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athena + minimalism

[taralaraloobell]

Mother’s Day is coming up quick and I bet there’s a few (hundred) of you that are blank on gift ideas. Well, if you’re near Toronto then you have a literal treasure trove of options.

From presents to places, I’ve got a list of Mother’s Day gift ideas that’ll work for the broke and not so broke!

PLACES

1.      Coffee and Pastries at Nadège Patisserie

If you haven’t tried the macarons at Nadège yet, well, guess what you’re doing this weekend? Hands down, the best in the city, you can an unbelievable latte or cappuccino to go with them.

The atmosphere is cozy and inviting, and the staff is unbelievably friendly. It’s also right next to Trinity Bellwoods. Your mom will be thrilled to have a midafternoon treat with you here!

2.     Walk Through High Park

Toronto has green space, who’d have thought? This park can get pretty busy during the weekends (especially with it being cherry blossom season) but it’s worth a stroll. Beautiful pond views, winding paths through lush trees and totally quaint eateries make this an adorable Mother’s Day choice.

3.     Picnic in Trinity Bellwoods

And we’re back to Trinity Bellwoods! I might be a little biased for this place but at least I own it (the cherry blossoms kick High Park’s @$$ if you ask me). This park has become a picnic haven for city goers and your mom will love it too.

Swing by one of the nearby grocery stores, get some take-out from any of the local options or get a gourmet lunch basket. Here’s hoping the weather comes through!

THINGS 

Stuff, thangs. If you don’t have the time or funds to take your mom out for Mother’s Day, a good old gift will do the trick too.

1.      LUSH Cosmetics Bath Products

Sure, Lush sells more than bath products but we all go in there for the bath bombs. It is a universal fact that no girl can resist a sparkly bath bomb.

2.     Golden Apple Confectionary

If chocolate is your mom’s thing, then Golden Apple Confectionary is where you need to be. Chocolate. Covered. Everything. No exaggeration: chocolate covered Oreos, Rice Krispy squares, marshmallows, sour keys, and more.

Oh, and then there’s ‘straight-up chocolate’ category. Anything from here and you’ll guarantee your spot as favourite child.

EXPERIENCES

Sometimes a gift or outing isn’t enough. These ideas are for kids who really want to spoil their mom; we all know she deserves it.

1.      Her Majesty’s Pleasure

Have you ever had a manicure or blowout and thought ‘you know what would be nice right now? A drink.’ Well HMP saw the opportunity and they took it. Not only do they offer spa service staples but they give you booze while they’re at it. For those not interested in alcohol beverages, they’re café bar options are just as tempting.

2.     VIP Movies at Yonge & Dundas

This is no ordinary movie experience – this is THE movie experience. There are a few VIP Cineplex theatres in Toronto but Yonge & Dundas is by far the best. The seats are so spacious that no one can kick your seat, genuine food and drink options are brought right to your seat and the lounge actually feels VIP.

Pro-tip: the very first row of seats (usually the have-nots of theatre seats), recline a full 180°. You’re welcome.

3.     Float Toronto

Sensory deprivation tanks aren’t an experience you can do together but the blissed out post-float vibe sure is. If you’ve never done a tank float before, this is a really cool new experience to try. Sometime all we need is to turn off the lights and shut our brain off for a while.

4.     Spa Day

This one’s pretty obvious. The ultimate way to treat yo’ self and your mom is by hitting the spa. Make it an all nighter event by hitting up one of Toronto’s hotel spas and really impress her.

Hammam Spa, the Four Seasons Spa and Spa My Blend at the Ritz Carlton are some of my favs.

5.     Sit Down for High Tea

When was the last time you had a tea party? Pre-school? Plenty of luxury Toronto hotels offer high tea services, but the Fairmont Royal York has been doing it since the 20s.

6.    Toronto Flower Market

You can’t go wrong with the classic bouquet of flowers, but this way adds something special. The Toronto Flower Market happens once a month during the spring and summer. The May date will be happening Saturday, May 13 at Shaw Park near CAMH (Queen St. West and Ossington), so treat mom to an early gift.

7.     Cooking Classes

Get your foodie on in a cooking class. Toronto’s got workshops galore here are a couple options especially for Mother’s Day:

Dish Cooking Studio is offering a ‘Brunch with Mum’ workshop on Mother’s Day Sunday

The Cookery has a Custom Cooking Class on the same day

I imagine space is going to fill up fast, so go register now!

8.    Bartending and Cocktail Workshops

Let’s get down to the really fun stuff. Not only do bartending classes count as a guaranteed fun time, but you walk away with the ultimate hosting skills.

