to get it in Edmonton until recently.

Before, the places you can get it here are a little more authentic instead of being a chain and, therefore, are not always as easily accessible unless you know what you're looking for. Evenutally we found a couple places, and then a couple of months ago a little place called V Sandwiches opened up right next to my work in Rice Howard Way. Awesome.

I recommend the beef satay. It comes on a toasted baguette with cilantro and spicy mayo and pickled carrots. But, if you are feeling even a little bit adventurous, then I recommend trying to make it yourself. It's not that hard and the ingredients are pretty basic other than a few specialty things for the sauces. I found a fun recipe that I tried the other day and it was easy. You can link to the full thing with pictures here, or I have put the directions below...

For the chicken:
1 lime, juiced
1/2 tablespoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons olive oil
2lb chicken thighs
1/2 cup coconut peanut sauce (see link or recipe below)

In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the lime juice, sugar, salt, and olive oil. Add the chicken and toss until well coated. Set aside to marinate for 20 minutes.

For the pickled carrots:
1/4 cup rice wine vinegar
2 tablespoons sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 medium carrots, cut into 1/8-inch match sticks

In the meantime, whisk together the vinegar, sugar, and salt in a medium mixing bowl until dissolved. Add the carrots and toss until combined. Set aside to pickle for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally.

For the sandwiches:
2 baguettes, sliced in half lengthwise
1/2 cup mayonnaise
1/2 teaspoon siracha
1 bunch cilantro, bottom of stems removed

Brush a pan with olive oil and heat. Grill the chicken in batches and then toss it together with the peanut sauce (see recipe below) in a medium mixing bowl.

In a small mixing bowl, combine the mayonnaise and the siracha. Season with a sprinkle of salt.

Toast the bread on a cookie sheet under the broiler for a few minutes until crusty. Spread mayo on bread. Add the chicken, then top with the carrots and a handful of cilantro leaves.

And for the peanut sauce...

Peanut Sauce
Makes about 1/2 cup

Ingredients
½ teaspoon oil
1 clove garlic, minced
2 teaspoons ginger, minced
½ teaspoon chili-garlic paste
1 cup low-fat coconut milk
3 tablespoons smooth peanut butter
1 ½ teaspoons sugar
1 ½ teaspoons soy sauce
1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
2 teaspoons fish sauce
juice of half a lime

Marcel the Shell

2010-11-08T11:55:00.001-07:00

I had a great weekend. My friend Natasha was here from Seattle to hang her show at the Sugarbowl. I might post about that tomorrow because everyone should go see it and buy something. Other highlights included my sister returning from the west coast (YAY) and hanging out with a four-and-a-half pound dog! Cute cute and more cute.

Last night, we wrapped up the weekend with a yummy dinner made by the newlyweds Megan and Joel. Conversation circled around whether they were officially grown ups now that they are married and have a nice place to live and can cook dinners for people together. But then we started watching youtube classics and all of a sudden it didn't matter whether we were grown ups or not.

If my friend Megan was a youtube video, I think she would be this Marcel The Shell (with shoes on) video that she showed us last night...

She is shockingly good at the voice.

Watching this youtube inevitably sent us on a revisitation of a few classics from this past here, so I figured it was worth sharing links to a few faves. Two funny, and two cute. Shane Sings 5 Octaves stands out head and shoulders above the rest though...

Shane Sings 5 Octaves on the Piano: wherein Shane tries (and dare I say, fails) to sing five octaves. On the piano. Worth it for his strained facial expressions alone.
Double Complete Rainbow: I thought everyone had seen this but Megan saw it for the first time last night.
Happy House Lamb: oh my gosh. I want a happy lamb.
Baby Bunny Eats Tiny Flower: Exactly what the title says it is.

Hipster Central

2010-11-07T16:12:00.000-07:00

So in September I got to eat some really great french toast in Seattle. Some genius decided to make a toppings bar with a crapload of fresh fruit. Pretty much the dream of everyone's life.

Highlights of the Seattle trip included Natasha's hipster glasses (Seattle is full of hipsters and plaid, by the way) and watching her text. When she lived here she was a vocal anti-cellphone type, so I really enjoyed watching her do it. She was posing, trying to look distressed and bad at texting. I think it worked.

We spent a lot of the week just wandering and shopping, reading and eating deli take out food on the beach. This is a cute garden shop in U-Village. Below is a picture of my cute friends at the cute shop.

And, Tash graciously took us to the Pike Place Market several times. They have the most amazing flowers there. I wish we could get Dahlias easily in Edmonton. Dahlias and Lavender are two seriously lacking things in our city.

We had a few really beautiful days and one of them just happened to be when we were down by the beach in Edmonds. We took some cute pictures, but I like this one below because I was imitating Kerry's fake smile from one of the other photos we took. Good times.

Suuuuper Belated Hiking Adventures...

2010-11-06T21:03:00.000-06:00

I saved up my annual vacation for the end of August and mid-September this year. Let me tell you, January through August is a long haul to go without vacation. But it was totally worth it. Our all-women hiking trip adventure to the North Coast Trail on Vancouver Island was pretty much a dream come true and exactly what I needed, and then Seattle was faaan-tastic.

Lots of beach walking, even more forest walking, and overcast weather, plus four of the best hiking companions of all time added up to one seriously awesome trip.

Basically, we hiked five (six?) days on the remote tip of Vancouver Island and served as entertainment/comic-relief for the hard core arcteryx-sponsored family of hikers that hit the trail hours ahead of us every morning, and were in camp hours ahead of us each night. We were too busy laughing to hike at a regular pace. I think they liked us.

It was pretty remote...we saw two bears on the beach where our water taxi dropped us off at the trail head, and there were several bear sightings, wolf sightings, and even a cougar (apparently) sighting by other groups, but I think we were a bit too loud for the wildlife, so they scrammed long before we got close enough to see them.

In conclusion, I loooove my sister and friends and everyone should do the North Coast Trail. The end.

A biannual indulgence: a post about the dictionary and other such related things

2010-11-05T10:44:00.002-06:00

The great thing about a blog is that I get 100% freedom to direct my own content. This is why twice a year or so I indulge myself in a post that is dictionary-related. You nerds out there may not care what this nerd is learning from the dictionary, but then again, you might. The beauty of blogging is that I can float it out there without really having to worry about the negative impact that dictionary-focused blogging might have on my readership (hi Kerry and Joel!).

So, today's post is brought to you by the hard copy of The Canadian Oxford Dictionary, The Chicago Manual of Style Online, and Dictionary.com

It's no secret that I love leafing through a hard copy dictionary. At work I will often look up words and then spend a few moments scanning the pages before and after my original destination to see what other interesting things it might turn up. So this morning, while I was cementing my understanding of the definition of the word 'egregious' (gross, flagrant, shocking, our outstandingly bad), I came across 'el cheapo' (cheap, inexpensive, of inferior quality, or a stingy person) which pretty much made my morning.

For a relatively static document (at least compared to the ever-evolving internet) that has such an academic and sometimes stuffy feel to it, the dictionary actually does a surprisingly good job of keeping their finger on the pulse of popular culture. They may be a few years behind on word trends, but they're doing a pretty good job of staying relevant.

