the flour pot bakery

I am blogging at 1am which may indicate that my life is slightly insane.   Between working, teaching yoga, studying for night school and renovating, my creative outlet, blogging, has taken a bit of a back seat.  (not happy about this one bit).  I have another week or two before things at the condo wrap up for good and I get my weekends back to explore the blogsphere and share my inspirations.  What’s worse, I didn’t even get to blog about my favourite holiday, Thanksgiving and blog about my birthday this past week. 

Just to let you know that I haven’t completely disappeared off the map, here is a sweet piece of branding that I saw posted on the blog, frolic that was in turn posted on Truly Smitten.

I saw it in my half sleepy state and was giddy with excitement over the lettering and menu for the flour pot bakery designed by Sara Nicely (from San Francisco).  

via frolic

via sara nicely

Love Heart: Alexandre Girard

As you know, I have been collecting ideas to decorate the walls of my “art gallery” condo.  I found this piece today and fell in love.  This has to go on my wall somewhere too! 

The piece is called Love Heart and was designed by American textile designer, Alexandre Girard.  Alexandre was born in NYC in 1907 and was known for his work for Herman Miller as head of fabric and textile design for the company.  This piece in particular was created on Columbia Forest Products and can be found on Design Public.

via design public

bride designed invitations

These are beautiful wedding invitations designed by bride, Nicole Tremblay of coral pheasant and printed by beast pieces.  They are letterpress invitations and I am in love with the grey script across the top with the message “you should come, it’ll be fun!”  Beast pieces has some great ideas if you are looking for something a little less traditional and very creative.

via beastpieces

via beast pieces

rue magazine

A new magazine was launched this month called Rue Magazine.  It is in digital format and it is going to be big interms of influencing other magazines for user interface and quality.  It has over 200 pages of digital content with a focus on interior design and lifestyle.  The women behind the magazine did an amazing job with their first issue and I love how there are links embedded so when you scroll over a product you can see where it comes from.  Below is a look at what is inside Rue Magazine.

via creamy life

via creamy life

via bussbuss.com

via attention to detail

via table tonic

happy birthday

I know so many people with birthdays in September that I decided to dedicate this post to them with a picture of a really cool “cake”.

Happy Birthday friends. 

via table tonic

reno update again

Couple more pics for the readers out there and lessons learned this week in project: renovate my condo:

• Skilled trades are invaluable to the success of a project’s timeline.
• Punctual trades are a rarity.
• It can be challenging to work with family.
• Plumbers will cost you more than the original quote.
• You can test what kind of paint is on a wall with some acetone nail polish remover.  If it comes off, it’s latex, if it doesn’t come off the previous owner painted the wall with oil based paint.
• Sometimes forking out cash for trash removal makes everyone happier and less stressed out.
• Thanking neighbours is important especially when you are making a lot of dust and noise.
• Not all microwaves are created equal! (ours is being returned even though it was the smallest)

This past week, the counter top was measured, three quarters of the plumbing was completed, all the debris was cleared including old appliances (minus a fridge i’m still trying to sell), kitchen cabinets were installed, fronts put on, floor grout done and mudded and sanded the walls.   This week, the tiling begins as well as the painting.  Should be exciting.   We have tentatively booked an October 9th move in date.  I think we can make it!  I have total faith in our painting skills.

kitchen updated with cabinet doors/flooring

Looking into kitchen from living room

Hallway

Bedroom

Powder room

reno update 3

Renos are slowly progressing.  Underestimated on the time it would take to complete everything.

We finally got a plumber in and he worked on four different things in the apartment including fixing the plumbing in the kitchen because we changed the order of our sink and dishwasher, working on the shower stall, the bathtub and the masterbath vanity.  We have returned our bathtub faucet for a second time and hope we get it right on the third time.  Because we chose a tub with a four inch lip, we kept selecting hardware that would not clear the lip/ledge.  Also, started laying down kitchen tile only to realize that halfway through, the tiles were slightly different which resulted in lifting everything back up, driving back to the tile place and purchasing new tiles.  They were good enough to take back what we had not used and split the difference. 

This week, the kitchen was installed, the floor re-laid, the walls were mudded (I did some of that!), and we have the counter top person, tiler and hard wood floor guy coming in to give estimates, take measurements and get the job done.   I have also finalized paint that I have to purchase this week and have made my fifth trip in two weeks to Ikea.  I suspect that Ikea has not seen the last of me.  At least I come prepared now with things to keep me occupied while I wait in the exchange line and the pick up line.

Two more weeks I think and that should do it on the new casa.   Here are somore more reno/demo pics.

the tub

the brand new shower stall

the kitchen demolished

Our Ikea cabinets patiently waiting to be hung

words on wood

Love this!

via apartment therapy