Elaine

Food & Drink, Mains

Smoked Salmon and Goat Cheese Pizza

April 29, 2013 by Elaine No Comments

This is hands down my favourite pizza in the whole world. Seriously. It is SO g.o.o.d. Really good. And I managed to convince Chef Kev to make it for me on Saturday evening. Yay 🙂

This pizza is right up there with finding twenty dollars in the pocket of a jacket you haven’t worn in over a year (yes!). And right up there with hitting every green light on the way to work (score!) This pizza is even as good as eating more chocolate than the Easter Bunny, yet still loosing two pounds when you step on the scale (SAWEEET!) Like I said, G.O.O.D.

Okay, let’s get to gettin’.

ingredients:
whole garlic bulb
extra virgin olive oil

pizza crust – thin

package of smoked salmon lox

red onion – thinly sliced
capers
goat cheese
fresh dill – chopped
lemon

to make:
Before assembling and making your pizza, you will first need to roast a bulb of garlic. Preheat your oven to 400°, then cut the top of the bulb so that the tips of each clove are exposed. Place your bulb on a sheet of tinfoil and drizzle with extra virgin olive oil. Wrap the garlic bulb in the tinfoil and roast in the oven for 30-45 minutes. You will know it is ready when the cloves turn a rich caramel colour and pop out of their casings easily (to release them squeeze lightly at the base of each clove and they should come right out). Yum!

With your oven preheated at 425°, begin assembling your pizza by first brushing a layer of olive oil on to your crust. Next, cover your crust with the smoked salmon and add your thinly sliced red onion and capers. Top that with chunks of crumbled goat cheese (mmmmmmm…). Bake in the oven for 15-20 minutes.

Remove from oven. Finish with the dill and freshly squeezed lemon juice.

Zesty, Yummy, GOLD.

Enjoy!

Okay, so maybe it is better than eating more chocolate than the Easter Bunny, yet still loosing two pounds when you step on the scale. I stand corrected.

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This post is part of the monthly link up party Our Growing Edge. This event aims to connect food bloggers and inspire us to try new things. This month is hosted by Sonja at And More Food.

Garden, Home & Garden, Seasonal & Holiday, spring

Putting the Spring in my front door’s step!

April 26, 2013 by Elaine No Comments

Ah yes, Spring is here. Now doesn’t this image just scream “Spriiinnnng!”

No? I agree. It screams “mama’s been kinda busy”, actually if it were screaming it would be more like “MAMMA’S BEEN KINDA BUSY!” but I don’t like to yell. What you are looking at here are the remnants of my Christmas planter (I didn’t blog about it this year but it looked basically like this). Now, in my defense this is from about a month ago (so late March isn’t too bad is it)? Okay, it is.

Chace and I set out to give this planter a Spring overhaul. First we removed all the dead foliage and thinned out the branches drastically. Then Chace worked his magic moving the dirt around. Nothing like putting your (almost) four year old to work. And don’t you love the outfit he picked out? Priceless.

Once Chace had filled his time card we turned our attention to the flowers I had purchased. My birthday is mid-March and my sweet coworker bought me a gift card to a garden centre near my office (thanks Sharon)! I picked up these 6 plants on my lunch break a day or two before the big dig.

I’m sorry that I can’t recall the names for all of these but basically I picked up some ground cover, some heather (the purple one), decorative grass, a succulent variety, and some violas.

Then we began planting. I let Chace help by telling me which one he wanted to plant next and I helped chose where to put them.

I tried to place the plants in an arrangement that would add interest from each angle you viewed the planter at. For example, I put the succulent near the side of the planter where the door is as it is small so you may not notice it if tucked in back. I also put the heather to the far right as it is large and colourful so adds a nice ‘frame’. I put the grass near the succulent as I loved the play of texture. And the ground cover and flowers I tucked throughout to add diversity and interest.

Then my helper cleaned up. If anyone is looking, he charges $10/hr. All calls go through his momager.

