Elle Dubs' Strawberry Social

SO LONG 2011 (AND 2 PROJECTS IN THE CAN)

2012-01-01T13:11:00.003-05:00

Not much posting went on in 2011.... it was a pretty busy year, here. Finally finished the cross stitched stocking... just in time for our daughter Frida to arrive on December 15th! So much can change in one measly year...

2010 Christmas Cards

2011-01-30T14:13:00.002-05:00

These were my Christmas cards for this past season. Martha paper punch with vintage wrapping paper and/or Anthropologie catalogue images of white birch trees, and rubber stamps, and gold pen! Easy peasy, and liked how each one was a little different.

Cross Stitch Stocking Project

2010-11-10T08:33:00.003-05:00

Dudes... I have spent well over 30 hours on this I would say. Cross stitch is a time sucker. But the results are so worth it, so I keep doing it.

I have started this stocking to give to a future progeny at some point; a child that in no way exists yet but I am hopeful that when I do eventually become pregnant, have a kid, send it to high school and listen to it tell me that my music is "lame and old fashioned" or whatever kids in the future will say, that the stocking may get done. And then the child will be so in awe and grateful that he or she will sit down with me, look at the stocking lovingly, and we will listen to Sonic Youth together and eat Christmas shortbread. That'll shut 'em up.

Madewell tank make me swoon

2010-11-04T21:27:00.003-04:00

Want it, but it would look weird on me. Sads. Why am I so sequin-obsessed?

I cooked a turkey

2010-10-30T11:18:00.003-04:00

It wasn't massive (9 lbs or so) and the brining process definitely helped make it tasty (lots of sugar, salt, thyme, sage, apple, celery, carrot, onion, bay leaf etc, for 24 hours sitting in the fridge, marinating the turkey). But it really is a little daunting when you keep brushing past the oven and the too-sensitive knob keeps turning the temp down to 200F. And you are trying to time the cooking with the 4 sides one must make with a dinner such as this. I must salute my aunts and grandmothers for their turkey-making for up to 20+ people over the years, and to my in-laws for being my guinea pigs for my very first one! (And to my vegetarian hubs for not vocally getting grossed-out by the carcass- because they are weird). All that said, I look forward to doing it again!

Mrs Press

2010-10-08T11:18:00.004-04:00

Mrs Press is Clare Press of Australia, a designer and blogger who, I believe, makes my dream clothes; every single piece I would wear, if I had the money and appropriate places to go. I have been looking for a perfect sequin bolero for a while, and this one would be in my closet by now if it were about 500$ cheaper, oy. The "Mia" blouse, pictured left, reminds me of something Katherine Hepburn might have worn in Bringing Up Baby. Maybe a little cuckoo for day to day, but so gorgeous. (I tried to find a pic of Katherine Hepburn's totally insane hat in that movie- like two ribbons cascading down from the top of her head. Hard to describe, but seriously, the craziest headgear ever. If you haven't seen the movie, you should. Delightful.)

TERRORDOME!

2010-09-30T08:41:00.002-04:00

Well, actually, terrarium, made with old mason jars and plants from the cottage. Terrordome sounds more exciting.

Cloth Napkins

2010-09-27T08:45:00.006-04:00

One of the first projects I knew I wanted to undertake for the wedding was cloth napkins for the tables. I settled on using the several colours from our invites and found gingham fabrics in different sizes of checks that matched as the main focus for the settings. I thought it would be easy enough to find a lot of different colours in a decent weight of cotton fabric, but it was not the case. Yellow was almost impossible- I ended up buying 3 yards from someone in Wisconsin on Ebay. But I was very happy with what I ended up finding, colour-wise, in the end.

I tried making 6 napkins at first, to get a real sense of how long it would take. After washing (pre-shrinking) the fabric, then ironing it, cutting it, and hemming 6 napkins, I was a little worried. The hemming especially took a very long time- about 20 minutes a piece using an iron and double fold. Oy. Could I really make 140 in this way?

