It's Monday, one of the last Monday's of the summer break.  Can you even believe it?

We finished our back to school shopping last week and so now, we will enjoy the rest of the break by sleeping in, spending time at the beach and not having a schedule to live by.  Though I have to admit, after a few cool days, I am kinda excited that fall (my fav season) is right around the corner.

Tomorrow I have a super fun post for you!  Here's a hint:

A group of lovely ladies have organized a Canadian Bloggers Home Tour and were kind enough to invite me to participate!  So be sure to stop by tomorrow to find out more about it!

Have a lovely Monday, friends!

Cheers,

On Repeat: Mind Over Matter by Young The Giant

As I mentioned in Monday's post, hubs and I went to Toronto to see the Kings of Leon perform at the Molson Ampitheatre (it was such an awesome concert!).  One of the bands that opened for them was Young The Giant, who I didn't know I knew until they sang Mind Over Matter.

You guys, I've no joke, had this song playing on repeat ever since.  I'm pretty sure that hubs is ready to kick the speakers out the window (I kid, he'd probably throw them to not injure his foot, haha).  Anyhow, because I'm loving it so much, it's worthy of a post.

Enjoy!

source

Cheers,
 

This Thing Called A Blog - Hello Again!

Hey friends!  I hope you've all enjoyed some amazing weather and family time the past couple of weeks.  After a wonderful break, I'm slowly starting to get back into the swing of things.  I'm coming back with a little bit of a recap of the last couple of weeks, which were truly enjoyable.

We didn't do anything too extreme, we just lived in the moment and took the days as they came. Something that we don't do all that often.  I'm very very very good at being "busy", which can be a terrible fault.  For the first time in a really long time, I felt relaxed, which explains the extended break.  We cherished some really great family time and though I need to get back to blogging, the return will be slow, just until the kids go back to school.

With that, a little recap of the past couple of weeks (all photos from instagram):

 staircase gallery wall in progress. something's not right, need to figure out what it is, but it's getting there. Ikea frames found here.

there were a lot of late starts and pj days...and yes, coffee IS always a good idea, Chapters!

I will be planting plenty more hydrangea bushes in our yards, I couldn't stop bringing the outdoors in!

an absolutely lovely free printable from Paperfelt. Go get it!

framing the kids' art is high on my priority list lately, love it so

new favourite spray paint colour by Rustoleum - Winter Grey (the frame)

pillows were sewn (fabric from Tonic Living)

beautiful, natural moments....orchids flowers are pretty even when they are on their way out

Love. That is all. Get your SS Printshop print here.

We had a few long days, so we made cinnamon rolls

We were so excited to have this guy back home, after a month away. Date night to see Kings of Leon in Toronto

I attempted skim boarding for the first time. Oh man, so fun! 

Uno on the patio....moments like these are why it took me so long to come back.

And moments like these. Easing into the day, such a treat that I'm so thankful for.

We celebrated three birthdays!  July is birthday month in our house.

And this is why it takes me so long to unload the dishwasher. I'm easily distracted! Bicycle print available here.

I've got some fun posts coming up, can't wait to share them with you!  I will get back to my regular posting schedule in Sept, but there will be posts between now and then.

What have you been up to?

Cheers,

Vacation Time and A BBQ Summer Treat, S'Mores!

Oh yes, I've decided that I need to take a vacation.  As much as I love blogging, I am in desperate need of a break.  I'm so thankful to have the ability to step away for a couple of weeks.  I really want to enjoy a few weeks with the family, so I've decided to take the last two weeks of July off to do just that.

I will still be on Instagram and Twitter, but there won't be any blog posts.

Before I go, I wanted to share a delicious treat that we made last week on the BBQ!

Now, BBQ s'mores aren't anything new, but we'd never tried them before, we've only ever made them over a fire.  We were pleasantly surprised by how easy it was to make them on the BBQ and how they tasted just like the real thing!  And just as messy (but that's part of the fun, right?!).

At first we had the BBQ on low heat, but it wasn't working so well (or fast enough I suppose!) so we cranked the heat to high and we were in business!

We placed some foil on the BBQ and then layered the s'mores on top of it (we like to use Jersey Milk chocolate bars).  We didn't throw the top cookie on until the marshmallows and chocolate started to melt.

After the marshmallows and chocolate melted enough, we turned off the heat, added the top cookie and flipped over the s'mores, one by one for a little bit.

We seriously had so much fun, who knew making s'mores on the BBQ would be such a blast!

I hope you all enjoy the rest of July and looking forward to coming back at the beginning of August all refreshed!  Please don't go anywhere ;)

Be sure to follow along on Instagram and Twitter while I'm away from the blog.

Cheers,

Art in The Kids Bathroom and A Fun Feature!

Hello! First off, today you can find me over at Tiffany's blog chatting about our living room coffee table!  She's started a new series and I'm thrilled to have been invited to take part!  You can find the post here.  Take some time to look around Tiffany's blog, she's so unbelievably talented and has amazing taste.  You'll love what she's done to her place!

Onto the kids bathroom.  This is a project that I've been wanting to finish for while.  I've had the prints for some time, but needed to get the frames and just kept putting it off.

I finally picked up a couple from Walmart and got to work!

Our kids are super silly, they are so crazy, so I wanted to have some fun art in their bathroom.  I chose to go with black and white and went with prints that made me think of them.