Also on the lighter side of referencing materials, I find myself returning to the Q&A section of the Chicago Manual of Style website time and time again. Every month, they answer people's questions on issues that may not be clear from a reading of the manual. There is always a mix of genuine questions from people and questions that are coming from people who are clearly pretentious snobs. And time after time, I am amazed at the way they humorously and effectively answer the questions and, when needed, knock the snobs down a few pegs. I love them for it, because if anything I expected them to be the snobs. I LOVE the people who answer the Q&As. I want to be friends with all of them. An example from last month's questions...

Q. If you have to call someone “Jeff-bear,” is the hyphen appropriate, or would “Jeffbear” suffice? The new Manual doesn’t say.

A. I’m sorry, but when we got to the term “Jeff-bear,” the Hyphenation Committee couldn’t agree and things started to get nasty, so we left it out. I’m afraid you’re on your own.

and another from the archives...

Q. I wonder which you think is best: Key Lime pie, Key lime pie, or key lime pie?

A. I’m actually partial to pecan, but if you’re asking about spelling, consult a dictionary: Webster’s 11th Collegiate prefers lowercasing, noting that “Key” is often capped.

Ha!

And finally, I recently discovered that dictionary.com has a blog! It's called the Hot Word Blog. It's basically a playful forum for discussing all sorts of words. Today's post is on the latest discovery of yet another word coined by Dr. Seuss. Enough said. I like it.

The C-Line

2010-11-04T14:45:00.000-06:00

As of October 8, 2010, the City of Edmonton has finally figured out how to get us a bus to the airport! I'm sure it will have its share of challenges, but seriously, it was ridiculous how difficult it was to get out there (and expensive). Don't even get me started on the taxi licenses that prohibit drivers of the airport taxis from taking return passengers back to the airport. ACK.

Anyways, we now have something to Leduc called "The C-Line". All it is is a bus that goes from Century Park LRT station out to the Edmonton International. One step closer to actually becoming a visit-able city. How can we hope to attract a full range of visitors to our City of Champions if they keep getting stuck in Nisku?

I hope it works!

The Daily Good

2010-11-03T13:14:00.000-06:00

There is a hard copy magazine called "Good" that has awesome design and quirky content. One of their big things is to be all about sharing information in attractive and well designed ways that are both interesting to look at and easy to understand. The first time I saw it I spent a long time reading an article about subway systems in major cities around the world. That's a subject that could go either way in terms of interesting-ness, but it was so visually awesome that I really got into it.

Since I try not to subscribe to too many magazines (they stack up and I find it hard to get rid of them because I think of them as almost-books) I didn't sign up to receive the magazine, but I did sign up for "The Daily Good", which is basically one good thing a day, sent to your email account. It's fun, and the things they send are surprisingly awesome and intersting, if not a little heavy on the bicycle news which is understandable since bicycles are generally awesome.

One of my favourites was this prototype of a station wagon bicycle. It's funny and great all at once. In one of the pics it is even holding an adult as a reclining passenger.

I am a bicycle enjoyer and latent bicycle commuter. Heavy emphasis on the latent. But we won't talk about that.
I borrowed a pic here from designboom.com which I linked to above. If you click through the link there are some images showing it in use, but here it is in all of its glory. Think of all the excellent things you could do with this!

Stars - a Halloween diversion

2010-11-02T14:37:00.000-06:00

I started listening to Stars in about 2004 when I was still in university. A couple of their songs figured prominently on some of the early mix cds that I made for Joel right when we started dating. We've seen them a few times over the years and every time I think I might be done with them, they come and play a show and I love them all over again.

This time, they played at the Winspear on Halloween, which was doubly awesome because it gave me something awesome to do on a holiday that I'm not crazy about. The best thing about Halloween otherwise was an email from my brother letting me know that Halloween was in full swing over at their house and that my neice was dressed up as a POODLE and was rolling around on the floor eating chocolate.

As you can see in the picture (credit to Joel, who took it on his phone), they had a bubble machine on stage. How can you not love them for that? We were three rows back so Joel and Torquil (one of the lead singers) exchanged an awkwardly lengthy thumbs up avec eye contact close to the end of the show. And Amy Milan (the other singer) totally called out a lame guy who was smoking in one of the balconies and ashing over the railing down on to the stage. She called him a "little sh*t". Ha. I loved her for that.

Their new album is called "The Five Ghosts" and sounds worth checking out. My favourite will always be "Heart", followed closely by "Set Yourself on Fire". Joel and I were listening to their old albums (and new) this past weekend while we were working on a project, and it was totally transporting me back to old, fun times.

Also noteworthy: Torquil is an actor on the side, which you can totally tell from watching his melodramatic stage presence, and had a speaking role on on episode of SATC. He was a guy at a party that Carrie goes to with her super young boyfriend. His line is "I like your leather pants". Totally a claim to fame though to have spoken to SJP.

NaBloPoMo

2010-11-01T11:56:00.000-06:00

I have been challenged by a coworker to join the ridiculous sounding "NaBloPoMo". In a nutshell, blog every day for the month of November. Since I'm always toying with the idea of giving up blogging entirely but spend equal amounts of time toying with the idea of buckling down and actually blogging more regularly, I figured it was worth accepting the challenge.

The timing is right because I was thinking this weekend that there is quite a span of unrecorded years in my life right now. I journalled like a maniac through university and as embarrassing as some of it is to read now, it's nice to be able to go back and visit my old self in that way.

In the past five or so years, other than a few spotty journal entries, the major written record I have of my activities and interests is actually my old blog posts. So, maybe it's time to pick up again with a bit more momentum before I can't remember how I spent my youth. Otherwise, I won't have anything to look back on and be embarrassed about!

For more information about NaBloPoMo, click HERE.

If I fail miserably, be gentle with me.

Megan & Joel

2010-10-24T12:55:00.000-06:00

Megan, who I have known for 9ish years now, got married to a Joel earlier this month. We like to refer to him as Joel II, because he came on the scene of our friend group several years after my Joel was already established as the group Joel. But for the purposes of this important occasion I will drop the slightly rude "II" and call him THE Joel. Just be aware that THE Joel does not = MY Joel.

I volunteered my kitchen and my efforts to helping Kerry create their wedding flowers. It was quite the process and there were flowers everywhere. Kerry posted about it here.

Since Kerry already posted about the flowers, I thought I would highlight the adorablecuteness of the decor. As Kerry said, obviously the marriage is the most important thing, but SERIOUSLY, how cute were their decorations!

I loved the door backdrop with the flags and the silhouettes. And the tissue paper poufs. And the cake topper as well as the real live cute bride and groom.

And I threw in a cute picture that MY Joel took of our hands. Because it's cute.

All the best to you Megan and THE Joel.

Love, Bethany

Painting!

2010-10-14T17:10:00.000-06:00

As I mentioned, I painted my kitchen. A super cute aqua colour. It was SO fun to paint after years of not being allowed.

And my parents brought over an intense picnic lunch because they are adorable. And then Joel christened it with a closed-eyes dance party. He didn't actually say I could put this picture online.

So that's painting. Next up: finished house!

The reverse penthouse

2010-10-10T09:48:00.000-06:00

More than two chaotic months ago, I moved. I feel like I've hardly been home since the August long weekend (a good chunk of that was vacations, so I'm not complaining!), and it's just now that I am finally starting to catch up and feel like my little place is becoming a home (for now, even if not for long). Anyways, I meant to post "before" pics when I moved in and just didn't get around to it, so here they are now...