This angle makes him look so tall!

Speaking of angle, this one here had a good one. She did nothing but look at me like this and try to get me to throw her ball for her. Get to work Belle. Shameless.

Once we were all done we had a planter that was ready to start growing. Now it feels like Spring!

As mentioned, I did this about a month ago and grow she did! Here is how she was looking last night when I snapped a few quick pics…

The flowers are loving their new homes and I am loving the colour and life.

This succulent is just so succulent. Sorry, had to be said.

Well, that put a little spring in my step – har har. There is something so refreshing about flourishing flowers. Gotta love ’em.

And the planter-o-shame is but a distant memory (albeit one with photographic evidence).

What about you guys? Get up to any spring cleaning inside or out? I love Spring cleaning/organizing. I get a real itch this time of the year. Nothing is safe. I’m talking to you garage. You’ve been warned.

Home & Garden, Living Room

Artsy Fartsy

April 25, 2013 by Elaine No Comments

Chef Kev will think it’s funny that I used the word ‘fart’ in a title #guyhumour. My mom won’t #sorrymom!

Earlier this week I shared with you the updates we did in our living room. For those who missed it you can read about it here – but basically it is our new curtains and panelled wall.

We used to have art hanging over the couch and behind the dining table.

But it was taken down when we put up the awesomesauce panelling.

As juicy as the panelling is, the spot above the sofa still looked a little bare. The couch is such a similar colour that it almost blends into the wall.

In an ideal world I’d also love to update the throw cushions (bring in something more modern with hits of grey) and that lamp is totally the wrong lamp for the space but Rome wasn’t built in day and neither was my living room. I’d actually really love a dark charcoal couch there but I digress… We work with what we have right!? And what I have is a small budget.

Okay, so the painting I did of Chace didn’t work in this spot any more so he got moved to the basement. Sorry nugget!

Where he went up, four black frames came down. I’m going to reuse three of them here.

I was originally thinking of framing some black and white prints in them but then I had another idea.

One of my favourite tricks is framing ‘art’ from what are known as ‘mill swatches’. In my industry (Graphic Design) mill swatches are a designers’ best friend. Think of them as the paint swatch deck to a painter, the surgical tools to a surgeon (dramatic yes) or Sriracha sauce to anything Chef Kev eats. Hand in hand my friend.

Mill swatches are booklets put out by the different paper mills showcasing their paper. The swatches show different weights, colours and what sizes the paper is available in. They also contain a bunch of information about how the paper is produced, recycled content of the stock etc. In addition to this, the mill swatches also show examples of different printing processes to show how the paper stock takes ink. As you can imagine, each paper has different qualities and the imagery plays into that. For example, a shiny slick coated stock may be used in producing a car pamphlet (as it makes the car look new, shiny and fancy) so they may showcase imagery of the sort. An uncoated stock with high recycled content may boast imagery of fabrics or something much more tactile and textured. Mill swatches are awesome reference for Graphic Designers.

Sometimes the paper mills also put out what is known as ‘printed samples’. Printed samples are design pieces with amazing imagery showcasing multiple lines of the mill’s paper and various techniques. These are my faves. The designs and processes used can be breathtaking. And yes, I am 100% a design nerd and totally okay in admitting it.

And that pic is actually a self portrait that I took of myself stuck in a traffic jam. I guess my nerdness knows no bounds…

Okay, but back to this!

Here is what mill swatches and printed samples look like.

I’ve framed images from other mill swatches and printed samples in the past. In our main floor bathroom for example…

I have a set of three up but they are a bit hard to shoot together so here is the other one…

and a I’ve used printed sample imagery again in a corner of our entry way.

Back to the pile above though, here are the ‘series’ that caught my eye as possible options.

Tickets. I loved the colour here but didn’t really want to cut the picture up in to three sections. I was worried it would lose the feeling that this single image captures.

Pay-per-view binoculars: these are just three but you can see under the middle one that there are a few more poking out.

