Time for Toms

It's officially time for some new Toms.  I bought the Ash Canvas ones a long time ago and wore them out.  Seriously... they smelled... badly... so badly they were un-redeemable.  After wearing them non stop in Italy walking for 12 hours a day I had no choice but to throw them in the trash when we got home.  It was a sad day.  I miss them.  And I need a new pair because they are just so comfortable.

But, as much as I loved the Ash... I'm hesitant to get the same color again.

I don't really like black shoes so those are out... my next choice would be the olive green ones but most of my jackets are of the olive green color so I want something that will contrast.  I'm kind of feeling like color might be my best bet since I tend to wear a lot of black, grey, brown, olive green, and navy during the winter months...

So, I've narrowed it down to the following...

(top left and moving clockwise): red canvas classics-- love em... and Eme has a pair of red toms too so we'd match.  Wine Canvase Classics-- I feel like these could be the ones but darn... they're out of my size.  Burgandy Wool Cordones-- this color is everywhere this fall and it's kind of grown on me... I'm liking the style of these shoes too.  Multi Knit Women's Classics-- I guess if you can't decide on a color you could always get shoes with all of them?  Either that or get a pair in EVERY color--- but I'm pretty sure Doug would say that's not an option :)

Decisions, decisions.  What's a girl to choose?

Counting Down the Days...

Yup... I'm still counting down the days till our kitchen is done.

I'm here to tell you that the end is in sight folks.  The last of the finished parts have been dropped off at the sprayers (yay!) so in 1-2 weeks they should be ready to be installed... hopefully :)  Then we've got some tiling to do!

via Inspiration for Decoration

Just thought I'd let you know that we haven't abandoned the kitchen project... it's still a work in progress... but the end is in sight.  I hope :)

Nursery Gallery Wall

Every so often I stumble upon things like THIS...

The gallery wall in Eme's room somehow made it's way into this nursery gallery wall "how-to"...

Glad other people like the art wall in her room as much as I do!  Too bad it's going to be changing in the next few months as the nursery will soon have a new occupant...

October so far...

busy month.  here's what's been up around here...

spent thanksgiving weekend in whistler.  hot weather and outdoor pool at thanksgiving?  when does that ever happen?

boots weather arrived... Eme approves

fall weather means baking weather around here... Doug approves

purchased some usbourne activity cards-- draw on them with dry erase marker-- hours of fun

made a quick trip to the new west elm in vancouver and got a gorgeous kantha throw-- kids are not allowed to touch it

Eme got sick last weekend.  boo.

as of today (friday) I finally got caught up on laundry after Eme's "frow up" fest.  boo.

under cabinet lighting finally got installed.  yay!

Caleb's got a day off from school and decided to practice his letters.  he's loving kindergarten :)

And... I'm glad it's friday :)  how bout you?

Building Boxes

Work in Caleb's room has begun.  Moving the toys on out has been in progress over the past two weeks.  The closet needed some organizational help so I was pumped to find these cute cute cute storage boxes at Ikea for dirt cheap... $4.99 for two.  They are cardboard-- but they'll be used on the top shelves out of the reach of the kids determined to seek and destroy.

I was super excited about these boxes-- until I tried to assemble them yesterday afternoon.  I wrestled with one of them for about 2.5 minutes, flipped it over to glance at the instructions, and gave up.

Seriously now.  What on earth does this mean!!?

After the kids were in bed I informed Doug that he had 4 boxes to build.

He quietly set to work building the boxes... and all of a sudden I hear him muttering under his breath:

"build a box for your wife and she'll ask you to build three more."

"teach your wife to build a box and she'll build them herself for the rest of her life."

Nice try buddy.  I ain't touching those boxes :)

But I will admit that I giggled out of control over that comment for close to an hour.

Well, more work has got to happen in this room before it can be converted into a shared room for Caleb and Eme.  But, most of Caleb's "stuff" has been moved out (with the exception of his clothes), I gave the walls a fresh coat of paint a week ago (similar color to what was already in there), and the rug I ordered for their shared room arrived.  Just need to get the bed situation figured out and then we'll be open for business!