Happy new year!

Happy new year, friends! Hope all who celebrate December holidays had a lovely time with friends and family.

Have you made any new years' resolutions? Do you do that sort of thing? I usually don't but this year I've made a few. Mostly boring stuff like decluttering and getting my life more organized at home. I know, yawn, right?

But I've also started a little project for the year! I've jumped onto the "picture a day/365 project" bandwagon. This means I'll be taking a picture a day for the whole darn year or whenever I decide this project is far too tedious to continue. Today is Day 3 and I'm going strong. Here's what I've got so far.....

Day 1/365
I started 2011 by painting my nails on New Year's Day. Base coat of black and then a couple of coats of a deep, dark red (Revlon's Vixen) on top. Makes me feel dangerous and a bit like an Olsen twin.

2/365
A blurry but sweet picture of Noah taken at the dinner table. He has perfected the art of looking adorable in hopes of getting a few table scraps. It worked. He got some brocolli.


3/365
Made the yummiest stew tonight from a recipe found on the Gluttonous Vegan blog. I had to sub in rapini instead of nappa cabbage or kale because it's slim pickin's in the green aisle of the grocery store the last few days. I think it's because there's a big recall on kale and other veggies because of salmonella. This was super yummy but rapini has a bit of a strong taste for this dish. Will definitely make it again but next time with kale (minus the salmonella).

Is anyone else taking part in the 365 challenge? Leave a comment with a link so I can check out your pictures!

PS. If you're interested, I've created a set for all of my daily pictures over on my flickr.

noah considers writing a novel

recently paul borrowed this issue of national geographic from the library. in the article about animal minds, it talks about a border collie named betsy who has a vocabulary of over 300 words! so over breakfast on saturday, paul & i started a list of how many words & phrases our little noah understands. we've been adding to it as we think of more but this is what we're up to so far. (oh, by the way, we only listed the word/phrase if he reacts to it in a predictable way. very scientific!)

*in no particular order*
1. stay
2. cookie
3. park
4. kibble
5. Noah
6. grandma
7. grandpa
8. car ride
9. later
10. hungry
11. outside
12. go (*see note below)
13. sit
14. come
15. nap-time
16. bedtime
17. walk
18. "go get the ball", "where's the ball?"
19. fetch
20. Patrick (neighbour)
21. Bettina (neighbour)
22. Portia (neighbour's dog)
23. Meg (another neighbour)
24. good boy
25. high five
26. shake a paw
27. other paw
28. down
29. "go get it"
30. enough
31. dinner
32. away
33. bed
34. okay
35. mommy
36. daddy
37. chair; "go to your chair"
38. no
39. bath-time
40. kitty cat
41. doggie
42. "go say hi"
43. bone
44. gentle
45. "drop it"
46. pill-time

*note: he actually knows 2 different meanings to this word and can figure it out based on the context. "go" when in the backyard means "go to the bathroom", while "go" at the park means "go run around and get your sillies out".

i'm willing to bet if you made a list for your pet you'd be totally surprised how many words he/she knows. i estimated 25 words for noah before we started this list!

the fur was flying

the things we won't do for our fur kids.

we used to take noah to a groomer every 4 months or so. a really lovely woman who always did such a nice job. but here's the thing: noah is such a sensitive little guy that he would come back from the doggy salon acting freaky. at first it would last a few days but then it would start lasting 7 or 8 days before he got back to normal. it was really upsetting for all of us.

in the fall, we decided to cut his hair ourselves. yep, DIY baby! the doggy equivalent of putting a bowl on his head!

on sunday noah got a shampoo and haircut. the 3 of us were locked in the bathroom for 3 whole hours! but only one of us got lots of cookies.....


we cut off enough hair to make another dog!

and after it was all over:

now we have a clipped (and very happy) poochie!

snowed in

toronto got totally pummelled by a massive storm today. this is the view of our street taken this afternoon.

needless to say, it was the perfect excuse to stay inside, drink tea & hot chocolate, and take a mid-afternoon nap. we did, however, have to brave the elements to dig out the car so i could get to work tomorrow morning. i can't remember the last time i've seen so much snow!

and what blog post about a storm would be complete without a picture of noah looking cute with a snowy face!?

awwwww.....

'bye summer

it's monday night and sadly i have to go to bed in a couple of hours because it's back to work tomorrow morning. time to become re-aquainted with the 6 am alarm clock. (grumble grumble...)

it's been an awesome two months though. probably one of my best summers yet. and although i didn't get to everything on my list, i do feel like i made the most of each day and accomplished a whole lot. i actually started to exercise on a regular basis (HUGE for me!) by swimming laps at the olympic pool closeby. i'm hoping to keep up the momentum even after going back to work by pledging to swim a couple of times a week (or more) at an indoor pool. i'm hoping that if i go straight from work, i'll actually stick with it.

so many other good things about the summer: lots of bonding with noah on walks and trips to the beach & park, reading more than i have in years, getting a crazy good start on my jewellery production for the "one of a kind show", experiencing real homemade ice-cream at ed's, lots of time with my honey on his weeks off, tuesday visits to the farmers' market and weekly tea time afterwards with kim. so much more but of course i'm forgetting it all now....

i ended my vacation today almost exactly how i started it in july. i took noah down to cherry beach for a romp on the off-leash trail and some time on the sand by the water. not quite as long as at the beginning of my summer: of course i had lots of things on my mind (getting back to work stuff) and i couldn't relax quite the same way. but it was a great way to say goodbye to my favourite season.

i took the top picture while on the trail at cherry beach this afternoon. and here's noah reluctantly sitting still amongst the tall grasses there. it's going to be a weird adjustment for him too when mommy leaves to go to work in the morning.


hope you all had a lovely labour day weekend!

it's monday

goodies in the mail from my cousin & her hubby.


productive time in the studio.


bellyrubs on the beach.

all in all, a pretty good start to the week!

i luv farmers

i was an early riser again today. 7:00am. why is it so easy to wake up bright and early when i'm on vacation but as soon as i have to go back to work i drag my sorry ass out of bed only after two alarms have gone off?

today i was motivated by the farmers' market. what a great way to start the day...shopping for fresh, local produce and handing your money directly to the farmer who grew it all!

i was so excited by all of the lovely fruits & veggies that i went a little crazy. i'm most excited by the corn on the cob (because i loooove corn on the cob), the strawberries (because i thought the ontario season was over so it was a lovely surprise!), and the yellow watermelon (because the woman gave me a sample and it was the sweetest melon i'd ever tasted!)

after the market, i drove out to mississauga to pick up my camera that was finally fixed. i'm so happy to have it again!

on to the grocery store to pick up a few groceries for the week.

back home for a quick lunch.

then to the dog park to take noah for a walk.


he had a fun time running about and sniffing just about every square inch of the grass. he didn't want to sit still for a photo so the picture is a little fuzzy but i like it because it looks like he's laughing.