Black & white to colour imagery: thought this was interesting, especially since black & white was my first instinct…

And this one here full of different rulers and the like.

I was still a bit torn so I propped up each ‘set’ against the frames sitting on the back of the couch. I did each one like this…

And then I made my choice. Spoiler alert – it’s the pay-per-view binocular series! I loved the colours and mood of these pics. I had to go with them.

Then I set about framing them. The frames are quite old but I think I got them from Real Canadian Superstore (about 10 years ago)!

I have a few framing tricks for you though to make your framed pieces look like a million bucks. Number one is to have your mats custom cut. The word ‘custom’ can conjure up images of dollar signs but it’s actually not expensive at all. If memory serves, these were $7 each and you end up with beautiful thick mats that really highlight whatever you are framing. I like to make them nice and generous. I find the ones that come in the frames are always a bit skimpy and have very thin margins. Ample white space = great showcasing of your subject. I think they look more like gallery pieces this way. I had the foyer and bathroom ones shown earlier custom cut too.

My second tip is to put a piece of tape on the backside top edge of your photo/picture/art print with the sticky side facing up. This way, when you centre your image in the mat opening all you have to do is lightly press down on the top of the opening and your image will get ‘tacked’ in to place. Then you can flip the mat over and tape your image securely in place to reinforce it.

After all three were framed I marked the wall using a level and a pencil. Then I turned to my favourite 3M picture hanging strips. I love these things. Easiest way to hang art without ever damaging your wall. Golden. I used the strips like this on two of the frames but placed them top and bottom middle for the centre frame (as it is on the moulding versus the flat wall as you will see).

So here is the ‘before’ again for you…

And the ‘after’!

Here are some close ups of the art prints.

right hand side:

centre:

left:

I love how the soft haze in the photos really helps link the cream in the couch to the grey on the wall. And because I used what I had on hand this whole project probably cost me less than how much one of those pay-per-view binoculars charge! The only supply I had to get was some new picture hanging strips because I was out.

A few more angles for you…

I think it really finishes off the space and helps identify the ‘living room’ area in this open concept space (the dining table is just to the right of this area).

What about you? Any picture hanging tips or favourite things to frame? Any secret nerd confessions that you are just dying to get out? Please share 😉

DIY & Crafts, kids

Potty Pirate

April 23, 2013 by Elaine No Comments

The other day Chace (my four year old) saw me coming out of the bathroom after changing the toilet paper roll. I know, random but I have a point. Before I got to the recycling bin he said “Mommy, can we make something with that?” The craft loving designer in me had her heart grow three sizes that day (oh, whoops, that was the Grinch) but needless to say I was happy. DIY something crafty? Of course!

I asked him what he’d like to make and he said “a pirate”. Of course he did. Because he couldn’t have just said something simple like “an orange toilet paper roll”. But my little four year old wanted a pirate so this mommy was going to do her best to dream up one with what I had on hand.

Oh, and did I mention that Chace’s favourite show right now is ‘Jake and the Neverland Pirates‘? Yo ho let’s go!

Ahoy Matey!

Okay, so obviously this is not the best thing ever crafted BUT, more important than that is what this means. Having Chace ask me to make him something out of a piece of material destined for the recycle bin was a bigger question than that. What I heard was a little boy asking his mommy to come and ‘play’ with him.

To digress for a moment, with all the ‘stuff’ going on in the world these days and the horrible events unfolding in Boston and all over the world right now this simple question was a reminder. A reminder to take a deep breath, to get off the computer, log off of Facebook, turn off the news. Let the dishes sit dirty in sink, don’t worry about Chace’s bath night that night and needing to rush because of it. Just. Be. Present. Sit down. Make a silly craft and soak up some of the best medicine the world has to offer (in the form of a four year old boy who wants his mommy to do a craft with him).

