Brrrr...

It's been extremely cold here in Ottawa all week. Temperatures dipping down to -22C at night and daytime highs of around -16C (if you can call that a high!). That's -8F and -3F for my American friends.

These frigid temperatures have encouraged me to make a few more scarves and mitts for my Etsy shop. Here are a few of my newest creations:

On a side note, remember my post from Thursday ...

Well now it's time to vote for your favorite entry. Be sure to vote on the CanArtisan blog before December 22nd.

Christmas tree '09

Here are a few pics of my Christmas tree and the decorated mantle:

Mercury glass ornament

Mercury glass ornament

CanArtisan is having a fantastic contest. You have the chance of winning a $25 gift card from Chapters by sharing you favorite holiday memory, photos or tradition. Just be sure to enter before the 19th of Dec., see blog for more details.

A foot of the white stuff

It's officially time for winter boots.

Contest alert - TCET 12 Days of Xmas

There's another great contest from the TransCanada Etsy Team. It's called The TCET 12 Days of Christmas!!!

This promotion runs from Wednesday, November 25 to Sunday, December 6th.

How to participate: You receive a ballot for each $10.00 (excluding shipping) you spend in participating shops (see TCET blog post for the full list of shops). The Draw for this fabulous package full of handmade Canadian goodies pictured above will take place on December 7th. This Package is worth over $350.00!

Be sure to check out the TCET blog each day for holiday-themed features from our members including recipes, holiday traditions, and stories! I decided to share my mom's famous shrimp dip recipe!

Auction find

Yesterday, I attended my very first auction. It was at the Salvation Army and I scored a large print by Canadian artist Benjamin Chee Chee called "Friends". The print caught my eye a few weeks ago and I just hoped there wouldn't be too many people at the auction. I was right!

His bio is fascinating and tragic. Here's a small excerpt I got from Wikipedia:

"Benjamin Chee Chee, artist, of Ojibwa descent, born Kenneth Thomas Benjamin at Temagami, Ontario 26 March 1944; died at Ottawa 14 March 1977. His early life was troubled and he lost track of his mother, who he spent many years searching for. He moved to Montreal in 1965 where he developed his love of drawing, moving back to Ottawa in 1973. He gained fame as he developed his unique style of clear graceful lines with minimal colour of birds and animals giving sense to emotion and movement. After finally finding his mother and achieving success as an artist, he committed suicide in an Ottawa jail. "

November challenge

Every month, the Trans Canada Etsy Team has a creative challenge. This month, the idea was to create or submit something spicy!

I wasn't able to create something new for the challenge but I did submit my Grecian inspired red hot dress. Voting is now open 'till the 29th. Psst, if you vote and leave a comment on the blog post, you'll be entered for a chance to win a super cute Etsy prize.

Vote here

I ♥ Dace

Last week, I was scrolling my usual blogs when I came across this contest on Lake Jane. Dace, one of my favorite Canadian designers, was having a contest to win a few of her styles.

As I'm scouring the Dace website, I came across the sale section. First, I couldn't believe my favorite styles were on sale and second they still had smalls left. I just had to buy them. Well I received my two dresses in the mail today and I couldn't be happier. My favorite is the green Sheila dress. Although my long torso makes it a bit too short to wear as a dress, it will be perfect with a pair of jeans and sandals next Spring.

fyi, the Dace contest ends Dec. 10th.

New scarf

I just listed this new scarf and matching mitts in my shop. Both are made from felted lambswool.

Available here for $32

Available here for $12

Wordless Wednesday - shades of fall in the yard

My Batwing dress on Etsy's front page

Front page recap courtesy of Craftcult's vault.

Sneeze in your knee

From the Canadian show This Hour has 22 Minutes.

His and hers pumpkins

Happy Halloween Everyone. Here's our pumpkins that we carved out:

His

Hers

We placed some dry ice in a can inside my pumpkin. Then we poured some hot water to create the smoke. Unfortunately, the smoke effect doesn't last a long time and it's a bit of a pain to refill every time.

Spooky decoration

With Halloween around the corner, I decided to do a little decorating this weekend. I found a bunch of empty vintage frames in the closet (bought for another project). I arranged them on the fireplace mantle, overlapping each one. Then I added some fake cobwebs and a few plastic spiders - instant spooky decoration! Total cost of this project: $2.