Above: the living space, complete with laminate floors that help it not to feel so basementy and a little fireplace which means I can control the temperature down here. Whooo! Also, it's totally big enough for a living room space AND a desk/sewing area behind.

Above: my bedroom. Well, they were drying laundry in there when I took this photo, but you get the idea.

The shared laundry area, in progress with painting.

My little bathroom. All mine. All white. All the time.

The kitchen, before I got my hands on it with a can of paint. It has those cute metal retro knobs and is actually pretty spacious considering it's a little basement suite. Or, reverse penthouse, as my friend Amy would say.

So, that's the idea. Yay for my new place!

Engagement Reactions

2010-08-17T22:18:00.001-06:00

Ahh, this blog is going to make a liar out of me yet. I promised engagement reactions. So, here are my faves, finally.

1. My dad. Well, in the summers my dad works really hard. Long days, lots of computer work. But in recent months he and my mom have made going for almost daily swims a priority and as such, he has decided that on hot days especially he will work in his bright red swim trunks on the laptop at the dining room table. Usually he wears a shirt, although quite possibly not always. Anyways, the day that Joel and I got engaged we came over to share the news and caught a whole crowd of people in the back yard eating dinner. My dad in his summer uniform, sitting at the picnic table. So we told them and after all the exclaiming was done, my dad stood up and said, half to me, half to nobody, "Well, I knew I wore my good shoes for a reason". I hadn't noticed, but he was wearing trunks, a polo shirt, and black leather tasseled loafers with no socks. I love him.

2. Lewis. He knew in advance, but when we stopped by to head out for some celebratory drinks he just gave me a huge bending over (because he is tall and I am short) hug and just kept saying "Ohhhhh, ohhhhh, Bethany I'm so happy, Ohhhhhhh". It was super cute.

3. Uncle Doug and his son Aaron. The next day I told Uncle Doug and Auntie Nola that Joel and I were engaged and they were SUPER excited. After the mood calmed a little, Uncle Doug stood at the kitchen counter shaking his head and saying "Joel, well, he's perfect". And then he kept saying "That's the best news I've heard in a long time". Later that evening Joel and I called my cousin Aaron in Toronto to tell him the news. He exclaimed for a minute, then settled down and said "Well, that`s the best news I`ve heard in a long time". I started to laugh and when I told him that was EXACTLY what his dad had said, he responded `Well, the apple doesn`t fall far from the tree does it Marilla?". Now, for those of you who don't know, that is an Anne of Green Gables movie reference. Which is pretty much perfection.

4. Um, pretty much all of my ~~besties~~ dear friends, who were all SO happy for us and made me feel so happy.

He asked, I said nods head vigorously

2010-07-29T16:18:00.000-06:00

Joel took me on a bike ride last week and asked me to marry him. Apparently, my answer was *nods head vigorously* followed by ”...yes”! I’m not sure I remember that part but he says it’s true.

The proposal was fantastic and lovely, which was no surprise, especially when the proposer was the king of orchestrating surprises.

But I was surprised by how great it was telling people the news. I have lovely friends and family and am so glad to be with someone who they all love too. Thank you everyone for being so happy for us, and for telling us so.

I might spend a bit of time posting some of my favourite reactions to the news. There were a couple of real winners.

Braving the clowns is totally worth it for pizza this good.

2010-07-23T17:08:00.000-06:00

It's festival time in Edmonton and that means a delicious selection of lunch food choices for those of us lucky enough to work close to the square. The only trouble with the most recent festival is that, well, it was the Street Performers Festival. This festival has the ability to give me "the knot" (thanks Dietermans for coining the phrase and putting words to that awful feeling of awkward, make-it-stop, embarassment on behalf of others that plaques the pits of the stomachs of overly socially conscious people everywhere).

I was walking through the square the other day when it was on and watched an unsuspecting office worker strolling past a peformance. The performer stopped, ran out of the circle he was performing in and chased them down so he could pummel them with some sort of fake balloon sword. UGH. All this to get a half-hearted chorus of chuckles from a crowd of kids and parents.

Anyways, Joel and I went back later looking for a snack that didn't involve sitting inside at any sort of restaurant and we found something that totally made it worth enduring the awkward. Some genius ordered a wood fired pizza oven on wheels from freaking Italy and is now making awesome pizzas at festivals in Alberta. His oven is on a trailer.

We shared a BBQ chicken pizza and it was so good that I went back the next day in a thunderstorm to eat it again for lunch.

Braving the clowns is totally worth it for pizza this good, my friends.

Craft camp

2010-07-20T23:07:00.001-06:00

Traditions are nice. I think the best kind of traditions are the accidental ones. Like the fact that it seems like Kaeli and I have done some sort of ski trip on all of her past few birthday weekends. I don't know if it ranks as tradition yet, but it might be starting, and that's nice. Another good one is going canoeing on my birthday weekend down the north saskatchewan river with a pack of my friends every year for several years now. Another good one is eating chicken ceaser salad with natasha. A not so great one is drinking diet coke with Natasha. ha.

Every Canada day weekend for the past 14 years, my extended family on my mom's side has gathered in Saskatoon. This is pretty much the tradition to beat out all other traditions as far as my life goes. We eat good food, have fun times, and craft our brains out. My friend Rebecca has started calling it craft camp.

It started out when my sister and I spent a week with my aunt each making our own quilts. I was 12. The next summer we went back and made another one, this time for my parents. And my brother tagged along and spent the time working with my uncle in his fully equipped wood working shop. And the next summer we decided to get together and make a quilt for my cousin who was getting married as a gift from all of us. By this time we were noticing the pattern and somebody dubbed the event as QUILTFEST as a joke, but the name stuck.

Then we started doing other sorts of projects. Making canoe paddles with the help of my patient uncle. Making cutting boards, knitting, upholstering, gocco printing. Anyways, here we are 14 years later still going strong and taking on even bigger projects, like my brother who put the biggest log of all time on the lathe...

Joel made a quilt and a lemon meringue pie using a blow torch...

Other projects included making dresses, drum sticks, upholstering, a huge cedar bench, a giant set of pick up sticks, a wooden bowl.

I almost feel sheepish at how great my family is when I talk about Quiltfest, but then I remember how to everyone else we just sound like a bunch of nerds, so it can't be that bad to gush a bit.

just the five of us

2010-06-09T23:57:00.000-06:00

I usually let May long weekend pass without any major plans, but this year some sweet plans fell into my lap. When I was visiting Kerry early this spring we spotted some serious antique cuteness in her house and asked about it. She told us it was from Nanton, which has great antique shops and an all girls road trip was born.

It was a great weekend. We picked up Kerry at camp and headed straight to Nanton. I had no idea they had all those antiques. Being in the car for that long got a little tiresome, but over and over, there were little moments where we all felt glad to be friends. I like those moments...the ones where you know that everyone is thinking the same thing: how am I so lucky to have these great people as my dear friends. There were five of us, and I've known them all between 9 and 23 years. That's a lot of years.

Sooooo, because I am lazy, a photo collage clockwise from top left: we found letterpress blocks at the last minute, antique gates and beds, sharing a milkshake, we're not sure, grumpy family vacation photo, kerry and tash against a brick wall, best pic ever of kim wearing an aviator hat, pretending to walk down the street in nanton, grain elevator!