I’m a big believer in doing stuff like that. Of course I love my blog, I have freelance commitments, a full-time job and I love my house being tidy. But more that all of that, I love my family. My Chef Kev, my dog Belle and my little nugget Chace. Spending time with each of them is a silent way to say “you are worth all of my attention. You. Nothing else matters right now”. Time to breathe.

Easy to forget to do at times isn’t it?

So, to sit down and make a little pirate for my adorable little crew mate as he finished his dinner was something I was more than happy to do.

Impromptu as it was, I just went upstairs to my craft bin and grabbed what I had on hand. It didn’t need to be the best pirate ever to be valuable. 😉

I grabbed a bunch of leftover felt and pipe cleaners (used here at one of my annual Christmas Craft Night’s for making elves!) as well as some other left over pipe cleaners, little pompoms and googly eyes (from a kid’s Halloween craft party where we made spiders out of mini pumpkins). I also grabbed some white glue (and not pictured but grabbed after was a paint brush, coloured markers, a T-pin and my glue gun).

Originally I was going to get Chace to help me make the pirate but it was a bit too difficult for his skill level (he just turned four as mentioned) and he said he wanted to watch me make it as he finished his dinner. Good gig kid.

If you have any desire to make a little pirate then you’re in luck as a I documented the steps. If not, then I hope you like pictures of ‘how to make a pirate’ because you’re going to see a lot of them. Buckle up.

First, line up your ‘pant’ felt about halfway up the toilet paper tube. Disclaimer – none of this has to be perfect. I will show you evidence to support this statement below. You have been warned.

Apply some white glue to your tube.

Wrap the felt around.

PANTS. Done. As easy as dressing a toddler. Scratch that. Strike the oxymoron from the record.

Next up was a shirt. I chose my blue felt (well, Chace did) and decided to wrap this one a bit differently for interest. I started on a bit of an angle…

So that when finished it had a neat ‘seam’. As you can see I used the ‘cut a strip and apply glue’ method as mentioned above for the pants.

I overlapped the pants too just for fun (like a real shirt).

Moving along to the hair now. I made simple cuts to create some hair texture…

And glued this on as well. This piece was not as long as I didn’t want the ends to meet. Have to leave room for a face!

It was about this point that Chace exclaimed, “Mommy, this is a really cool pirate!”. Melt my heart kid.

This little pirate needed a hat and I’ll admit, I totally winged this part as well.

I folded my red fabric in half and just started cutting, figuring it out as I went.

I knew my pirate hat should have some sort of a ‘bill’ that was big and floppy. The rest I just made up. It looked like this after I was done.

Here is where I used my glue gun. I glued the top part (where the fabric folds) together so that the top stayed closed. If not then the hat would have looked like a big round ball on his head.

I glued the hat on to my pirate and added some googly eyes as well!

He kind of looks like a bandit here! Oh well, perfection was not my goal here remember? 😉

A pipe cleaner and pompom later and we had a belt. I used the glue gun here too. I cleaned up the rough edges with scissors after (where the glue strings are).

To add the arms I used my T-pin and poked a hole.

Then I popped in a pipe cleaner, pulled it down (through the bottom) and tied a knot in the end. Then I pulled the arm back out to the point where the knot stopped it and trimmed the arms to size.

Every little pirate needs a sword right? Well luckily I had a pipe cleaner that could turn in to one!

To make the handle of the sword, make a small loop and twist the pipe cleaner end back on itself.

Next, fold the long end roughly in half.

Bend the right side out like a little blade and twist the bottom end back on to your handle shaft.

SWORD!

With some coloured markers, draw on a lopsided face as well as some buttons and feet and guess what? You. Are. Done.

And the best part? This.

Cutest toilet paper roll ever. And cutest toilet paper roll player.

So that is the tale of the Potty Pirate. The tale of Chace and the Neverland Pirate. The tale of the ‘totally tubular dude”. Aaarrrrrhhhhh! Me’s off to scrub the decks. Actually I’m going to go watch ‘the Voice’ that I pvr’d but same diff right? Ursher baby!

