I've been terrible about keeping up with my Friday round up posts. So here I am trying to get back to it!

• I love these faceted drawings at the restlessthings etsy shop.

• The new Marni for H&M collection launches next week! I have to say that I'm not a devout fan of many fashion designers, but Marni is definately one of them. The accessories are perfection, as are all the silk prints.

• And these kitties might be the best thing I've ever seen on the internet.

I have completely fallen for all the stripes and chevron patterns that are all over, well, everything these days. I'm really trying to push myself away from them, since they are so trendy, and in a year we will all be over it, but then I found these lovely ceramics.

I saw this geometric gold and white ceramic tray on Coco & Kelley earlier this week and was completely taken by it. It's by artist Susan Dwyer who sells a variety of ceramic and paper vessels through her etsy shop, up in the air somewhere.

While I love the use of gold in her patterns, the soft grey, yellow, green, and blush shades are also perfect. My heart is torn.

I've been catching up on some projects around the house that I've been meaning to get to for awhile. Remember this:

I wrote about my colour deliberation here, just about a year ago. Geeze, it took me a long time to get around to this one. Well, here's the after!

First we masked off the grate portion, and sprayed it with a few light coats of matte black spray paint. This was pretty easy, but beware that we had fine black dust all over the office for the next couple of days from the over spray. One that was dry, I taped off the grate, and black stone insets, and the outside edge and painted the tiles with one coat of primer, and two coats of semi gloss paint in this great tealish grey colour.

Here's a closeup of the grate details. The taping turned out to be a bit of a nightmare, with lots of bleeding and stuck edges. I had managed to put the tape around the backside of the grate, but the thicker paint basically glued the tape into place. It was a nightmare to go around everything first with an exacto knife and then a touch up brush.

But it's all touched up, and looks great now! It's so nice to have one more project finished.

Editors Note: So I put this post together of some jewellery I have been admiring, and realized, once all the pictures were in place, that I might be in a blue/green/cream/gold phase. Divine.

Mini Equatorial Necklace by Irene Wood

Sea Green Bauble Necklace by Oliphant

Viuhka Earrings by Fay Andrada

Kate Spade Bangles

Marc Jacobs Enamel Stud Earrings

This weekend I got up to some seriously delayed projects.

See that!?! I put up the wallpaper in the bedroom. Finally. After debating for weeks over which room I should finally have it in. And we love it!

The wallpaper is Wilderness by Ferm Living. It was my first time wallpapering, and it went pretty well. The video below was a fantastic guide, and had many tips that I wouldn't have considered, including marking the pattern match before pasting the strips up on the wall. I did the job by myself, which was also managable. Hanging the strips is pretty much a one person job, but at some points a third hand would have been handy.

I learned one good lesson, and that is about measuring the width of your wall. Like the video, I just started the paper in one corner and went across from there, but as I got closer to the other side, I thought I was going to end up with a silly 2" filler strip at one end. Indeed that was not the case, but I only had about 1/2" to spare on the width of my last strip. So try to plan the drop layout ahead of time, even if it means starting in the centre of your wall and working outwards.

Hopefully I will have more bedroom progress sooner than later. Alas, at this point, in addition to having out bed, the room is also a storage ground for our sectional while the basement gets renovated.

I love these great postcards by Paul Davis, via Polite.

Gardens & Villa: Black Hills

Last weekend while in Toronto I got to visit some great restaurants, but my favourite was Bannock.

Bannock is located on the corner of Queen and Bay in Downtown Toronto and has actually carved out space from The Bay next door. I passed it while on the streetcar, and the graphics immediately caught my eye. I had put it on my potential hit list for my visit, since someone had instagrammed an image from the restaurant a week prior to my trip, and I was intrigued.

The restaurant's focus is on Canadian comfort food. Here's how it's described on their website:

Bannock’s honest approach to food is rooted in familiar, wholesome ingredients that are reflective of Canada’s rich regional and cultural diversity, delivered in an innovative and playful way. Everyday classics are revitalized as the Chefs pay homage to traditional Canadian comfort foods, putting our cultural favourites front and centre.

The menu is also surprisingly affordable. Everything was well priced considering the quality of the food.

I started with the soup special of the day, which was a Cream of Field Mushroom soup. It was perfect for the cold blustery day outside.

Choosing a main was difficult, as there were so many great choices on the menu. In the end I went with my first instinct, which was the Pickerel Taco with Cucumber Apple Salad. The taco was served on a steamed bun and featured pickled rutabaga and caviar tartar. The tacos were awesome. I could have eaten twelve. The salad was a bit lame. My recommendation would be to substitute the salad with another taco. And the presentation on the plate was a bit lacklustre.

To finish, I had the Canoe Fireweed Butter Tart. Since they make the tart with honey rather than sugar, the centre is more liquid than a typical butter tart. It was delicious and was served with a berry compote. It paired excellently with my Earl Grey tea.

The room was nicely outfitted but didn't blow me away. Although I am so over the barnboard thing, it did make sense in a Canadian restaurant. Maybe they could have tried something different with the application. The antique wood is actually reclaimed from one of the Queen's warfs that was submerged in Lake Ontario for the past 100 years. So that's cool.

My favorite feature was the brown wool blankets that were rolled up to act as a window treatment. You can just see them in these pictures.

Here's the view from inside the Bay. The restaurant is actually a joint venture between The Bay and the restauranteur, and this location is hopefully the first in a chain of locations to open in Bay stores nationwide. The best news is that the first city they are hoping to expand to is Calgary!

I also have to mention my server, Marcel, who was absolutely fantastic. He had such enthusiasm for the food and made for a very pleasant visit.

So next time you are in Toronto, I highly recommend a visit. Or maybe it will be coming to your city soon.

Progress!

Not really...

We have demo'd more drywall in anticipation of our SPRAY FOAM insulation installation tomorrow!

It only gets better from here.