good eats: cadbury creme egg cupcakes

New apartment countdown: T-minus 10 days!

Once again, I spent my morning looking over old pics, and came across this little series from last Easter. I had spent 2011 drooling over a recipe from The Cookbook Chronicles, and patiently waiting for my corner store to restock their shelves with Cadbury Crème Eggs—key ingredient.

Finally they appeared and I whipped up a few dozen using Betty Crocker’s chocolate cake mix (the one with the pudding, obviously), popped in some crème eggs and baked. 20 minutes later I iced, topped with micro-mini eggs and voila—my year-long craving was satisfied.

DIY: ikea frames + fabric swatches

After recovering my chairs, I was left with a few fabric swatches that I wasn’t ready to throw away. At the same time, I was also looking for a print to hang above the stove in my kitchen. Despite pinning a handful of Etsy prints (this shop is one of my favourites) nothing really seemed to fit the space—poster-size seemed too big and purchasing a set of smaller prints seemed too expensive.

Then, after a weekend trip to Ikea, I found a set of white gallery frames that fit my budget and the size of leftover swatches I had laying around. One thing led to another and boom—my mismatched swatches found their home and standing in front of the stove became a little less painful. 

White RIBBA frames start at $6.99

Ps...Check out my Pinterest board of random things I want to frame :)

before & after: that time I upholstered a chair

The countdown to my new apartment is in full swing (18 days!), but I can’t help but start to feel a tad nostalgic for my current pad. Hence, I spent my entire day determined to document as much as I possibly could of this little 400-square foot space. I’ve searched every folder in my computer looking for as many first-apartment-snippets as possible, so I won’t forget anything.

My search led me to some old pics of one of my favourite pieces—a set of sturdy old chairs my mom and I found in Barrie’s Habitat for Humanity Restore (find a location here) and I think we managed to barter the set of four down to $20 (from $25…yeesh). I fell in love with them instantly, and had big plans of painting them white and then sanding them down—thankthank god I’m lazy and left the finish as is. But what absolutely, without a doubt needed to be changed, were the cushions.

After what I thought would be an easy peruse through Queen Street for fabric, I was left a little overwhelmed and frustrated by the stacks of fabrics to choose from—I love having options, but I had no idea what I was doing or looking for. Enter, TonicLiving.com—an online fabric shop/dream come true. I spent a few days humming and hawing over patterns and colours, and then purchased a few samples (starting at $2). A few days later, an envelope of generously sized samples arrived, I Hummed and hawed for a few more days, placed my order, and almost three years later I’m still in love. 

The actual upholstery process was easy and really only has three steps: Measure fabric twice, snip and staple (use lots of staples). 

Downloaded the fuzzy picture above from Facebook, circa January 2011. 

good reads: adore home magazine

J'Adore Home. Kinda works, no? Either way, I'm in love with this Aussie-based magazine.

Not only did it convince me that I'm in desperate need of an iPad, but it gave me a pretty hard shove onto that online-magazine-bandwagon. Yes, I still support print magazines (a la Martha Stewart, Style at Home and all the trashy celebrity gossip ones), but Adore Home pulls together the best parts of the internet: one-click access to new products, online shops and international décor trends. Plus, the same features we know, love and expect from print mags: editorial spreads, curated product recommendations, design tips from experts, etc. etc. The tipping point: this little puppy is completely free for readers! Although, it is well stocked with pretty, but totally shopable, advertisements. 

See what they're up to down under in this month's issue of Adore Home

blogroll: 5 faves

 

Spoon Fork Bacon
Stumbled upon this smokin' blog through Pinterest and was immediately smitten with the tasty looking pics, adorable design and the promise of a billion bacon-infused recipes. I'll admit I have yet to make a recipe, but if comfort food were a blog—this would be it.   

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What Katie Ate

Hands down, this blog has the most stunning selection of food styling and photography I have witnessed on the internet. Perfectly imperfect, each shot has a beautifully messy vibe that I wish I could replicate--but unfortunately, I have yet to create a kitchen mess that is anything less than disgusting.  

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Mrs. Lilien 
Mrs. Lilien is the collage queen, whipping together the most whimsical posts packed with colour, typography and products I will never be able to afford. I'm in absolute awe of her design and styling skills—not to mention that classy-fun-and-fabulous persona she's perfected. 

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Smitten Kitchen 

The one food blog I have actually cooked from! ...several times, actually. And every recipe was a definite home run. If it were physically possible, I'd give this blog five thumbs up. The photography looks delicious, the recipes are delicious, and browsing for tonight's dinner is easy as pie.
 

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Oh Joy

Sweet and simple (although I'm sure she pours buckets of blood and sweat into each post), Oh Joy's blog has a really clean and easy-going feel to it. Lover her 'Currently Snacking On...' feature, style boards, outfit sketches and...pretty much everything she posts.