Home & Garden, Living Room

Livin’ it up

April 22, 2013 by Elaine No Comments

We made some changes in the living room. Ah yeeeaahhh…. Good vibratiooonnsss!. (Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch style)

Here was the ‘before’.

Fine. We repainted back in the summer of 2011 to this much brighter creamy shade (the room can be quite dark). It was a massive improvement from the avocado green walls (with tone-on-tone varnish stripes) that were there when we bought the place. One of the reasons I chose this shade was for a treatment I had in mind for the loooooong wall you see on the right. I’ll get to that….

But first I wanted to address the glaring wall of windows you see centre stage.

We updated the blinds too at the same time but I always wanted to soften the edges of the windows.

In January I finally found the perfect panels! Yes! But they were on back order until mid-March. Zing.

Oh well. It was love at first click so I had to go for it. I ordered up three of these beauts (found here from Sears) in the grey shade (called ‘Metal’). Why three? Because I wanted one for each ‘end’ and one to branch the space between the large main window and small one that you see above on the left.

One of the things I love about these is the subtle texture in the fabric.

I decided to hang these curtains right up to the ceiling for a few reasons: 1) the mirror above the fireplace goes right to the ceiling so I thought this would create a nice balance 2) the main window is so large that again, I thought the extra height would be a good balance and 3) because this way I would not have to hem the curtains – ha!

Because the rods meet each corner at a weird angle (not 90°) in all instances I decided to forego a finial (say that last bit five times fast). It was too tight a space to add one and since these are panels vs. curtains, we don’t draw them closed. No movement of the panels = curtains not yet falling off the end of the rod. I will keep you posted/remedy the problem if this changes!

I went with a simple black Ikea rod (Hugad) – mainly for ease and price) plus my friend Natalie gave me some that she had left over from a project she did (score!). So I didn’t even need to buy any. Saweeet!

For the brackets I bought five Betydlig brackets like the one shown below (from Ikea) but in black.

See that long flat base though? It’s like a big black skid mark coming down your wall. Not a problem if it’s behind a curtain, but REALLY ugly when it’s the middle support bracket. So instead of painting over it in the same colour as the wall, I bought one white bracket (yes, I splurged an extra $1.50 for this) #highroller – and covered up the black one used in the middle. And because Ikea ‘white’ is a little off-white it actually works quite well! A little less garish no?

I could paint over that to really make it disappear but it looks fine to me as-is.

For the corner where the two rods needed to meet, I picked up a corner connector piece. It’s bendy so you can adjust this to fit your exact angle where the corners meet – genius! It’s from Ikea as well and is also in the ‘Hugad’ line.

And this is what the the big wall-o-windows looks like now! Phase one complete.

Okay, so now we’re back to the big looonnng wall that I had plans for…

Back in 2011 when this wall was painted I envisioned a large panelled wall. Hard to picture? Well maybe the diagram I did will help clear things up for you?

Still confused? That makes two of us. I suggest you read on 😉

I pictured what is sometimes called a ‘library wall’ where a piece of moulding with a simple (non-decorative) profile is used to create large rectangles on the wall. I know this may still be confusing but hopefully the pics below will clear it up.

First I began by re-painting the long wall. The cream shade was fine but I had changed my mind in the year and a half since I had originally painted it (a woman’s prerogative right? No? okay. Moving on…) I chose a light shade of grey as I wanted to tie in my new curtains. I had actually planned to do this back in January when I chose them. But get this. Since my curtains were back ordered so long – and I am impatient – I ordered another design (a Chevron pattern) from the same manufacturer in the same ‘Metal’ shade. Then I used those ‘stand in’ curtains while picking my new wall colour. I didn’t hang them or anything of course, I just used them to hold my paint chips against while checking the undertones of the greys. Matching greys is hard and I wanted to get just the right shade! After choosing the grey, I returned the curtains. I know, totally dorky but it worked!