Then my gorgeous and talented friend Reva (skona life) who is a proud owner of a serger (remember those crazy-looking contraptions from home ec that cut and sewed fabric at the same time to create easy and solid seams?) suggested I use it if I wanted to make quick(ish) work of them . That is exactly what I did and was very happy with the process (so fast!) and results (professional-looking seam without any bulk). The mix of bright colours really popped and looked casual and pretty.

Pickles!!

2010-09-24T09:52:00.000-04:00

So in the thick of my and K' coming up with more and more insane projects to do for the wedding, one came to mind that had to be done- pickles for all the tables. Homemade pickles are summer- and as we wanted an airy, casual, almost (but not quite) picnic-y feel, we decided to make one for each table.

My friend hooked us up with a vegetable guy in Kensington Market whom he uses to supply his restaurant, and we bought a bushel of pickling cucumbers. (Dudes- it turns out a bushel is a ****load.) We easily made 20 jars, could have made 8 more at least. Cucumber salad was on the menu for a while.

So that we could use pretty swingtop Ikea jars that could not be heat processed, we made refrigerator pickles- ones that stay pretty crunchy because they are never heated. After about 3 weeks I tried them- too mustardy and not nearly garlickey or dill-y for my liking. So I took them all out and added about a clove a piece and a handful of dill. They went over like gangbusters.

Now my mom, who initially thought we were crazy for taking them on, got really into it when she pictured them on the tables of our quaint little venue. She then insisted that she find us antique pickle forks for each jar at the tables. My mom ended up using Ebay for this- her first foray- and it was adorable how into it she got. She found some insanely cool and gorgeous ones, from Queens, England and even Japan. Very glad we made them, but also glad to have the lower shelf of our fridge back now.

Invites

2010-09-23T12:20:00.000-04:00

Rubber stamping is one of my favorite nerdy pastimes as anyone who knows me can attest to. Ever since I was a kid I loved them- it's like being your own little printing press.

When it came to our wedding invitations, there was no question we would make them. So over a week we chipped-away at them diligently. I made the invitations, and K made the inserts- the location directions and map, hotel info etc.

We used a printer to print our names, and I bought the rubber stamp pad on Ebay of the two horseshoes, and then had it mounted super cheap at Speedy Rubber Stamps on Queen east. First, the image was stamped, then embossed with the heat embossing method. Then I did the side flower garlands one colour at a time. K used Illustrator to make the inserts- I think they looked amazing. All in all, we took a good week of evenings to do execute these (not including the time it took to work out the design).

For the reply card, we replicated one of the better invite specimens and made a postcard, using an oldtimey postcard template from good ol' Martha on the reverse. I gotta say, getting reply cards in themail is very exciting- I miss mail!

Easy-as-anything cake topper

2010-09-22T10:52:00.000-04:00

My very talented sister Julia and I have had a long standing pact that when I got married, she would make my wedding cake. This may sound like folly, but she just so happens to thoroughly enjoy making cakes and was no stranger to fondant work. So she made a wonderful chocolate cake with minty frosting between the layers. Just beautiful.

Now topper-wise, Etsy has all kinds of adorable, customizable options, where your likeness can be made into peg figures, or your wedding ensembles painted onto squirrel figurines or (my favorite) a little bust of a tree trunk has your names or initials "scratched" into it. As the wedding got closer, my attention moved away from figuring-out the cake topper to important things like schedules, catering, and booze numbers. (It should have been about what hairstyle I should have, but I will tell you that story later).

A trip to my not-so-local Michaels produced a very simple, pretty and yes, DIY cake topper. And it cost about a buck fifty.

3 wooden pieces, an L, K and a heart, spray painted with blue and red Krylon that we already owned and then each piece was hot glued onto its own wooden coffee stir stick. I was very happy with the results!

This Summer

2010-09-18T16:29:00.000-04:00

... was amazing and busy and I am now a Mrs.! Our wedding was more or less of the DIY variety (though I am loathe to use that term when I can avoid it) and we had a lot of help from amazing friends and professionals. I will be detailing some of our projects on here in the weeks ahead. Hope your summers have all been wonderful...