Chatting with my brother

2010-05-15T16:47:00.001-06:00

I think my brother can make me laugh harder than almost anyone else. It's all in the details.

Scott: BSS* tix on sale for oct 8 show at Winspear. Heidi and I got tix and Sean bought 2 also!

Me: Did you mean BSB?

Scott: Yes. The ESO covering the backstreet boys entire discography with a guest French hornist.

Me: Call me crazy but I'd buy tickets to that too.

Scott: You know what else we should really see is all the HSM movies back to back (the acronym is a test).

Me: HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL! KABLAM!

Scott: Nothin but net

*BSS is Broken Social Scene

Seedlings

2010-04-27T23:45:00.000-06:00

Gardening started early around our house this year. Bri's got a flat of jiffy pots growing, and Joel and I have been working on our own seedlings too. The first picture is of the tomato seeds in Joel's hand...we were amazed by the tiny-ness of the tomato seeds. I've never taken the time to grow tomatoes from seeds, since it was always fun to pick them up at the farmer's market. As an experiment, we used plastic egg cartons with holes punched in the bottom to grow our seedlings. I'm not sure it was the best choice as they are pretty small, but the verdict is still out on that one.

We've got basil, tomatoes, green beans, sugar peas, sweet peas, and lupin growing so far. The rest will be planted straight into the ground. At first I wanted to start some beets early but then I realized that if I did that, then I would have to transplant them one beet at a time into the garden, which would be ridiculous. Glad I realized that one before I tried it!

I'm excited for my little garden this year. Yay.

Guilty (musical) pleasure

2010-04-09T17:16:00.000-06:00

John Mayer concerts are turning into a guilty pleasure of mine. You may recall the event of '07 when Kerry and I were transplanted from our nosebleed seats INTO THE FRONT ROW. Because John Mayer is a lovely (if somewhat vile in magazine interviews) musician who likes to save the best seats for random fans with crappy seats.

So, this time, NayNay and I scored 6th row tickets with help from my friend Matt. The opener was Michael Franti and Spearhead, and I wouldn't normally bore you with details of the opener, but they were totally awesome. Like rock-the-whole-place awesome. Michael Franti ran off the stage and through the crowd high fiving everyone (including NayNay) as he ran past...

And his guitar player was the happiest little guy I ever did see. He smiled at least this hard for almost the entire show, except for one song where he was totally rocking out too hard to smile...

And now some John Mayer, who put on good show, except for a very, very long drum solo. I'm talking possibly over five minutes. The only other negative was his cargo pants. He reallly needs to stop wearing those. New fun fact: he is pretty good at whistling...

Dictionary Love

2010-03-23T22:36:00.000-06:00

I recently discovered an awesome new section in the Canadian Oxford Dictionary that I hadn't noticed before. It happened when I was looking something up at work, and just kept flipping to the back where I discovered a compilation of all of the words that have been most recently added to the dictionary! So awesome. Words like "cougar" and "bootylicious" are constantly emerging and coming up for review by dictionary editors, but I'm never sure which ones actually make the cut. Anyways, some of the most relevant and entertaining ones, in my opinion, are below...

Icicle lights (thank you 2001)
Bad hair day (really?)
Boy band (thank you BSB vs. 'N Sync rivalry circa 1999)
Oxygen bar (ugh, people are so lame)
Machiato (thank you Starbucks...and Italy, I guess)
My bad (ew)
Text messaging
Yada yada yada (I want to say thank you Elaine from Seinfeld, but I'm not sure...anyone? Tash?)
Talking stick
TTYL
IMHO
Forensic accounting (thank you big business scandals of the 20th century)

Anyways, I thought it was pretty cool. Some of the words totally suck, but I guess that's not a legitimate criteria for not including them in the dictionary. While we are on the subject, here is a word I would like to see REMOVED from all dictionaries: irregardless. SHUDDER.

And here is something fun: The Pictorial Webster's Dictionary

Okay, one more thing, since I don't often indulge a dictionary blog post...I was flipping through the "C" section of the dictionary last week and happened to read the definition of Corona. I had no idea that one of the definitions was "a chandelier of wrought metal, having the form of one or more concentric hoops". Did anyone else realize that this is why Corona LRT station is so named? It totally has two huge corona style chandeliers above the escalators. I never thought of it, although I always thought that the chandeliers were awesome and that it was a strange choice for the station name.

I love dictionaries.

Bicycle Love

2010-03-18T00:04:00.001-06:00

I have always liked biking around, but many summers ago, I spent a summer biking an hour each way to work at the farm, and then two summers ago, my friend Rebecca decided to challenge herself not to drive for the month of June except when it felt absolutely necessary. She's cool like that and inspired me to start riding my bike to work. I fell in love with the commute and ended up riding almost every day until it snowed in November. I had purchased a new bike that spring and probably made its cost worth back in saved gas money that summer.

Anyways, it was a great summer, but then the next year I got a new job, and it messed up my biking groove, because I now work in a stuffier office tower downtown with nowhere to change and nowhere to stash my bike. I haven't been able to overcome the obstacles, so my bike didn't get nearly as much use last summer as it had previously. Sad.

Anyways, another strike came against my little bike when I got a flat tire riding home from my parents' house last fall. It sat in the garage all winter just waiting for me to fix it.

As much as I love biking, I don't know much about how to fix them. I always feel a little embarrassed about it because generally I like doing little repairs on things and like to know how to take care of my stuff. So, when my friend Caylie invited me to take a basic bike maintenance course at the Bikeworks, I jumped at the chance. It cost only five bucks, and I took my flat tire with me and they totally showed me how to patch it! So great.

Also, Caylie's tire was a bit wonky and wavy, so they showed her how to "true her spokes" as I breathed down her neck in fascination until she asked if I wanted to try. It was so awesome.

You just put your tire in this stand, spin it and carefully watch for the places that are scraping and tighten the spokes accordingly. Caylie and I nerded out and compared it to editing, because it requires such careful attention and detail. Anyways, I ended up buying a membership and definitely plan on going back to learn more. I definitely recommend checking it out. Like right now. Go do it.

Swap-o-rama

2010-03-08T20:51:00.000-07:00

A couple of times a year for the past few years, my girlfriends have been getting together for an event we have come to lovingly refer to as swap-o-rama. We unofficially practiced clothes swapping one-on-one, with my mom always being unable to keep track of whose clothes I was wearing, but this is our more official way of doing trades.

Here's how it works: we get together at one house and all bring our reject clothes. Anything goes from ugly, stretched out, tye-dyed tank tops (ahem, Natasha) to leftovers from ugly sweater parties. And of course, we fully expect there to be some cuteness as well. We organize the clothes into piles according to type, and then one person volunteers to be the auctioneer. This time around it was Kerry, who entertained us all by holding things up and commenting with gems such as "And here is a tragic mistake in Jenny's past" and "this shirt looks like it belonged to someone with a desk job". Inevitably, someone ends up with layers of clothes. You can see it in the picture below where Kerry is wearing four or five shirts plus a bikini top.

This time, we hung the uglies off of the chandelier in my living room. It started with a red tank top I had leftover from grade nine (it was my first item of clothing with spaghetti straps). It continued with a 'wizard robe' left over from a costume party and a few other awful, awful items.