And another side note I actually used them here (check out the last picture) when taking photos of the ‘new baby art’ that I made for my friend’s little guy Evan. 😉

Okay, so back to this. After painting the wall, I went shopping with my dad and found the right profile and size for the moulding portion. If you follow me on Instagram you may have seen this pic…

Once we figured out how much wood was needed I purchased it and took it over to my parents. Since I had roped in my dad and Chef Kev into this project my dad graciously offered to paint the moulding for me over at his place. My mom helped too. Thanks guys! xo

Then I went and got my hair cut and coloured while my dad and Chef Kev slaved away. No seriously, I did. It sounds totally diva but is just a coincidence. I actually only get my hair cut twice a year (thanks to the curly Gods) but it sounded fun to type anyway, like I was all J.Lo there for a second..

Do you see what I mean now with the whole ‘library wall’ thing? If not, then keep scrolling. But first, check out this photo that I can use as blackmail to ensure that Chef Kev will never again get dibs on my dad’s second hockey ticket. Can you believe my dad gave it him once over me!? Where’s the love … (mwwaaahaahaa)…

Why yes that is my loving husband pretending to be winding up with a hunk of wood like a bat…

And here’s the real shot. Awww 🙂

After a lot more cutting, gluing, seam patching, sanding and touch up painting, we are D.O.N.E!

seriously

love

it…

Subtle but so interesting.

We had one ‘work around’ where there is a bulkhead just before you go in to the kitchen. But a few cuts made quick work out of this little corner. You can also see here where the seams have all been patched, sanded and repainted.

This is also the corner where the motion detector for our house alarm is. The wiring used to come out the wall that now has the moulding but Chef Kev simply cut a little slit into the drywall and moved it over so it came out just past the corner. Smarty pants.

I am SO happy with how it turned out.

So, to save you the scrolling, here is the ‘before’…

And the ‘AFTER’!

A year and a half in the making but SO worth it. Just think of it as carrying twins… one right after the other, For 18 months… okay, don’t think of it that way, that’s just weird. But I’m really happy the twins are finally here. I’m going to call them Curtains and Wall. Those names won’t get them teased on the playground right?

Oh, and a few little things to tie it all in together? Some new throw cushions with a bit of grey in them as well as some art on the wall. To come in ‘due’ time (see how I did that, twins, due… ). Okay done.

photography

That new baby smell…

April 19, 2013 by Elaine No Comments

I know, I know, I have been a horrible blogger lately. But I’m still here. I seriously have a million things I could post about, but seem to lack the time involved in getting them up on the ‘ol interweb. Picture my head hung in shame.

Speaking of pictures – one of besties had a baby girl (Juliette – how sweet is her name!?) two weeks ago and this past Tuesday Juliette’s mommy humoured me and allowed me to get snap happy while immersing myself in that new baby smell. Seriously, the smell. It’s right up there with the smell of freshly ground coffee. A drug I tell ya.

So, I’m by NO means a professional photographer (I’m a Graphic Designer) but do love playing with my camera and love taking photos. I enjoy a challenge so wanted to see if I could get some good shots that would make the new mommy proud.

I made a quicky pinterest board to see if there was any certain style she may like in particular. My pins were mostly from Bower Power Photography (Katie writes one of my favourite blogs) and Mikaela Ruth Photography (sidenote, Chef Kev used to play soccer with Mikaela’s husband) because they are really talented girls who shoot inspiring photos.

Camera in one hand, a basket in the other, and sushi in the other (figure that one out) I showed up ready to do my best. I have a Canon T2I and most of these pics were taken using my favourite ‘nifty fifty’ lens. For those not familiar, this lens is awesome for taking portraits. If you want a shallow depth of field (where your subject is in focus but the background blurs out) then take a look at this lens. It is a ‘fixed’ lens (meaning you can’t zoom in and out) but perfect for this kind of application

The shots were okay straight after the camera but a little photoshop never hurt anyone. I did some retouching and cropping to some of Juliette’s mommy’s faves and you can easily see how post-production can have a huge impact on the final product.