Andwabisabi!

2010-03-14T10:09:00.000-04:00

Oooooodles of cool dude cross stitch patterns, some would be great beginner projects, some nice and big with images you would probably want on your wall. This one is called Dream City. you can find the store here on Etsy. Finally cross stitch patterns worthy of our future Rheumatoid Arthritis!

Vanilla Experiment

2010-01-26T09:59:00.000-05:00

I had a couple vanilla beans sitting in my cupboard. Though fancy recipes often call for whole vanilla beans, it just seems like such a waste to use a vanilla bean once and then toss it. My friend told me how easy it was to make your own extract, and cheaper than buying, so I thought I would try it. Basically, you sterilize a jar and fill it with vodka (or rum if you want that kind of taste in your baking) and then for every couple ounces I think, you use one bean. Here I have a baby food jar with two little guys. Now I wait..... 2 months.

But in my online research, I found out some crazy stuff about vanilla. For one, imitation extract comes from the byproducts of the paper industry. Without knowing the exact details, that sounds super disgusting. And at one time, 60% of the world's imitation extract came from Ontario, where there is such a big pulp and paper industry. Also, vanillin is not found solely in the vanilla bean (which is from a type of orchid), it is a chemical compound that can be made artificially (ie; from wood) and can occur naturally in things like wine if they have been in certain types of wood under the right conditions (Yellow Tail Shiraz, anyone?)

Hey Sailor!

2010-01-15T09:34:00.000-05:00

Not been terribly inspired by any Spring looks for 2010- don't know if that is due to my status as a student and so I feel pickier about what to spend on, or if I look at too many fashion blogs, but I loves this top from Anthro tons...

Gorgeous Kitchenware

2010-01-15T08:31:00.000-05:00

I wish I lived-in Sweden or at the very least understood the Swedish that could explain to me where to get these gorgeously patterned items from retailer Rorstrand. The colours are killing me!

Gift for the in-laws

2010-01-03T11:47:00.000-05:00

Fun little project- maybe my last non-wedding project for the next few months....

Rifle Paper Co. (drool)

2009-11-24T09:48:00.000-05:00

If I were someone who didn't have the need to make her own Christmas cards, I would buy these in a heartbeat. On another note, how awesome would having your own stationary company be??? Man.

Rifle Paper Co.

Constellation Cross Stitch Project

2009-06-25T09:54:00.000-04:00

Great beginner cross stitch project from MiniatureRhino at Etsy. Also happens to be gorrrrgeous and does not contain kittens sleeping or anything.

xoxo

2009-02-14T16:46:00.000-05:00

Is this a problem?

2009-01-19T15:14:00.001-05:00

Do you see a common thread here with a chunk of my wardrobe? Why yes, I do like fabrics with 80% or more natural fibres. But that's not it. These are most of my items with a striped pattern. Have been obsessed for years. Am I obsessed, or am I just 1/16th gnome or something?

Balloons

2009-01-12T21:34:00.000-05:00

After seeing the engagement photos of some random couple with a giant pink balloon floating around the blogosphere, I found myself wishing I had a big bunch of balloons, too. But in warmer weather. And maybe as a blouse???

Glitter Stamping

2009-01-12T10:39:00.002-05:00

I made a Boxing Week stop at a couple suburban Michael's craft stores, as there are none in the downtown Toronto region. I always go straight to the Martha Stewart section, because she comes up with some pretty awesome stuff. I found this to add to my arsenal of stamping supplies- a glitter stamping starter kit! Here is the gyst:

You have a clear block upon which you put your "stamp", a rubber image that clings to the block. Then you put some glue on the glue pad, press the stamp into the pad, and "stamp" your chosen surface. Then you sprinkle it with glitter, tap it off, and you have a bedazzled whatever. The glue pad gets crusty pretty fast, so I tried just putting a little glue on the stamp with my finger, which works for the less-detailed stamps. There are sparkles all over my living room, though. Have to find a way to not make my house into a Bob Mackie dress.