So, enough talking. Here is a collage of the photo highlights from the evening. In the bottom right, you can see the piles and piles of clothes. We are ridiculous. Kerry is drowning in them in that little photo on the right. Click on the photos to see them bigger.

AGA!

2010-02-01T20:05:00.000-07:00

My brother called me at 8:15 on Sunday morning to see if I wanted to come to the opening of the new (much anticipated) art gallery with them in 1/2 hour, as they somehow had an extra ticket. Heck yes I wanted to come. I have been waiting for this for YEARS. Ever since they posted the three designs in the Edmonton Journal and asked Edmontonians to pick a favourite. This one won out over the boring choice (think boxy bricks, without the antiquated charm) and the extra-zany choice (think neon). Ever since then I have been excited about us finally having an interesting building downtown. I work downtown, so I regularly take my lunchbreaks and wander over past the gallery (due to not having any work friends. sob story.).

Side story: I overheard an awesome conversation between a bunch of middle aged women waiting for the LRT awhile back who were mystified by the design. The question: "what are they going to do with all those curves, go sledding on it??" was thrown around a few times. A bit of "tsking" and head shaking was present as well.

Anyways, what I didn't realize was that we were part of the very first tour through the gallery. They counted down before they opened the doors to us and then everyone shouted "Welcome to the Art Gallery!". It was super cute. There was media crawling around everywhere and they had CKUA broadcasting live and doing an interview with the architect, who Francis got to meet on his way out. Scott stopped him to say hi and then said "Francis, can you say 'hi Mr. Stout'". It was pretty cute.

And, Francis was quoted on the front page of the Edmonton Journal giving his thoughts on the new gallery.

Francis Benoit, age three, enjoyed playing on the curved metal walls in the stairwell before his granola-bar meltdown on the second floor."I like it," Francis said. More specifically? "I just like it," he explained.

I would not have called it a meltdown as there was no kicking or wailing, just a bit of short-lived yelling from a little guy who wanted a granola bar, but whatever.

My verdict is that this gallery feels like the sort of gallery that they would have in a big, hip city like Sanfran. We're not quite there yet, just give us another hundred years, but in the mean time, the gallery shop was totally awesome.

And here is the media swarm. Okay well maybe not a swarm.

And the view looking up from the main floor.

Terrariums

2010-01-24T12:01:00.000-07:00

I love making Christmas gifts and I always try to make at least a little something for my sister. This year my project for a couple of people were moss terrariums. I had been wanting to make one for quite a while, and then I went to visit my friend Caylie and someone had made one for her. So, the next week, I went hunting for jars to house my terrarium in. These were easily acquired at my favourites store, Value Village. Yes, I am an addict. Next stop was the pet store to buy some activated charcoal. Coincidentally, this also caused me to have a lapse in judgment wherein I decided that I wanted a chihuahua. The urge has mostly passed, but I can't get over the enticing idea of owning a mini dog.

Here is the list of my terrarium ingredients and a picture of them spread out in my kitchen:

Glass jars
Rocks or gravel (Dollar store)
Potting soil
Activated Charcoal (pet store)
Moss (garden centre)
Water spritzer
Magic modelling clay (Toys R' Us)
Paperclips

It's pretty straightforward to make. You just put some rocks in a jar.

Then you mix potting soil with some activated charcoal, which keeps things fresh.

Next, you get to place your moss. The hardest part for me was getting my supermoss embedded in the soil so that it was standing up straight with the bottom portion all the way down in the soil. I ended up using tongs to place it.

After all my moss was placed and my kitchen was cleaned up, the jars looked like this...

Next, it was time to cute-ify (kitsch-ify) them by making tiny mushrooms out of modelling clay. I made each mushroom with a paperclip sticking out of the bottom of it so that the paperclip could be jammed into the soil to help it stand up straight.

Then the mushroom went in the jar!

In the meantime, I had spray painted the jar's lid cream, and covered the rest of the lid with red checked gingham. And that's the end.

Spa-father

2010-01-13T23:15:00.001-07:00

Before the holidays, a few of my girlfriends and I got together to watch the wonder that is "Little Women". It was perfection, right up until I suggested we follow it up with "Ghost". NEVER watch Ghost if you haven't seen it already. It's super lame and not worth it. Ugh. Anyways, after the movies, we got to discussing "The Godfather". I had purchased the trilogy on VHS at Goodwill because I wanted to someday watch it.

My external reasoning was that it was a classic that everyone should see. My internal reasoning probably had something to do with all of the lines that Tom Hanks quotes to Meg Ryan in "You've got mail". "Go to the mattresses", "Leave the gun, take the Cannoli", you know...

Anyways, that started things rolling and we decided to have a Godfather watching party in the new year. But all of us weren't actually sure we would enjoy the movie, so we decided instead to have a "SPAfather" night. A girls night with soaking, scrubbing, nailpolishing and lotioning. You know. At least that would make things bearable if the movie was terrible. And oh boy, the movie was terrible. We hardly watched it until the last 1/2 hour or so. And by that time, nothing in the epic plotline made sense to us because all we had done for the first 2 hours was paint our nails and talk over the movie.

It was pretty much a blast...

The spread: cotton balls, nail polish, files, buffers, cuticle trimmers, bath bombs, lotions, vaseline, epsom salts

The feet soaking tubs for all

The hot, steamy towels, delivered with tongs

Biore strips galore, with Joel saying "Shhhh, don't put this photo on the internet"

Cucumbers for the eyes (also effective for blocking out disturbing scenes of domestic violence)

Gross lotion feet and feet soaking in the background

Nail stickers for french tips, with a tiny glimpse of "The Godfather" in the background. Yep, that's pretty much as close as we got to watching it. Actually, I think this photo was taken during a completely ridiculous scene that led to a discussion about anatomy that I won't go into detail about here, because I don't want to come up on any raunchy google searches. But for all of you who left early, you missed out on a fascinating scene.

Belated Resolutions

2010-01-10T21:43:00.001-07:00

My 2010 resolutions include:

Reading all of the unread books on my bookshelf, even if it means not using my library card very often. By my count there are exactly 20 books, but a couple of them are doozies. Les Miserables and The Brothers Karamazov are both on the shelf. I can do it, though, and I believe I will be better for it. This resolution is brought to you by Kerry, who resolved it first, and who is my inspriation.
Finding a better way to deal with coffee beans at home. Most of my coffee is consumed out, so whenever I buy a bag of beans, it inevitably goes stale on the counter or ends up smelling like my freezer. Ew. I am considering buying tiny amounts in bulk. Another option is stealing small amounts from my parents when I am over there. They always have nice fair trade coffee and I'm sure they wouldn't mind sharing a wee bit with their youngest darling daughter. Secondary coffee resolution: go back to ordering tall drinks at starbucks. I snuck over to the grande side in 2009 for no particular reason.
Not buying clothes unless I LOVE them. I have too many clothes and work too close to the mall. I don't have any lunch buddies at work, so I end up shopping way more than I need to. I don't want to squash the fun, but I do want to evaluate my purchases a little more. Secondary reslution: make a lunch buddy at work? Ha.
And lastly, "Love much. Earth has enough of bitter in it" - Ella Wheeler-Wilcox.

Bell Jars on Design*Sponge!