The "Hello" print by Jen Ramos used to be in our kitchen.  The kids have always loved it and enjoy reading "hello" in all of the different languages, so I decided to move it upstairs. (unfortunately it's no longer available).

 
Shae's "I love you this much" print speaks for itself.  It makes me think of someone giving a person a huge, tight squeeze, letting them know just how much they are loved, so it was a must!

Stephanie's "Work It" print reminds of kiddo 2.  He has an awesome pair of glasses that one of his uncles gave him.  Fluorescent orange bands, super dark black lenses, they are so him and so is this print.

I'm not sure why, but I just envisioned them hanging with the bottoms all lined up and I'm so happy with how it all turned out!  That being said, the towel rack may need to go.  I used 3M velcro command strips hoping that they would hold up better to potential bumps than a nail, keeping them from falling, but kids will be kids and the rack may need to move (which wouldnt' be too upsetting since I could then center it).

All done!  Another to-do checked off the list!

Cheers,

Canadian Living August Cover Recipe - Blueberry Cornmeal Cobbler

I've got to say that I kinda love that it's summer and we are testing out all of these delicious summer time recipes!  So much fun!

Okay, it's time for the Canadian Living August Cover Recipe: Blueberry Cornmeal Cobbler.  Again, this was something that I'd never made before.  Truth be told, I'm not much of a fan of baked blueberries, I find the taste just isn't for me.  So I was interested to see how I'd feel about this dessert.

Turns out, baked blueberries are baked blueberries, though I am still not a huge fan, the rest of the family devoured and I mean devoured this easy to make dessert!  I did however thoroughly enjoy the biscuit topping....oh yes!  Crispy and tasty!

The dessert was really simple to make and required few steps.

I didn't have any ramekin dishes, so I just used a square baking dish, which worked out well.  Just make sure that you follow the directions and drop the dough evenly because it will cook that way, essentially making servings.

The dough itself was simple to make by hand.  Easy peasy!

After placing the biscuit topping evenly on the blueberries (or as even as you can get it!) you finish it off by sprinkling the entire dessert with the leftover cornmeal.  Then into the oven it goes for around 40 mins (I had to take it out before 40 mins, otherwise we would have had an extra crispy dessert on our hands!).

Serious baked perfection here!

I chose to serve it with some whipped cream, but I'm sure that vanilla ice-cream would have tasted just as good!

Even though I wasn't a huge fan of the blueberries, I would make this again because it did go over so well with the rest of the family and it was easy to make.  Perhaps I'd try using a different fruit base.  Either way, this recipe is a keeper!

You can find the recipe here and you can read what other bloggers thought about the recipe here!  Let me know if you give it a go!

Cheers,

*sponsored post but opinions are completely my own

Happy Friday - Enjoy The Simple Things

Hey, friends.  Happy Friday!

I hope you all enjoyed a lovely week and that you also enjoyed reading about our inspiring House Rules vinyl wall decal from Urban Walls.  I truly love it.

Wishing you all a fantastic weekend and hoping that you will find the time to enjoy the simple moments that life has to offer.  Morning coffee on the deck, crafting, reading a book, working in the garden, playing with sidewalk chalk, going for after dinner family walks, throwing rocks in the lake.  Those little moments are to be cherished.

we escaped the city and enjoyed a beautiful day at our friend's cottage.  exactly what we needed #thankful

A few bits and pieces before I sign off for the weekend:

The lovely Sarah Richardson has launched a Hallmark Collection and it's a beauty!  You can read all about here it here on her site and you can also read a wonderful interview here on Alex's blog

Chapters Indigo is having one heck of a sale right now and I'm having such a hard time resisting buying a slew of items for our home.  Check it out here.

Lastly, the gorgeous Jillian Harris has just launched a clothing collection with Privilege Clothing!  So exciting!

Cheers,

Main Floor Hallway Update! Hint: Urban Walls!

You guys, I'm so unbelievably happy to have finally found something to put on a wall in our main floor hallway that I've tried and tried and tried to fill.

Enter: Urban Walls.  First off, I adore Danielle, who is the founder of this fantastic vinyl wall decal shop based out of Vancouver.  This fun and beautiful mama is helping us add character and personality to our homes with ease!

I'm a huge fan of quotes.  Always finding strength from reading them and am completely inspired by the power of positive words.  So needless to say, when I saw the House Rules decal I threw it into my online cart.  I love that it makes our house feel more like a home and totally feel like it was meant for this wall.

I ended up needing hubs help to put the decal up on the wall.  After taping it in place, hubs slowly removed the backing while I pressed the decal onto the wall by gliding a meter stick along the entire piece.

After that, I used a credit card to rub each letter onto the wall.  I ended up going over each letter a few times and in different directions to ensure that it adhered to the wall properly.

After we removed the top sheet, we got this:

I can't even begin to tell you just how much I love it.  The best part is how much the kids love it too!  Kiddo 2 is always reading them out loud and each time he gets a kick out of the last rule.  That will probably be the only one that he remembers, ha!

I decided to go with white because I wanted it to blend in, mission accomplished!  You can find the decal here.

I love that we've got some momentum going after a few months of not getting much done around the house.  My next job is tackling the gallery wall up the staircase.  I have five IKEA Virserum frames that I want to fill with family photos, of course, I shall share the results with you once they are all up!

Cheers,