Hello again.

I am back from vacation and feeling fine. A catastrophe of major proportion did not implode my career, my house or the city during this absence. We journeyed to our favourite Island and literally lived on the beach for more than 2 weeks. The kids cried when we left for home.

While we were away:

we watched the sunset a lot,

we had three legged races and slept in the hammock,

we made s'mores and s'mores and

the not husband and his friend risked their lives and then

we watched sadly as their beautiful sailboat crashed into the rocks and

we caught frogs and a salamander and

ducked our heads from the disoriented bats swirling above in the rafters

and swam and floated and splashed and

washed our clothes in the bay and hauled water to the cottage for dishes

and ate by candlelight and drank champagne and

had a talent show and walked to the beach and back

one hundred times and applied sunscreen over and over and over

and drove to the store to buy ice everyday to keep our food cold and our

tummies full and barbecued and laughed and boggled and

crushed limes for caipirinhas and dug a big hole that

will some day be our outhouse and burned out many batteries

in the flashlights that took us to and from the bonfires where we

sang and talked and took turns enjoying ourselves and watching

the beautiful sleeping children and after several days of waiting

we watched a spectacular chrysalis become a beautiful monarch butterfly

(and if you haven't witnessed this you must put it

on your list of things to do before you die)

and mostly we felt grateful that we are so

lucky to have so much and to get by at the cottage with

so little.

And still, it's nice to be home.

Vacation Diary: Day 1

It's here. It is absolutely, positively here and what am I doing? Grinning mostly and: doing laundry and packing, tying up loose ends, talking on the phone, lip syncing the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, and trying to think relaxing, decompressing thoughts while watching the squirrels chase each other in the freshly cut grass out of

this window while I am writing to you about

my son's room and how sweet it might be

and thinking of the packing and the music buying, the planning, the groceries and the squealing children who are at the Museum now but will soon come home and say "Mommy is it here?" and I'm going to tell them that it sure is. And great as that moment will be it will not even begin to compare to the joy in every day ahead for the next many days. in a row.

Maybe I'll see you back here. Maybe you're on vacation. Whatever you're doing, I hope you're happy about it.

Tuesday Look: A Drop By

After confirming today that I don't have any worrisome spots of melanoma, I headed home earlier than usual to await the 6pm arrival of my family. I was aimlessly pulling up weeds in the front garden when they pulled up happy to be home and wondering about dinner. At about the same time Stephen arrived on his bike. It was a drop by. Don't you just love a drop by?

Here Stephen is sporting jeans by William Rast, vintage Prada shirt and the look good, feel good, give back shoes are Toms.

We took the kids to the park while the barbeque was firing up.

Dinner time round up.

The not husband headed off to his new running club and Stephen took the hoolies up the street for ice cream and I tinkered with the crossword which wasn't as hard as I thought and realized that my tummy was actually right as rain and that the 15 year old mattress made the bed wetting problem smaller and thought about how great Wyatt and Graydie's room is starting to look and imagined the weather starting to turn and thinking about how much more watering I'll have to do in the garden after the vacation which starts on Friday and I realized that the clouds were lifting and it was all thanks to a few minutes gifted to me by my lovely friend the Tuesday Look.

Showers and Showers

Warning: Gloomy weather. Gloomy post.

This is Stella McCartney's cloud print dress available from Bergdorf's for a mere $2200.00. Isn't it lovely? I'm going to a shower for my sweet, lovely cousin Stephanie today (yes, she and her sister did choose to get married in the same summer). I wish I was wearing this dress, I've been feeling rather cloudy this weekend. We stayed home from the cottage to make a beautiful room for Wyatt and Graydie but the blues and obstacles unforeseen seem to have severely hampered any progress. Sigh. That and the 25 mm of rain that fell yesterday brought a rainy day feeling to the house.

A blog reader sent me a message recently telling me that she liked reading about my "well planned life of gratitude". Where do I start countering this claim today? First I need to tell you that my life is a well planned as the contents of my purse is organized (enough said) and I'm trying to muster the gratitude but the following is getting in my way:

1. My G9 got sand in it a couple of weeks ago and when i tried to find my Tuesday look I discovered that it was broken. So then I decided that I was a camera repair gal and started taking it apart which embarrassed the not husband when he took it to the repair shop because "any person with respect for a camera would never just start taking it apart". He's right.