2010-01-08T13:08:00.001-07:00

This is surely old news to my handful of regular readers, but too fun not to post here anyways! I submitted the bell jars of the previous post to my most favourite blog, Design*Sponge, and she posted them on her weekly "Before & After" round up yesterday. It was so fun to see my little bell jars up there. If you want to take a look, go check out the post on D*S right here.

It's worth checking out the rest of the blog, because it is completely and utterly delightful if you are at all interested in design, decor, creativity, or anything of the sort.

Thanks for the 15 minutes of pseudo-fame, D*S!

Love,

Bethany

Old people clocks...transformed!

2010-01-05T23:30:00.001-07:00

The Clock Transformation is complete!

If you recall from a few weeks ago, I went thrifting on Saturday with Megan and Trixie. My biggest score of the day was three hideous glass dome clocks. I left the picture below for speculation, but as you can see above, they are fully transformed. The backstory is that I'd had my eye on bell jars online for months, and saw one recently at a sweet store in Edmonton called "The Artworks", but it was 450 freaking dollars and was more modern than I would have liked anyways. I'm sorry, but for $450 it had better come with a free lifetime supply of milkshakes or some other such incentive. It didn't, so I was left to my own devices.

1. The first step was to take the dome off and assess the situation.

2. Second step was to unscrew the clock mechanism from the base of each one. This wasn't too hard, except that the plastic columns were actually part of the base on the smallest of the three clocks, and being impatient to get this project rolling, I opted for ripping them off with pliers instead of tracking down a hacksaw or something that might have made a smoother cut. I was planning to cover the base anyways, so I wasn't too worried.

3. Next, I spray painted the bases of the clocks with white spray paint, to remove all trace of and likeness to the old people clocks.

4. Once the paint was dry, I traced circles of paper to affix to the bases, both for extra cuteness points and to cover up the screw holes in the bases.

5. Cut out the paper circles with an exacto knife and scissors. I had to cut an extra hole in the paper for a stubborn protrusion on one of the bases.

6. Base covered in paper.

7. Completed domes from above! The figurines in order are a bear, a bird cage, and a birch tree with paper flags in it. I later removed the flags because even thought I liked them they somehow looked awkward on the little tree and competed with its cuteness. We'll see.

The clocks were $1.99, 4.99, and 6.99, respectively, and the paper and spray paint I had on hand. I purchased the little birch tree from Rona's Christmas village decorations for $8, so all in all it cost me just over $20 for all three bell jars. Instead of $450. Also it was way more satisfying and entertaining. Hey-O!

This kind of winter

2009-12-04T16:33:00.000-07:00

I love this kind of winter.

A massive winter storm rolled in over night and hasn't let up all day. I don't have to worry about driving to work, so I enjoyed the snowy-but-warm walk to the station and hopped on the train and made it to work early. Then I watched the river valley turn completely white from my office window until 2:57, when they sent out an email telling us all to go home.

The train was totally running smoothly, and the driver even made announcements about the treacherous conditions on the platforms telling us to watch our step and have a great evening. I love it when LRT drivers talk like they are flight pilots. Makes my day every time. The platforms have piles of snow that were almost as big as the ones I remember from my childhood.

After trudging (literally) through the deep snow, I arrived home and decided to shovel my car out, the driveway, the sidewalks, etc. The entire time, my iPod chose songs on shuffle that were totally rocking my face off. M. Ward, Wilco, Stars, Sufjan Stevens. It took about an hour and when I got into the house the bottoms of my pants WEREN'T EVEN WET. That is how fluffy this snow is, my friends.

Let's do a quick recap: snow day, fluffy snow, lrt, awesome!

Enjoy it.

My brother sewed a stuffed penguin on his own initiative.

2009-11-29T23:32:00.000-07:00

Last weekend, my sis came to town for a crafting weekend with me, my mom, and my sister in law. it ended up with the kidlets as well as scott and my dad, and it was such a great weekend.

We busted out Amy Grant's "A Christmas Album", and ate dessert for breakfast while we worked on various projects and hung out. Kaeli sewed stuffed birds out of fabric from Italy. I worked on flags for the Royal Bison. Francis made some a gingerbread house and train set with Heidi. Geneva was adorable. Mom knit. Dad teased us and read the paper. And our brother, Scott, sewed a stuffed penguin, with a little help from us.

Ingenuity

2009-11-19T20:44:00.000-07:00

Although I sometimes get teased for my 'methods', sometimes I just have to risk the teasing and share the genius.

My most recent stroke of brilliance came when - after weeks of hunting for wool tights so that I could extend the dress wearing season late into the fall (thus putting off the inevitable evil of winter that is wearing DRESS PANTS to work) - I wore my new tights once and busted a hole through the toes. Darn toenails.

Soooo, I pulled out my tiniest pair of ankle socks and slid them on first next time I wore my tights. Not only are my feet totally warmer when I walk to work in the morning, but you would NEVER KNOW that I have socks on under my tights. Seriously people.

And, in summary, that is how much I hate dress pants.

Rolodex Love

2009-10-20T22:01:00.000-06:00

Growing up I often asked for very...utilitarian...Christmas and birthday gifts. Dustbusters, rolodexes. So, I've had (and loved) this rolodex for many years, but because I just can't leave stuff alone once I get in in my head that it might be spray-paintable I did a little rolodex makeover this weekend. All it involved was spraying the dividers with my favourite blue paint and affixing cork letters. Easy and so much cuter now.

Little things that make my day better

2009-10-16T23:28:00.000-06:00

I love customizing the spaces that I occupy; however, I once read an article that said people will view you as unprofessional if you have too many personal artifacts in your work space. These two things are butting heads. So, I have to be sneaky in my customization. And it is the little things that bring me tiny bits of joy throughout the day. Some of them are obvious and some of them more clandestine. So today I stealthily snapped some photos of them and here they are, starting from the left upperhand corner:

A plant from my dear friend Karen (plants are innocuous enough, right?), with a card from my dear co-worker Amy stuck on a card pick.
Next, a totally vintage tape dispenser that I found (to my extreme joy) in the reject cupboard at work. I quickly grabbed it and switched it with my black plastic one. It rocks.
Natasha's show postcard from last year, and a red polka dot nail file that I keep on hand to prevent those pesky rough edges that send me into nail biting fits.
My desk phone, which I frequently use to call Amy (who, coincidentally is leaving me for another job at the end of next week. Sadness. Amy if you are reading this: I WILL MISS YOU and our daily chats).
My many pairs of shoes. Usually hidden in a filling cabinet, but some of them end up on the floor under my desk.
A felt bird I made last year before Christmas and put up as a decoration. I could never bear to take it down. Plus it looked so cute with the typewriter key thumbtacks.
Framed Emily Carr postcard from Lisa. I love it. Had it at my last job too, but I recently painted the frame.

So, there you have it. A little tour of the things that make me smile throughout the workday.

The mounting obsession with coconut

2009-10-04T23:22:00.000-06:00

I decided last minute that Joel must have coconut cupcakes for his birthday, so I headed to the grocery store over my lunch break in search of some vanilla cupcake ingredients. I planned to just buy some coconut and sprinkle it on top of them as a finishing touch, since the two of us have been egging each other on in our coconut obsessions. In the cake section, I found a boxed 'Barefoot Contessa' coconut cupcake mix, so I took it as a sign and bought it. It was amazing. And the cupcakes were beautiful.

