friday fixations

{hani zahra} I could listen to this song a million times a day.

{a girl and her cat} These photos are so sweet. Makes me a little teary eyed remembering my kitty.

{food forests} I want this to be here. I mean, I want to live there. Also there are saskatoon berries around Edmonton in the parks if you look for them and I've never seen anyone else but me picking them.

{modern calligraphy} I've got a calligraphy book and pens and I've always kind of dabbled, but I've never found a book or information on doing modern calligraphy which is really the calligraphy I want to learn. Maybe I should take this course...

{forensic beauty} You probably saw this last week, but I think it's equally important to put a spotlight on the devastating beauty issues that men have, too.

{space} It's still pretty cool.

{oat bran} Do you like Cream of Wheat? Like that small little grainy texture in your hot cereals? I LOVE IT and haven't had it for years and then when I was researching foods that are nutritionally dense and filling, I stumbled on oat bran and tried some. It's so good, I've been eating it for breakfast for two weeks now.  I've even had it as a savory breakfast. Kind of like morning risotto with chicken. Super delish and keeps me full all day!

{dino corn cob holders} Good thing these are still in concept mode, cuz I don't eat corn on the cob so they'd be a completely useless purchase for me (but something I'd probably whip out and brag about every chance I got). Maybe someone could make a fancy dinosaur teapot instead?

{diy body wash} I know. I'm so cheap. But I see the tutorials on Pinterest so often, I just couldn't ignore them anymore. My soap turned out a little runnier than her version, but it works just fine and is super smelly. Are bar soaps smellier than body washes? Cuz I've been using Dove body wash for the greater part of my life and this is the Dove-smelliest I've ever been. Not that that's a bad thing. Anyway, I really like the cheapness, so I'll definitely be doing it again (plus I really wanna try the peach bars I spotted at the dollar store next time and I'll also be reducing the water by a half cup).

diys i didn't

{leaf prints} I love the look of these sweet little leaf prints from Design Skool! If there were anything green outside right now, I'd definitely be making up a set. I love how rustic they look and I can't really believe how well they turned out!

{gold rock book ends} I'm definitely a fan of bringing the outdoors in (can anyone have too many pieces of driftwood in their house?) and I'm an even bigger fan of any project that's CHEAP but looks all luxe. Design Love Fest doesn't actually call it a DIY (or make mention of it at all), but, if you have eyes, you can figure it out.

{washi tape power cords} Another from Design Love Fest, I kind of thought this one was a little too easy to even bother calling a DIY and it didn't initially hit me as a, 'WHOA! I have to do that!' project, but then I noticed that we have a lot of Apple power cords around our home and I thought this would be a nice way to tell them apart (also because I hate having to scrounge around in a pile of cords to find the one that I need).

So I immediately did this and I just have a few things to say about it. If you're using washi tape that has a pattern, wrap the tape around the cord just enough to cover it once so the tape doesn't wrap over itself. My tape is semi-transparent and I have polka dot and chevron stripe patterned tape, so as soon as I wrapped another layer around, the pattern became kind of pointless since you could see the first layer of dots through the top layer of dots and they don't match up so it looks strange. But since my tape IS semi-transparent, I could wrap a solid colour around once and get a light green stripe or wrap it around a couple times and get a more vibrant green stripe. That being said (and a day of living with it), you kinda need to wrap the tape around a couple of times to get it to stay. Either my tape's inferior (blast you, Anthropology!) or it's the number of times it's wrapped cuz the pieces of tape that were only wrapped once (the polka dots and chevrons) don't stay taped down (the ends are lifting up). So I'm going to take off those pieces and just go with the solid colour instead. Overall, it's still pretty cute (and it pains me to take the polka dots off!).

{rope shelving} Simple! Cute! That's all I think every time I look at this picture! Again, it doesn't have a set of DIY instructions for you to follow, but come on! Pretty easy, right? I'm thinking weird thoughts right now about putting some on either side of our bed and getting rid of the bedside tables.

{globe light} This is made out of bowls! But it's so pretty, right? I'm not sure if I'm exactly ready to make my own lights (i.e. I have no idea where I'd put one right now), but I'm still really drawn to this. Maybe it's the shade of blue... although I really liked it with either of the original bowl colours, too.

jumping point: black trim

So last weekend, I was sitting around watching The Lucky One (I know I'm a total sap, but I'm also someone who will generally watch anything that's "new" on the Movie Channel) and I completely fell in love with Zac Efron -- psych! I fell in love with the black trim. Specifically, the black trim with teal-blue walls. I've already got paint chips stuck on the walls in my kitchen, and now the black trim thing is making me rethink everything.

Here're some stills of the room that captured my heart:

These are the colours I've been entertaining for the kitchen for a few weeks now. 

I've already got the manta grey in the living room and the bathroom (it's probably my all-time favourite grey). I'm thinking about restless sea for the main kitchen area, around the cabinets. Since I can't change the dark cabinets, I thought painting the wall behind them a dark colour would make them less noticeable. Then I'd use girls' night out on the opposite wall as kind of a feature wall and to add in some brightness.