Recycling sweaters

My mom had bought a bunch of sweaters with the intention of felting them and making some type of craft. Well I guess the felting didn't quite work out so I ended up with a dozen or so cashmere sweaters. I kept a few for myself but most of them had holes or other faults that made them "unwearable". So with the salvaged parts, I decided to make colorful scarves and mitts. So far I've been able to make 4 scarves and I'm left with lots of little pieces that will be perfect to make matching mitts. Recycling is so much fun!


Here are a few of my favorites:

Available here

Fluffy's wake-up call

I'm sure this is one of the most annoying sounds in the world (especially when it happens at 6am).

New dress and weekend deal

In honor of Thanksgiving (yes folks, it's already Thanksgiving in Canada), I'm offering free worldwide shipping on every style in my Etsy shop.

I'm working on a few new pieces this weekend and hopefully I'll have them up in the shop before my sale ends. Last week, I finished this cozy plaid dress. I'm really happy with the way the collar and the cuffed sleeves turned out.

New photos

I just got my new photos for my Accordion bamboo top (right). The photos were taken by Isis at Paper Flower Girl. Aren't they amazing?

The photo shoot was in Belgium for the fall '09 issue of VivalaModa. This online magazine is focused on handmade fashion and beauty items. You can even click on the links and go shopping from the magazine pages. How cool is that!

Fall cooking

One of the reason I love fall is all the great recipes I get to make. Move over BBQ, here comes the warm hearty stews and yummy pumpkin pies. On my last weekend at the cottage, I picked up the latest Donna Hay magazine (winter issue) at Chapters. I'm always confused since we have opposite seasons so our summer is Australia's winter. That's too much thinking for the cottage. At least the magazine is filled with great recipes.

Do you have a favorite fall recipe? If so, please share. I love to get new ideas :)

Etsy's gift guide

Guess who's in Etsy's Gift Guide this week?

Yup, it's me. One of my newest tops from my fall collection made it into Etsy's Sapphire Gift Guide. Although, now I'm wondering why I called that top "Truffle"! It doesn't even remotely look like a truffle. If someone has a better suggestion, I'm all ears.

I also want to say a big Thank You to Necole from the CreativeMixx and TipandFiFI for featuring me their blogs.

Scenes from NB -part 2

It definitely feels like the end of summer today. A good day to reminisce about hot summer days at the beach. In case you missed my part 1, here it is.

Here I am trying to capture the dunes created during low tide at Parlee beach.

More scenes from the sand dunes. It's fun just to walk from one end of the beach to the other.

In between the dunes are shallow pool of water. They were filled with hermit crabs that got stuck when the tide went down. It was fun to watch them until I realized one of them was on my foot. Eeeck!

Shopping in Syracuse

Yesterday, we drove to Syracuse, NY for a mini shopping trip. It took us about 3 hours to get to the Carousel Center Mall. We were on a tight schedule since we needed to get back that night for a bbq. Once we got to the mall, I headed to Lord and Taylor. I wandered aimlessly for a while until I found the BCBG sales rack. I picked up the dress (below) and a linen skirt on clearance for like $30.

My next stop was at Ann Taylor Loft. I picked up the sweater dress below and a few summer dresses on sale. My last stop was DSW where I got a pair of Steve Madden boots for fall and a pair of black pointy flats. Then it was already time to go. I had tons of fun visiting these stores that we don't have in Canada. My bf didn't share my sentiment, he was very happy to leave.

Since I had exceeded my daily limit of $50, I would need to pay duty once we crossed back into Canada. I kept worrying that I was going to be charge an outrageous amount that would end my trip on a sour note. Once the agent processed my receipts, I only owed $44. Phew!

Scenes from NB - part 1

Back in July, we made our way to New Brunswick. We got a chance to visit Fundy National Park. Here are a few scenes from Dickson Falls.

Before going on a second hike, we had a little picnic overlooking the Bay of Fundy. The second hike was the Coppermine trail which was a bit of a let down. It was a long hike and there wasn't much to see.

F/W 09 bamboo collection

I've listed a few tops from my f/w 09 bamboo line in my Etsy shop. I plan on making more styles but a few of my fabrics are on back order. Next on my "to-design" list is a funky cardigan, a turtleneck and a tulip skirt. I also have a red hot one shoulder dress that's almost finished.

What I'm growing

Since zucchini is really the only vegetable thriving in my garden, I've been scouring the internet for some zucchini recipes. So far I've found this one on Epicurious. Delicious!

A few snap peas

The first 3 tomatoes make their appearance mid- August.

Mini green pepper