And the birthday boy was happy.

Parkour!

2009-09-24T22:49:00.005-06:00

I took a quick trip east this past week to visit my old friend and former co-editor of the Chronicle, Lisa DeMoor. I blame our shared history of ridiculously late nights spent bonding in the Chronicle office for the silliness that eventually ensued. But I'll get to that later. First I have to mention a few of the other things that I did while I was away.

Firstly, we drove straight from the airport to Toronto to see U2 play a show at the skydome. It was awesome. They had the roof rolled back, which meant that the CN Tower was visible right next to us, all lit up in (slightly tacky) coloured lights. Summary of the concert: Bono's still got it. Photo of the concert = don't have one, so you'll have to settle for one of me reading a review the next day on the train.

The next day was tickle trunk day! We went to the CBC museum and saw it. For reals. It's amazing. They had old clips of Mr. Dressup shows and other such delights. No puppets of Casey and Finnegan though. Other item of note: Mr. Dressup's glasses back in the day were essentially the same as Joel's current glasses. I feel that Freud would have something to say about that. Gotta love him.

The rest of the day was spent going up the CN Tower, shopping, wandering through Chinatown, finding the best coffee of our lives, seeing Kensington Market, and being taken out for a lovely French meal by my cousin Aaron and his fiance Karen. They took us to an art opening after dinner. We are so scene.

Next day we drove back to Ottawa. I cheated on the Lush pact* because I was seduced by a coconut scented product and then caught up on the season premiere of The Office. Well worth it, considering our activities the next day when we decided on a whim to head to Montreal (because we could) and spend the day wandering around. We managed to see a bit of the waterfront and Old Montreal before we regressed into a fit of parkour madness, inspired by The Office. In the end, we didn't actually see a whole lot of Montreal. But we sure had a great day.

Parliament the next day, where we crashed a suffragettes tea party and then I sat on Lester B. Pearson's lap. And then we headed off to eat some sandwiches. Apparently I am a big jerk for wanting swiss cheese on mine, but I suppose that was evident already with my choice of a red sports car avec spoiler for a rental. And that's the summary of my most excellent trip east.

* Lush Pact is a vow to never shop at Lush that I made with Joel some time ago. We made the pact because the store stinks and we hate it. Well, mostly hate it. Except this one product.

summer pout

2009-09-11T23:29:00.003-06:00

we went for a lovely picnic on the pedestrian bridge by louise mckinney park tonight. i forget how exactly i offended joel before this picture, but that is a real pout my friends. ahh the magic of summer evenings.

Camp Counsellor

2009-08-23T22:57:00.005-06:00

Today I sorted through a huge box of letters and notes that I had stored at my parents' house. I figured it was time to get them out of there and get rid of some of them. You can see the bag full of recycle next to me, and the consolidated letters sorted into shoeboxes.

Of course in the process a few gems were discovered. Like this picture, drawn by Tash. She hates cats. The sketch below is a cat being run over by a truck that says "devil patrol" on it.

I threw away most of the letters from people I have lost touch with totally, and a lot from summer camp friends. But I couldn't bear to get rid of one letter...most of you know that at one time I was a summer camp counsellor. Those were some of my glory summers, and one of my favourite campers was a 10 year old girl who came to the 'roughin' it' camp out at the tipis, where we lived away from the main camp and cooked our meals over a fire and played in the creek and all that good stuff. Anyways, this letter wins points for cuteness. Click on each page to view it larger - it's much more readable that way.

Our very own town troubadour

2009-08-19T20:42:00.004-06:00

ALL CAPS UPDATE: HE PLAYED 'ALL AROUND THE MULBERRY BUSH' AGAIN THE OTHER DAY, AND THEN LINDA FREAKING DUNCAN WALKED UP AND GREETED HIM LIKE AN OLD FRIEND. I STARED. AND MISSED MY FRIEND KERRY.

One of my favourite things about Churchill Square on weekdays is the busker on the corner who calls himself "The Electronic Busker". Most days he's out there with his silver sequined suit jacket and his flowing grey hair. He is often playing familiar riffs from classic rock or whatever he feels like. One time, two or three days after I had a conversation about the song "Ghost riders in the sky" with Lewis, he played that very song as if he knew. Today it was "All around the mulberry bush". Made my day.

I didn't know this, but I just checked and he sure does have a website, with an entire album available for download. Check him out.

Decidedly not

2009-08-13T23:20:00.003-06:00

Do you ever go through a phase where you find a new hairdo and it works perfectly for a couple of weeks, and then all of a sudden one day you wake up and it's impossible to get it to do that ever again? It may not look that fabulous to you here, but I was having some seriously fabulous and huge messy buns just after my trip to Europe with Joel, and now they are gone. The fabulous hugeness has disappeared, which is decidedly counter-intuitive since my hair is longer and huger now than it has ever been. Sadness.

Speaking of Joel, there is a rumor floating around Kings-land that we are engaged (we are not). Here is a cute picture of him lying on my sidewalk though. Is it wrong that I am amused and almost pleased to know that I am being discussed among the peripheries of my acquaintances? Maybe we are not supposed to admit it when we get pleasure out of such a narcissistic thought. But I just did. Don't judge too harsh.

That's all folks.

Think Big

2009-07-29T23:33:00.003-06:00

Above: Joel and Tash looking conspiratory

JK thinks big when it comes to gift giving. He thinks big a lot of other times too, but I'd say this feature of his personality is really highlighted around holidays such as birthdays and Christmas. You may recall the thoughtful the handcrafted ampersand as an example. Well, this year for my birthday he FLEW MY FRIEND NATASHA HERE FROM SEATTLE TO SPEND THE WEEKEND WITH ME. It was the best conspiracy I have ever benefitted from. He sent us off to spend the day together with his polaroid camera. I PROMISE to scan them in so you can see them. Just not tonight.

Beth and Tash on their way to Capital EX

Beth making out with a corn. And twirling his silk in her fingers.

Ha ha.

London: The Last Europe Installment

2009-07-18T00:36:00.002-06:00

First meal in London: theme song from Notting Hill plays in the empty pub.
Sushi and Starbucks on Shaftsbury Avenue
Letterpress extravaganza at Covent Garden
Fish and chips and disgusting gravy. Also, room temperature beer
British Museum of Natural History Gift Shop: Should I buy a miniature bust of Charles Darwin?
Awww, Joel loves little birds
Flashback to Paris: thirsty pigeon falls into the pond
Hunting for peacocks in Holland Park. We find the most boring peacock of all time
pints of cider over ice at the Churchill Arms. No celebrities spotted.
Hey, remember that trip to Europe when Bethany ate meat salad twice?
Jamie Oliver's restaurant: when the appetizer comes on a cutting board you know it's going to be good
Tate Modern: big table and chairs make me feel like a little kid
Millenium Bridge and St. Paul's Cathedral
20 pence for a toilet. Don't tell Kaeli!
Camden Market feels just like Whyte Ave
Coffee at Flat White in Soho
Harrods London - I mistook it for Buckingham Palace
Krispy Kreme donuts in Harrods? Weird. But tasty.
Cruising on the double decker night bus
Three o'clock in the morning at the bus stop Joel discovers the yogurt has spilled all over his cameras.
It's not white. It's oat.
4:15 a.m.: 30-something man walks past in a plaid suit and orange dress shirt...is it Elton?
Soundtrack of 4:30 a.m.: "Sugarlumps" for JK, "Ain't no Sunshine" for BB
Apparently other people are awake at 4:30. Who knew?
Joel drinks 5-hour energy followed by a latte. All before 4:30 a.m.
Free breakfast on Eurostar first class trains
Joel loves butter
Joel: "I am the world's best traveller! Oh wait a minute...where are my boarding passes?" Bethany: "Over there on the floor of the airport".

