Do you ever look at your closet and want to burn it all down and start over? That was me a few years ago. Since then I’ve worked on things like learning my style, purging my wardrobe, and only keeping things I love to wear. The result has been a ‘capsule wardrobe‘ and it makes […]
Last night we had friends over for hotdogs and chips. It was simple, laid back and enjoyable. A far cry from the hosting I used to try to accomplish. I used to be a stressball hostess. When I think of all the times I’ve been a stressed out hostess, I know it is because I […]
Twice. That’s how many times everything I believed about Christmas has been torn to little sparkly shreds of lies. First, when my older brother told me there was no Santa. I cried on the couch in my parent’s lap. Second, when I found out that Jesus probably wasn’t really born at Christmas time. Right?! I […]
Appies are my second favourite meal, next to brunch. But when someone asks me to contribute to the appy spread I have jumped all over the culinary map. I’ve done everything from heating up the frozen PC brand appies (don’t mess, those are good!) to wrapping roasted almonds into figs, then wrapping them with local […]
Traditions are the bonding goop in families. They are ‘understood’ by the family, like an inside joke or secret handshake. They are a constant to rely on, a marker for special events. Traditions are a display of family pride, like team colours or an anthem. And the BEST thing about traditions is that they can be aaaaannnnything […]
So we have a new tradition this year. Adventing (oh yes, in this house it’s a verb). This year I had felt overcome by the meaning of Advent. Suddenly the weeks leading to Christmas seem so precious to me. Give me ten years max and I will become ‘that weird Christmas lady’ because I am […]
We just spent the week talking about gift giving. We talked about ways to make your gifts more thoughtful and ways to give kids gifts without it feeling like you are overrun with toys. There are still some ways you can make your gift giving simpler. Here are some tips to make […]
We are coming off a year of ‘giving experiences not gifts’ so I’ve been approaching this Christmas with a smaller shopping list and big plans on how to ‘do things’ with our kids. We have told the kids that for Christmas we will take them to a hotel and go swimming. Their reaction has been […]
We all feel the tension. The commercialization versus the simple joy of togetherness. The presents versus the presence. Of course, I’d like to raise charitable kids over entitled kids but I don’t want them to think there is anything wrong with presents. I like presents! To me, the perfect gift is one that has thought […]
On Friday we talked about these five tips to make your Christmas simpler. But ‘simple’ looks different to each family. What does it look like to your family? The first step in finding your Simple Christmas is to get to know what’s going on under that candy cane grin. What are your expectations, your sources of […]