BareBones Bartending has a cocktail workshop happening at the end of May (nothing wrong with a delayed present) with a special focus on bourbon. Yum!

For those hoping to catch a class on actual Mother’s Day Weekend, check out BartenderOne’s ‘Breaking the Ice’ workshop. Be quick: space is limited!

There you have it. Go forth and gift!

[taralaraloobell]

Light travels faster than the speed of sound, this is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.

(via high-at-winter)

[taralaraloobell]

So I’ve been doing some hand lettering stuff.  These are nowhere near the quality I want them to be but I’m making progress from the crap I was turning out a few months ago.  Practise, practise, practise!

[taralaraloobell]

Adventures in Illustrator

This week ended up being way busier than I imagined.  I had a pretty outstanding work opportunity come through on Monday that’s taken up a bit of my time, in addition to starting a cleanse (hey...for foodies like me, the willpower to survive takes up a lot of time ok?).

On top of that I’m helping a friend with a video production, so I couldn’t complete a new illustration.  HOWEVER, I do still have something for you!  I completed this fan movie poster late last year and I was pretty happy with the result.

The theme is, yet again, horror movies.  I swear, I’m a bright and happy person in real life.

This one was really fun to do because I played with a lot of elements that are essentially the basics.  There are clipping paths, overlaid with different filters and then a folded paper texture to top it off.  If I did this one again, I’d probably go back and rearrange the ‘Halloween’ title differently. Something about the way the ‘N’ hits Michael’s leg bugs me.

I do have actual illustration pieces on the go so I swear I’m not just cheating and taking a week off.  There was just nothing finished enough to present yet.  So sue me.

Next week will have a new piece, promise!  As always, feedback is welcome and encouraged.  Bless!

T

[taralaraloobell]

Adventures in Getting My Sh*t Together

Well the holidays are just about the worst time to work on your diet and general health.  I spent the Easter weekend in Chicago with the family and unfortunately that city has this thing called a deep-dish pizza.  It’s exactly as greasy, fattening and worth it as it sounds.

Look me in the eye and tell me you could resist that.

Well now that I’ve returned to reality, I am painfully aware of how old I am and that my body doesn’t recover from grease-food binges like it used to.  So, I’m considering a juice cleanse (gasp!).

I’m nervous but if there is one thing my sluggish body is telling me, it’s that I need to detox.  Hopefully a cleanse is the thing I need to get a jump start on eating right and exercising.  I’m still debating a good time to start it, but man this needs to happen pronto.

Realistically the easiest way to fail this thing is to leave the responsibility of making said juices to me.  With that in mind, I am shamelessly stealing an idea from my friend’s handbook and using juices from Total Cleanse, a juicing/cleanse company in Toronto.

I’m going to start out with a 3-day cleanse and see how it goes.  I’m sure my body probably needs a month long detox but my mind likes solid foods so I’m going realistic.

I’ve also come across a super handy food diary site: My Fitness Pal.  Not only does their food database have pretty much every food product and restaurant dish you can think of, but it also has an easy-to-use app to take on-the-go!

Using this app you can enter in your data and decide your ideal weight loss and health goals.  With this info, MyFitnessPal calculates the daily calorie intake you must stick to to meet your goals.  The greatest thing about this app is that it isn’t all about losing weight.  It keeps track of nutrition facts, such as your sugar, protein, water and fat intake.  This app is not shy about letting you know if you are not eating enough calories; it’s about overall health and safe weight loss.

Going forward, MyFitnessPal is going to make things a million times easier for me.  It keeps me accountable and the app is kind of fun to use.  We’ll see what progress I make implementing these two factors into my ‘getting it together’ plan.

Until next time beauties, T-Rock out.

[taralaraloobell]

Adventures in Illustrator

Week 3 and I’m already hitting the ‘I’m a talentless hack and giving up’ wall.  So this week’s digital doodle isn’t horrendous, but it only happened after two hours of literally hitting my head against a table.

I really wanted to do a new, original piece this week, but the gods weren’t having it.  So instead, I dug into the archives of my old sketches and found a piece I worked on back in university (oh god...so long ago).  I was pretty proud of it then so I thought it was a safe bet to update now.

The original sketch:

For all my movie buffs out there, that is Janet Lee from the infamous shower scene in Psycho.  I drew this for a class project.  Try and guess what kind of class I was taking (U of T is awesome).  The sketch was done as more of a guideline for what I later turned into a simple black and white portrait.