Status Updates from Europe continued

2009-07-15T17:12:00.004-06:00

The Paris Installment

Spotted in Paris: man with shoulder bag containing dog with pink highlights in its fur
Falafel in the Jewish quarter involves big beards, black hats, and tasty tasty-ness
Oo! Oo! Look at the dancer on the stairs! She's dancing!
Dancing, singing French man sells umbrellas and other delights
Coffee in France is not as good as coffee in Edmonton. Consolation = finding the archetypal donut in a "Beignet de creme"
At the Pere Lachaise cemetery we see a concerned locfal proceting Oscar Wilde's tombstone from getting any more kisses from tourists with red lipstick
The super sleuths find free toilets at Starbucks in Paris
Role reversal as Joel navigates the appalingly large department store like an old pro and Bethany freaks out because it's too overwhelming
Collette: wealthy hipsters of the world unite!
Lawn chairs for all at the gardens of tuileries palace
Free bathrooms at McDonalds
My Paris shopping consists of one pillowcase
Meet me at the Eiffel Tower. Wear white. All white. And bring your friends.
Man dangles cherries over his ears and yells en francais from behind his fruit stand at the Paris market.
Man dances with a goldfish bowl on his head
National day of music in France is more like cover bands playing "Proud Mary" all over the city. We heard it three times!

The Mont-St-Michel Installment

Not enough seats on the train ride to Mont St Michel. I stand for an hour
Settling nicely into tourist mode, we contemplate purchasing a likeness of the abbey that is made of chocolate
Train ride home from the Mont takes 3 hours. We pass the time by turning up the iPOD volume to MAX and putting the earbuds in Joel's nose to test the vibrations

An interlude in the status updates

2009-07-11T15:09:00.005-06:00

This is a video that we recorded in Annecy, France. We love Kerry!

The Journey to Annecy, France

2009-07-09T22:19:00.005-06:00

How to spot fellow Eurail pass travellers: Beer and bananas at 9 a.m.
Thought we didn't need a reservation for the train. Oops, that'll be 30 extra Euros.
Annecy's got hills like Huemoz, Switz.
"In France, the train rides you!" - Joel Kelly after an exceedingly unpleasant experience at the train station.
After train ticket nightmare, I buy a leather jacket on impulse.
Maxi pain au chocolat is bigger than my head.
Hot hot hot weather by Lake Annecy.
Swimming in the lake. Not all French beaches are nude.
Remember how bad that baking-soda-water was? Bleh. Never buy mineralized water in Europe. Ever.
Death by fondue. Cheese babies are a whole new breed of food babies.
Paddle boating on the lake results in sunburns all around.

Note: the central photo features Joel beginning to digest his cheese baby.

The Germany Installment

2009-07-06T23:05:00.003-06:00

German man on train doesn’t realize Mel speaks fluent German and pontificates to the rest of the people in the train car that we are “American Scientists” and “Obama-sisters”, whatever that means.
It’s fun to push the button on the bread dispenser at the discount market. Fresh pretzels!
Walking on a Roman road in Cologne.
Funf beers please! Joel’s pronunciation of five is misinterpreted as fifteen
The lotus effect was discovered here.
Beethoven's place of origin is in Bonn. No photos allowed so we purchase a miniature bust.
Germany smells so good at night.
12 different kinds of schnitzel!
Kaffe and Kuchen in Bonn!
It's raining in Cologne. We take refuge under a Starbucks patio umbrella.
Going 170 km/h on the autobahn. Nearly get cut off by a slow-moving van.

Status updates are the new way to journal

2009-07-02T15:57:00.002-06:00

After being on hiatus from journaling since early 2006, I have discovered a new way to journal. I was a committed journaller through university, but hadn’t been able to sustain it in the past few years. Sometimes I was fine with that, but other times I really missed having the record of my thoughts and activities.

Before I left for my trip, my mom gave me a little journal peppered with Oscar Wilde quotes, so I packed it and thought I’d try to use it. I find Oscar Wilde’s quotes pretty amusing, and his grave is in the Pere Lachaise cemetery in Paris, so it seemed fitting.

Without meaning to, I started filling the little journal with one-line snapshots of what was happening, and decided that this was a manageable way to capture a few of the noteworthy events of my trip. So, I decided that to share my trip, I would blog some of the ‘status updates’ that I wrote along the way.

I’m starting with my arrival in Paris and trip to Strasbourg to meet up with Joel at the Chemistry conference and will continue on with the other parts of the trip in subsequent posts.

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Was serenaded by French accordion players on the train ride in to Paris.

Ran into trouble – no train reservations are available for Strasbourg and I’ll be four hours late meeting Joel but have no way to get ahold of him to let him know!

Old nun on the train laughs at me when I fumble with my suitcase.

Nun proceeds to pull a rectangular prism wrapped meticulously in foil out of her purse and shake it thoroughly. After several minutes, she opens it carefully and drinks the tetra pack full of chocolate milk that was inside the foil. Strange.

Within the hour, said nun pulls a water bottle wrapped in foil out of her purse and does the same thing. Doubly strange.

Walking to the hotel and run into Joel on the street! He was coming to find me. Fancy meeting you here.

Hey, remember that time we followed a trail of rice on the street and got a free macaron at the end of it?

Man in straw hat feeds us slices of Munster cheese off his knife at the Saturday market in Strasbourg.

Marie Antoinette slept here.

Our answer to the question what does royalty do?: make babies and colossal mistakes.

Leaving the Motherland

2009-06-09T23:17:00.004-06:00

I said goodbye to Natasha tonight. She is moving to Seattle while I am on vacation, so I will come back to an empty city. To celebrate our many years of Edmonton-based friendship, we enjoyed a good meal at Bualong followed by dessert and a trip to Lucky 97 market to buy tamarind candies. Which inevitably resulted in the purchase of a coconut bun. Then we made a trip to Michaels, and (dare I admit it) Walmart. And then it was back to Tash's house where we sang "Onward Christian Soldiers" over and over again while I lay on her bed in a heap of curry and coconut bun.

She is one of my most favourite friends and I will miss her a lot.

And now, I will sign off because tomorrow I am heading to France to meet up with Joel and spend two weeks having fun in France, Germany and London. Love it.

hijacked

2009-06-01T22:43:00.004-06:00

bethany's blog has been hijacked.

best friend ever

2009-05-28T23:36:00.002-06:00

you know you were destined to be friends when you find a pic like this in the family archives. i have no idea who took this photo, but it surfaced in a slideshow at my grandma's funeral last week. my jaw dropped when i saw it. it is my new favourite and i never knew it existed. that's me on the left and my cousin-friend melissa on the right. we are totally bffs. even though her socks don't match in this photo. and she is bald. LOVE YOU MEL! oh, and that's my dad holding us.