2. My tummy is off.

3. I am having technical difficulties with my gmail and lost some critical "10 list" files so another weekend passed without the great list of Melissa.

4. I wrecked a chair. (don't ask)

5. The Globe crossword is super hard and I have maybe 12 boxes filled in.

6. I had a 2 day dispute with the not husband about a 15 year old mattress and its future.

The weather forecast for today is cloudy with a certainty of showers (both bridal and otherwise). I promise to make my next post a little sunnier. The weather and the gratitude has got to turn soon.

Tuesday Look: Stylish Dress Book Creation

Few people have inspired my sewing this last year as much as the delightful Karyn Valino of the workroom. Her blog is all about "making, learning, teaching and sharing a crafty life". So when Karyn posted this entry about a dress she had recently made I was in a frenzy to find the book, order, receive, tear open and begin immediately sewing. I've had a few sewing failures this year so when the books arrived without a stitch of English instruction to be had, I was a little crestfallen and worried about what was ahead. I decided to head to the workroom to buy the fabric that would catapult the project forward and the lovely wares did not disappoint. I left with the exquisite floral that became the stylish dress book "O" frock that you see above. When I came home today Tuesday Look-less I decided it was time to show you this small sewing success. The dress came together quickly and feels nice on. I just love the sleeves. I hope you like it. I sure smile when I wear it.

And if you haven't been to the workroom or the blog, you should go. I think you'll like it there.

At the cottage before I even get there.

I'm heading to the cottage now with inspiration in my heart to try to make it look a little more like the images to the right. I am thrilled to sweep the plywood floors, clean up after the mice, beat the rugs, staple up the fabric walls, sweep the deck, rake the fallen leaves all around the outside of the cottage, dust the cobwebs, discard the unwanted, centralize like items, cover the air mattresses with linens, turn on the coleman burner to boil the kettle for dishes, brush my teeth over a pail, light all of the candles, change the batteries in the flashlights, plug the ipod into the battery operated speakers, dream of a dustpan that could possible capture it all, wonder how the not-husband will get the late mr. bat down from the very high skylight where it is fixed, play boggle and yahtzee, delight in the isolation from the cellular signals and the ringing, beeping phone sounds. Happy Weekend everyone.

photos courtesy of jubellacottagechic

Tuesday Look: Kenia

It's been a busy couple of weeks and I have been short on Lemon Fresh time but I got back in the saddle this morning and slung the 40D over my shoulder and headed off to work. Stephen and I took the usual route home that takes us through a stretch of town that rarely disappoints in the sartorial eye candy category and presto, I was rewarded for my Tuesday Look discipline.

This is Kenia. (Lemon Fresh's Tuesday Looks are blessed with style and fabulous names no? Remember Kasha, Makara, Sora, Shallom, Dar and the like?) Kenia is a Fashion Communications student at Ryerson and works at the exclusive Ossington style mecca known as Jonathan and Olivia. She also has a lovely list of vintage wares in her Etsy shop.

I was already dreaming of getting out of my shoes when I opened the door to O and J and Kenia was the first person I saw and I think I actually gasped at the sight of her. After thanking the blog gods I asked "Can I please take your picture?" After the usual "what's it for?" and such we headed out front for a few snaps. She is even more beautiful on closer examination and I had to strongly resist the urge not to just post a close up of her stunning face. She is sporting vintage top and skirt, handcuff necklace, leather garter belt (okay you, like me are probably saying to yourself that you could never pull this off but don't you just love it?). Her oh-so-amazing locks are courtesy of the talented Karen Vu of Vidal Sassoon and have probably inspired many fringes. In my enthusiasm, I never even asked her about her shoes. This week's look is enhanced with the confidence of someone who already knows how to express herself with no apologies or second guessing. Kenia has made me a little excited about getting dressed tomorrow. You?