Similar to what I did this week.  It’s essentially a (mostly) black and white portrait...only digital.  BOOM.

I just really, really love horror movies ok?  Spoiler alert, but the next few weeks might be halloween related (I’m slightly alarmed by the slasher theme in most of my old sketches).  Besides, Easter is over SO HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

In another development: I’ve found a site called Skillshare.com with free tutorials and courses in the digital arts persuasion!  I’m going to start going through a few in the next couple of weeks and see if they’re beneficial.  

So I’ll probably stick to these digital doodles and maybe some layout design for a while until I’ve absorbed enough tutorials for me to feel comfortable working on things like patterns and more complicated illustrations.  Bare with me!

Until next time folks, T-Rock out!

[taralaraloobell]

Adventures in Getting My Sh*t Together

Oh no, I’m on a roll.  Remember how I said that motivation, routine and general keeping of resolutions were my ultimate weakness? Let’s watch Tara flail around to try and change that!

Here’s where my life is a coffee-riddled hot mess and I plan on getting it together like an actual adult

1. Diet and Nutrition - Admittedly I’ve made huge progress in this area since the new year.  I genuinely used to live off fast food, take-out, restaurants and general badness.  Shamefully I must admit that I had pop way too often than can possibly be healthy.

I’ve managed to dramatically bring down the number of times I eat out per week but there’s still a long way to go.  I face a number of hurtles here.  It’s just me and my mom in the house and let me tell you, two is the wrong number for making meals.

Second, my brother in law has a test kitchen.  With a deep fryer.  Oh god.

Third, patio season is coming up, and like most Canadians, the second the sun comes out my butt needs to be parked on a patio sipping a mojito and eating appies.  The endorphins make me do it.

2. Exercise and Health - Yet another area the new year has brought progress.  I’ve joined a gym!  Again!  The difference is that I’ve actually been going - a strange concept I know.  There’s still room for improvement though, like in everything.

It’s a ‘when it rains it pours’ situation.  I keep it up religiously for a couple weeks and then get swept up in new projects or events and abandon the ritual for another couple.  I need to find consistency in this area and ways to keep it up.

3. Career Development - I work freelance jobs in social media, copywriting and graphic design but currently only have a couple of clients.  This translates into not nearly enough income to support myself financially (this will tie into my next life shamble).  My aim is to develop my business materials and portfolio (follow my Adventures in Illustration!) to a professional standard and take on new clients.

4. Buy my own place - I am a 21 year old still living in my parent’s house!  Ok, I’m 25 but I still get carded so it counts right?  Now let’s set the record straight: in this day and age, living with your folks at 25 is not humiliating or shameful.  Save your money, make smart choices, work hard, you are completely normal.

Having said that, I have reached the point in my life where I am 100% ready to be out on my own and I’m starting to develop a case of cabin fever (see the movie for reference - it’s exactly like that).  

Know what I daydream about at night?  Walks through IKEA where I furnish my imaginary apartment in Liberty Village.  Strolling through my neighbourhood and not running into people from high school.  Making coffee in a cheap dollar store coffee pot because it’s all I can afford.  Actually lying down on my couch without my mother yelling ‘NO! THAT CHAIR IS NEW DON’T SIT ON IT.’  So what every girl wants really.

5. Sleep schedule - My internal alarm clock has pushed for me to be nocturnal since I was an baby.  Like every other tumblr user, sunlight makes me desperate for coffee but as soon as the stars come out at 9 every night, suddenly the second wind kicks in.  

I’ve come to the conclusion that adults do not live this way and that I’m missing out on vital experiences like ‘sunlight’, ‘social interaction’ and ‘9 am.’  Not sure if I’m exactly desperate to see 9 am but I hear it’s cool.

In the perfect world I would get up at 6 or 7 every morning, go to the gym, actually put on pants and lip gloss and take on my responsibilities with the rest of the productive world.  I’m going to start small though.

My problem is no matter how tired I am, my body says sleep but my brain always says ‘LET’S OVER ANALYZE YOUR ENTIRE DAY AND PANIC ABOUT WHAT YOU DIDN’T GET DONE’.  And then the restless leg starts creeping into my ankles and calves and I’ll shift around: sweet relief!  Another 60 seconds later, it’ll creep back in until I feel like all the blood is rushing to my legs.  Move around again.  60 seconds later...you get the idea.

I’m willing to try any and every weird or proven method to fix this one because I. NEED. SLEEP.

How am I tackling these challenges?