POLYVORE!

2009-01-07T10:38:00.001-05:00

The weirdest website thing ever. And, obviously, just some free market research for several industries. But so fun. Basically, you make collages. Usually with clothing and "inspirations". More or less you make your own fashion editorial pages. You can take images of products or other things you search for (by colour) or upload your own. But once they're uploaded, they are usable by the entire Polyvore community, so you may or may not want to use pics of yourself. Check out my first collage (needs more detail- but this one was all about my fantasy marching band costume). I thought it would be a totally dumb activity, but this thing is fuuuun. Maybe once I'm in school tomorrow it will lose its lustre...

My marching band

Christmas Cards, Finished

2008-12-14T12:06:00.003-05:00

So happy with the results. The 1D-ness of rubber stamped images can sometimes look a little blah, so I added globs of kids school glue over a few of the snowflakes and then sprinkled some of the classiest sparkles I had. Gave the cards much more character.

I love the idea of embossing as technique to give rubber stamped images a second dimension, something I learned a little about in New York last year at the amazing store The Ink Pad, but it feels like that sort of stuff is a slippery slope to old lady scrapbook country, a place I refuse to visit.

Harbourfront Swedish Christmas Bazaar

2008-12-11T12:41:00.004-05:00

For any Christmas-o-phile, any Scandinavian Christmas festival is going to be chock-full of delights. This year's Swedish Christmas bazaar at Harbourfront was my first, and it was everything I hoped for. 3$ cups of the best glogg (mulled wine) I have ever had (maybe some of the strongest, too!) ginger snaps to DIE for, 4 10ft tables lined-up, filled with homemade gnome and elf ornaments, a huge food and candy table, a cafeteria with open-faced sandwiches and meatballs with lingonberries. Yup, that's what I'm into.

The place was packed, I mean packed, and LQ, Stoobes, Reva, Justy and I were there for 3 hours somehow. We were just about to leave, after a second look at the marketplace room, when the lights started to dim and a procession of little girls in white were led in by their choirmaster to perform songs for the St. Lucia pageant. Adorable. Made me pine for my choral days as a kid...

Rubber Stamp Heaven

2008-12-04T08:37:00.001-05:00

I have always loved rubber stamping since I was a kid. I guess I love the permanence of them; that you can reproduce an image over and over, however you like, whatever colour you like. I saw this set by Yellow Owl Workshop on a couple design blogs, and had to have it to make this year's Christmas cards. A little pricey, so I used my Paypal dollars from Ebay sales. Just got them yesterday- so excited. They also have for sale a gorrrrgeous nautical set to die for. If you like stamps, that is.

NEW NEKO DEETS!

2008-12-03T15:31:00.001-05:00

The title of the new Neko Case record (Middle Cyclone), slated to be released by Anti March 3rd, already has its cover, and the recording finished recently here in Toronto. Pitchfork claims that there are 15 new songs. As always, I am so very excited. Not sure what to make of the cover; typical, if not a little bit sillier imagery. Wonder if the fame from Fox Confessor will have changed much of her songwriting. Can't wait!

Vintage Christmas Glassware

2008-12-03T15:22:00.003-05:00

Found these gorgeous numbers, depicting the 12 days of Christmas, at the Sally Ann in Parkdale. Sadly, only 6 of the 12 days could be found. The maids-a-milking is a very pretty one... Love old glassware like this. Heavy duty glass, and images that are beautifully detailed, coloured and quite permanent.

Jack-o-lanterns on Sorauren

2008-11-02T19:45:00.004-05:00

Last night for the third year in a row I attended the annual November 1st jack-o-lantern viewing at Sorauren Park in the Roncesvalles Village area. Everyone in the neighbourhood (seriously) drops off their creation from the night before, and lines them up around the park for a look- it is quite spectacular. The estimate for this year was that there were over 1000 jack-o-lanterns, some were sitting three deep the turnout was so great. Some kids got a second crack at wearing their costume, and when we left at 9pm, the pumpkins were still trickling-in.