And, considering the colours I've already chosen (pre-movie), the idea of black trim just works, you know? It really makes sense! But if I paint the trim in the kitchen, I'll have to paint the trim in the living room, and then I'll have to paint the whole main floor and then eventually, I'll have to paint all of it black. Is that crazy? I feel like that's crazy. But given the fact that my trim is a darker shade of mushroom already, I don't feel like it'd be a big stretch to go black. It's just a lot of work!

Maybe it's spring fever but I feel like a need a huge change and that might include overhauling everything in the house! Do you ever feel like that?

friday fixations

{year walk} I started this game by looking over Idle Husband's shoulder and then I sort of took over from there and then it turned into MY game but on his device (he kept telling me to install my own version but I didn't. I liked how it was kind of OUR game but really MY game, if that makes any sense). I think I'm kind of terrible at describing most games because I don't want to give anything away, so I'll just say that this is a spooky puzzle game and the game play is really unique. I definitely haven't seen it before on any app I've ever played (which is what initially intrigued me about it). As a friendly tip: you'll need a piece of paper to write stuff down (which makes me feel very Sherlock Holmes-ish). To be honest, I really hate puzzle games, but, after this game, we discovered I just hate crappy puzzle games.

{play with your food} I thought these Instagram pictures were so adorable, not to mention amazingly well done and so very artistic.

{typeRacer} Have I ever mentioned how much I love typing? I'm kind of obsessed with this.

{stove-top granola} Duh! Granola doesn't have to be such a big huge production! (This is my new favourite foodie blog, aka I've been unsubscribing from foodie blogs lately cuz they make me want to make and eat too many delicious things, but then I went against my rules and added this one anyway). (I also made her 100 calorie cupcakes for my birthday. I had problems with the icing, but the cakes were really good!)

{flock of segels} Hanksy just kills me.

{black and green olives} I used to hate olives unless they were black, sliced, and on a pizza or a sub. So imagine my surprise when I tried some of Lindsay naturals olives (cuz mom has given me half a dozen cans) and immediately loved them. Is it just canned olives or do I officially love all olives now?

{marcel christ} These photos are so gorgeous!

{dansons la capucine} Cats are better in french, non? (Poom!)

diys i didn't

Source: fabricpaperglue.com via i d l e on Pinterest

{gold trimmed geode coasters} I've had a set of geode coasters in my home for a number of years. Actually, they're not really a set. I just picked up four geode slices that were flat and a good size for a cup for next to nothing the last time I was in Drumheller and then I stuck some squares of felt on one side. So a few months ago, I thought I'd jazz them up by applying some gold leaf to the edges as I've been seeing a lot of gilded geode coasters popping up for sale all over the place this year (and last). And then, literally the week I decided to buy some gold leaf, I opened my reader to find this. The edges of these coasters are painted with gold paint which is so much easier than using gold leaf and also less expensive since I already own the paint.

Source: pineconecamp.blogspot.ca via i d l e on Pinterest

{pickled headboard} I guess this one isn't technically a diy that I can follow along with, but look at it. How easy is that to manufacture myself? I've been thinking and dreaming about doing this one for quite some time. Our bedroom is in the most horrible state of affairs. Well, I guess it's not horrible. Most people would probably think it's pretty nice. But I painted it blue a year ago and I've absolutely hated it since. Hated it. Hated it so much I didn't even put any pictures or art back up I was that convinced it had to be repainted. So I have a long list of things that need doing this year to make me happy and one of those is a headboard.

Source: blog.modcloth.com via i d l e on Pinterest

{matte nail polish} I was pretty obsessed with matte nail polish until I couldn't find the matte topcoat I wanted and then I thought this is probably another beauty product I'll have to wait 10 years before Canada gets a hold of, so I let my search die (I know, the internet, but shipping one bottle of nail polish here is crazy stupid expensive. FOR NAIL POLISH). This tutorial looks too good to be true and I haven't tried it yet, but I'm absolutely dying to. That'll be me on the weekend, either squealing with delight or cursing it out. It could really go either way on this one.

Source: grosgrainfabulous.blogspot.com via i d l e on Pinterest

{washi tape bike} We just bought bikes! I mean, a couple months ago, serendipitously, I wandered past a sporting goods store that was having a closing out sale and before I knew it, I was wheeling out two bikes plus all the accessories (locks, helmets, gel seats, the works) for less than the price of one bike sold during peak biking season. Anyway, I keep being drawn to this idea. Not that I really care too much about the style of my bike (and mine is a minty-turquoise blue so I like it), but this is kind of a cute idea. Except that I don't have a hell of a lot of washi tape in my possession and I like to save these things for special... things (washi tape is so expensive to me. Is there some discount washi tape dealer everyone else is using that I don't know about? Cuz I gasp with a look of horror every time I see someone using washi tape to, oh, I don't know, mask off their fingernail for a paint effect or use on the underside of something to hold it down. Um, the point is that it's an artistic tape, isn't it? Am I mental?). So given those facts about me (the cheap facts, not the mental sanity ones), and since my bike's already a pretty colour, I'm thinking I could judiciously use my cute washi tape to cover up the bike's horrible logo and printed details and leave the rest as-is. I think I also should have bought a bell. As a walker, I really appreciate it when bikers give me a ring before they speed by (bells prevent heart attacks!). (Maybe you should consider the mental sanity facts after all.)

april desktop

I swear! This is the last desktop till May!

1920 x 1080

1680 x 1050

iphone/ipod

ipad