Hey guys, happy Friday! I hope that you're all ready for the weekend, I know that we sure are. I'm excited for brunch, baking some delicious treats, taking Rudie on a puppy playdate, and doing some work/diy's around the apartment. Do you have any big plans for this weekend?

Thought I would do a little CURRENTLY post. This one mostly revolves around the apartment, but hopefully that's ok with you.

WITH:

Hanging out with this little dude most days. He's pretty happy lounging on our new couch. And hey, I actually pulled out my SLR today and shot some photos - so yay for progress!

MAKING:

I've been planning to do some IKEA hacks around our new place. I have a love/hate relationship with IKEA. I LOVE the modern design aesthetic at an affordable cost. But, I HATE that whenever you walk into another young person's home/apartment, you find half your furniture. When it came to choosing furniture for our new place, I bought some pricier statement pieces that I knew we could keep for years, or sell later on if our tastes changed (ex. the Eames Surfboard table). And when it came to picking pieces from IKEA, I chose things that I knew would be easily customizable. That's where these little tapered legs come in!

I had planned on purchasing some of these Pretty Pegs, but decided they were a little pricy (they were more expensive than the KALLAX units I planned to attach them to). After doing a little research, I found these tapered Waddell legs for a seriously low price.

Since I'm no DIY master, and this is my first real stab at an IKEA hack, keeping this project low-cost was important to me. I used this fantastic Brush N' Leaf to make the feet gold! Still need to stain the wood, and attach to the IKEA units, but they are coming along nicely I think.

FEELING:

A little nostalgic for our old place. Boston/Brighton is great, but I really miss Toronto, and our old neighbourhood. I decided to pull out these little guys, and set up one of our side tables like the one we had back home. It's funny how little touches can make your space feel more your own. Rooster souvenirs are a long-running joke between Pedro and I, and they have started to pop up all over our apartment. This collection was brought back from our various trips to Brazil.

WATCHING:

Nerds! I love 30 Rock so much. I think that this is about my fifth time marathoning the show (not including originally watching the show, or watching random episodes). Liz Lemon, you are my hero. Thanks for proving that you can have it all ;)

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Hope you guys have an awesome weekend!

Until next time,

Alex

Bup-baaaa... this is the sound of settling... Settling into our new place in Boston, and into this new space online (and as you can see above, Rudie has certainly made himself at home). So this is it guys. After a whole lot of thinking + plotting + planning, I've decided today is the day to launch YYZ -> BOS.

As you may have noticed over the past week, I have been switching all my domain links, info, etc. to the new domain (http://www.yyztobos.com) across the interweb, and setting everything up over here design-wise. Just to be clear, If you decide to keep following along - this space will be similar to POLKA DOTTED PIXELS, but different. However, the change was mostly brought about because of domain issues (and the itch to start a new project). I promise the content will be even better :) Check out my ABOUT page for a little more info about me, and what you can expect to find here.

YYZ -> BOS is ultimately a blog about my life/style/lifestyle. My life is not perfect (not even close), but it's mine. It's been a tough, awesome, scary, wonderful (and everything in between) kind of year for my little family. Looking back, we have embarked on some pretty amazing adventures, and this space is a way of chronicling them. Creating an archive so that I don't forget this time in our lives as it moves on and on.

So here you will find me in search of balance (the constant struggle), a collection of pretty things, and making my home away from home.

Here's a few snapshots from my phone/Instagram over the last couple weeks (excuse the photo quality, I still haven't unpacked my SLR.. baby steps.. ahha):

You know how sometimes you feel like your move is never going to end? Moving to another country is about 10000000x more stressful/complicated/insane (and had a lot of parts to it). When we were finally able to get into our new place, we welcomed crashing on the floor (and by the way, I'm kind of obsessed with our hardwood).

I've had quite the time picking furniture + decor for our new space. I had been fawning over these floor poufs (mint one from Land of Nod, and blood orange one from CB2), and they finally arrived last week. What a happy mail day that was!

Breaking in our brand new wine glasses after a long day of unpacking (left), and our first meal (bacon + eggs + toast + americano) in our new kitchen, at our minty kitchen table (right) - yumm! And yes, if I have my way, our apartment will be a sea of mint and gold.

Sketching little mock-ups of our place in a new journal. Trying to plan for wall shelves + frames + other decor (on the left). Night stand progress (though it has since changed)... Gettin' crafty with Rub N' Buff (that vase/can used to be bright red), and experimenting with the Wit N' Delight for Target Ceramic Diamond Tray (on the right).

And lastly, my favourite piece (and the first thing we moved into our apartment), our Eames/Herman Miller Surfboard Table. This guy is truly amazing - it's about 8 ft long.. haha. But it works really well with our super long couch (the Movie Sofa from CB2, seen here in Salt + Pepper, but ours is in Espresso, a colour no longer available), which is also huge.

Our little place is starting to feel settled, but it's not quite there yet. This week I'm going to tackle my desk/office + yoga/meditation space. I'm also making wall shelves + photo frames a priority this week. I don't know why, but I've got it in my head that our place won't feel like home until there are prints + photos on the walls.

Until next time,

Alex