There were some prevailing themes, lots of political and topical pumpkins. I missed taking a photo of the one that simply said "Melamine" but here are some images of other buzzed about jack-o-lanterns...

Another November, Another H & M Designer Collection

2008-10-25T11:19:00.000-04:00

Thank goodness this Rei Kawakubo Comme des Garcons collection holds little that I covet, unlike the Viktor and Rolf collection of 2006, and the Stella McCartney collection from 2005.

LQ took the hit for the Stella as I couldn't get out of work the day it was released to select downtown H&M locations. There was a call, with LQ breathlessly giving me a play by play. I heard her laughing and the describing of a sort of shopping pandemonium that I only guess would rival that of the Thanksgiving weekend in the States. I put in an order with her, but everything had been picked-clean. I got a lovely souvenir hanger, though...

Then there was the Viktor and Rolf debacle of 2006. I was working across the street from the Eaton Centre when the collection "dropped", and thought I would stroll on over a little after 10 and pick up a couple things I had picked-out online. I walked into the store and there weren't that many people- I was sure I would pluck something good. But all that was left were some size 14 wedding dresses hanging on the wall. The store had been pillaged! I walked-around, looking for discards around the store- it was a warzone in there. Women were working in twos; one would gard a pile of clothing for the companion to try on right there in the middle of the store by blanketing it with her body (I saw more than one instance of this) and then they would switch. When they were finished, they left what wasn't being purchsed for the carrion feeders to collect. I, sadly, became a vulture that day, and impatiently waited around for the fashion gluttons to finish trying everything on already so that I could find the blouse I so wanted. Instead, after asking a couple groups if they were finished, I walked right out of the store, embarrased of my mania.

A couple weeks later, upon entering the uptown H&M, I noticed a large rack with a bunch of returned items- bad or impulsive choices made by a fashion-maddened crowd. I picked-up one great piece, notthe one I reaaaaally wanted, in my size, and have worn it about three times. Checking out the upcoming Comme Des Garcons collection, I'm not sure I will be doing anything heroic for this...

SOUTHERN BBQ

2008-10-20T09:32:00.002-04:00

On my way to London in August, I had a layover in Charlotte, North Carolina. Having a strange affinity for all things southern (well, probably mostly just the food) I was pretty excited to have a meal for the first time in the south- even if it was just at the airport. After some pre-trip research, I hit Brookwood Farms for a pulled pork sandwich and hopefully grits. Their grits looked mushy (I have had them before here in Toronto- they're like a corn paste, sort of, but fluffy) so I opted for the side of greens and the battered and deep fried okra. Everything was soooo delicious,
especially the complimentary deep fried pickle... No, no... I swear this was really good.

SQUASH

2008-10-19T19:19:00.000-04:00

Back in the day (about 20 years ago, maybe?) this picture of me, my sis and my cousin Chris was taken at our grandparent's house in Belleville, with a giant squash grown by my grandma. We were all on our way to Thanksgiving dinner last week, and made a pitstop at Campbell's Orchard in Prince Edward County. We decided to re-stage the photo with one of their pathetically small squashes. My b-boy stance is slightly diminished, and Chris seems to look way more excited to be around the squash, but all in all, it is pretty accurate.

AUTUMN GNOMES

2008-10-10T12:22:00.000-04:00

After sifting through yet more things in the spare room of the new(ish) place, I came across this little doll-making kit given to me by a co-worker almost 3 years ago. I get into "craft mode" starting at about this time of year, and so I thought it would be a great little project for the week, that would make me feel less guilty about sitting in front of Iron Chef so much. Turns out, it only took about 4 hours of work at most, and the results are so cute! I have never made little dolls before- but these European-designed guys (either Dutch or Scandinavian- not sure) are super awesome. I took a look at the company name on the leaflet supplied, and it said Atelier Pippilotte. When Googled, I came across this store in BC that has loads of adorable and super different craft kits like this one. Where do I get stuff like this in the East???

Here is the website where doll kits like this one can be found:
http://beardancecrafts.com/