Well that’s what I’m going to find out.  Over the next few weeks I’m going to document my different ideas and attempts to build a healthy lifestyle routine (ha!).  I plan on making updates on my progress and sharing the different things I try; what works and what doesn’t.  Eventually I hope to achieve Pokemon Master status and become a real adult!

Join me in what will surely be a pathetic adventure that will make you feel a thousand times better about yourself.  Share some of your lifestyle tips, tricks and talents with me.  Teach me how to adult.

[taralaraloobell]

Adventures in Illustrator

Well wouldn’t you know it, the fates have aligned to gift me with a legit design job this week!  Ok, it’s through family, but it’s still a portfolio-worth project.

My brother-in-law is having open house for the test kitchen and showroom his business uses in May (you know, the one that’s threatening to send me into a deep-fried binge on a daily basis) and I’ve been recruited to design the invitations!

The inspiration for these came primarily from the company logo. With the nature of his business, there wasn’t a lot of room to go crazy design-wise.  For me, this is always a bigger challenge, trying to find a balance between modest, professional and engaging.  Corporate materials have a tendency to lean towards the dull.

I experimented with a number of fonts, scripts and layouts until they narrowed it down to these two as their favourite.  I’m fairly happy with the result considering the time constraints I was given (pretty quick deadline) and how much text had to fit on the card.  Next time I would like to experiment a touch more with backgrounds and border designs to avoid it looking so text heavy.

As always, I’d love your input, feedback, and tips!

Until next time, T has left the building.

[taralaraloobell]

For someone who is tired 100% of the time, I sure am bad at sleeping.

[taralaraloobell]

Adventures in Illustrator

Ok I made a digital doodle for this week!  So far so good! (I’m setting the bar low)

It’s small.  I’m starting really small.  But there’s love in this.  Because I love nothing more than I love coffee.

Can you feel the love?  So essentially this is an illustration I made using an existing photo as reference.  I’m pretty happy with how the actual coffee material turned out.  I’m satisfied with the actual mug.  I’m going to pretend the shadowing part is a file error or something and ignore it completely.

I have a really long way to go but this is a decent start considering I was planning on starting at rock bottom.  Feedback and tips (especially to improve on the shadowing part that I’m absolutely not talking about) are more than welcome!

T-Rock out.

[taralaraloobell]

well this social situation isn’t going the way i acted it out in the shower

[taralaraloobell]

Adventures in Illustrator

Do you know what my dream job looks like?  Creating art and designing in any way, shape or form, from dusk til dawn.

Know what kinda job can allow me to do that?  Graphic design.

Know what you need to work in graphic design?  A portfolio.

Know what I don’t have?  You guessed it, a portfolio.

Thus comes my endeavour to park myself in front of computer for as long as possible and churn out some design pieces.  Unfortunately, even though I’m addicted to efficiency in my professional life - personally? Motivation, routine and generally sticking to resolutions are my tragic character flaws (I’m awesome at pretty much everything else, so I can humbly admit to that).

So I’m challenging myself to complete one design a week and post it here on my blog.  I figure if I can’t keep myself accountable, maybe you gorgeous people can (be mean, be relentless, be drill sergeant ruthless)

The Goals

1. Produce one design or illustration piece per week

2. Use this practise to dramatically increase my skill set in Adobe Creative Suite, particularly illustrator

The Ideas

I want to explore every option possible and run the gamut of topics, styles and objects.

I’m starting small: basic objects, experimenting with style, brainstorming logos and branding.  Eventually I want to work up to more complicated and intricate pieces like editorial and layout design, type design and script, as well as my most feared hurdle: the intricate, ‘drink ALL the coffee!’ gig poster.

Since I’m still in a perpetual post-university state of mind where I feel all creativity has been sucked from my very soul, any suggestions and requests from you lovely people would make me cry tears of gratitude which I will deftly hide behind sarcasm and awkward humour.  In other words: your input would be much appreciated!

So thanks for listening, you guys are spectacular.  I hope to have the first little doodle up over the weekend!

[taralaraloobell]

Wake me up before you go-go #interiors

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Clarissa's Top Five

Each week we post the top five creative inspiration links from our designer Clarissa.  Take a look at this week’s selection of creative inspiration:

"Enhance Your Lighting" GE Commercial - ItsNiceThat.com

"Flickr’s 20under20" - Creative Review

"Elegantissima: The Exhibit" - Louise Fili

"Land Carpet" - Florianpucher.com

"Brauhaus Brew Labs" - lovelypackage.com

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Annie Owens

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Monogram Monday - Check out this week’s monogram from Spin!