giveaway: chantilly songs

today i have a lovely little giveaway brought to you by miss chantilly of chantilly songs who is a brilliant musician and is wanting to give you both of her albums; her new EP up to the moon & her older album caught light

to enter:

[you must be a follower of this blog]

+ make yourself a cup of tea, visit her bandcamp page, have a listen, then come back & tell me your favourite song!

bonus entries:

+ follow chantilly's blog

+ follow chantilly on twitter

that's 3 easy peasy ways to enter and to bring some new, pretty music into your life! her music makes me want to grab a glass of wine and sit on my balcony as the sun is setting...ahh, blissful.

winner will be chosen june 5th, good luck!

ps: i am guest posting over here today, this enchanted pixie with a little post on what makes me happy! and also over on wake up, lovely for the 'get real' series on blogging what you love, join me!

wishes

my birthday is just around the corner - the 13th of june so i thought i'd put together a little etsy birthday 'wish list' ...dream big, right?

i love love love this pretty little dress

as much as i adore big rings, lately i've been feeling somewhat simple, maybe it's the lightness of summer - either way, this ring is lovely

this adorable crop top would be perfect for the insane summer weather we've been getting lately

this print is way too precious. my heart is melting

this just may be the cutest boots i've ever laid eyes on

this is hands down the cutest bag i have ever seen. i would purposely take overnight trips just so i could use this gorgeous bag!

a little love

i apologize in advance as i'm going to go a little sappy on you guys right now. it's not too often that i do so i figured it was alright. 

mikey has been away in kelowna, BC for the week on a little unexpected visit to see his dad and some family and holy hell, have i ever missed him. mikey & i have never been apart for this long before and it's funny when you're so used to being around someone all of the time, how different everything feels when they're not around. things just don't feel right when your best friend & boyfriend is not there to share things with. we've been together for 4 1/2 years so you'd think a week wouldn't feel as long as it did.

absence truly does make the heart grow fonder, i firmly believe that. i also firmly believe that i will hands down be spending the rest of my life with this guy - and i cannot wait ♥

cute loafers for sale!

hey ladies,

so i bought a pair of shoes from modcloth and was sent the wrong ones (these guys) and as much as i think they're pretty cute, shiny & leopard print just aren't my style so i was wondering if anyone here would like to buy them from me. they've never been worn and are a size 7.5

if you'd like to make me an offer, shoot me an email at dear.love@live.ca & we can chat! at this point i'll take just about anything as i won't wear them and it would be a shame to let them go to waste!

& the winner is...

the winner of the ugglebo clogs giveaway is visa from 1finedai

congratulations! email me at dear.love@live.ca & we'll get you connected with ugglebo to claim your prize!

thanks everyone for entering & i'll be back soon with another awesome giveaway.

ugglebo clogs giveaway - there's still time!

today (monday) is the last day to enter to win a pair of the rio grande clogs from ugglebo. if you haven't entered yet, you might be going crazy so you better look into that - after you enter of course!

click here to win cute shoes!

THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED!

the best time!

you guys i think i may have just had one of the best weekends i've had in a really long time! friday night after work i took the bus to toronto to my cousin eryn's place. we spent the night catching up over a bottle of wine on her rooftop patio as it was a beautiful night. saturday we drank too much coffee & then headed to blog podium where we met up with new and old friends & fellow bloggers. it was such a lovely event which was put together so wonderfully. i really feel like i took a lot away from the event as everyone who spoke had something interesting to say and they really targeted a lot of key topics that i have been thinking of more and more for my own blog. 

after some mingling, wine & meeting/picking up some awesome goodies from the sponsors of the event, a bunch of us grabbed some food at everest on queen west in celebration of elycia's birthday. we bid farewell to a few people & the remaining ladies carried on to rachel's and then went out for a night on the town! what a fun evening, holy moly!! if you follow any of us on instagram you would have seen a very small portion of the fun and craziness that ensued. these ladies are awesome! we seriously had way too much fun together:

holly of holly knitlightly 

elycia (& ivan!) from love elycia

eryn from red food colouring 

rachel from the paper hearts blog

julie from the life of a cupcake

chantilly from my girl thursday

kait from miss kait online

ang from the sunshine memoir

mel from smiles from mel

& some fun smilebooth photos:

 (pretty sure this was the jumping one, lol)

 so many unexpected candids!

there are more photos here & here

also, i kept this mostly short & sweet because i have read so many amazing re-caps already, like julie's which you can read here and i also thought that adriane did a really thorough review of the event & what she learned which you can read here

eeee, overall it was just a really, really, really great time. it's so awesome spending time with people that you have so much in common with and geeking out over blog related stuff. i'm wishing we could re-do yesterday over & over again...i'm sad it's over but we already have plans for more summer adventures soon!

there were so many times when we were out (ex: at dinner) & i kept thinking "man, if other people were listening to us talk" haha, they'd have no idea what/who we were talking about...

you know you're with bloggers when:

+ you have to make it a rule that everyone puts away their iphones over dinner

+ talking about other bloggers as if you've met/are BFFs

+ dinner is interrupted by a 'very important announcement' that rachel had just read on her phone (bleubird vintage is having a boy!) lol, yes this actually happened

+ everyone is documenting everrrrything

+ instagram is a topic of almost every conversation

+ you refer to other people by their online persona/name

blog podium weekend!

it's going to be a little quiet around here this weekend as i am heading to toronto after work tomorrow to stay with my cousin erin of red food colouring for the weekend! i am SUPER excited for this weekend for a number of reasons...

a) erin & i hardly get to see each other & we get a whole weekend!

b) blog podium!!!! woooo, heading to this blog conference saturday

c) friends!! meeting bloggy friends that i haven't yet (holly, rachel) & some that i have already & love (chantilly, elycia, kait, julie) 

d) drinking, dancing, FUN!

i'm super, super excited!! it's going to be a great weekend!

insta-lately

in no particular order, photos from the last week:

 spent the night/day at the cottage this weekend (no filter, just beauty)

 speaking of beauties, i posted this photo on instagram on mother's day, my beautiful momma

 lianne came for a visit! andy loves her

 went for dinner twice in the past week to mikey's mums which was lovely

 the lake in the reflection of mikey's tumbleweeds

 ol' stink eye hehe

 found these gorgeous bushes outside our porch, lilacs are my favourite

 fave snack lately

 pretty bouquet from said bushes

 thursday night girls night at jess' lots of giggles

 my friends are the prettiest

 haha this unicorn puppet i got elliott for his bday got lots of laughs that night!

 shooting practice on the deck (pellet gun)

overall i've had a busy but lovely week and weekend. lot's of working but also just enough time to relax and rejuvenate! i have a 3 day work week this week then i am off to toronto for the weekend for the blog conference where i get to meet up with a bunch of people!! i absolutely cannot wait :) spending time with this little lady is going to be great as we don't often get to see each other, not to mention all of the other great bloggers & friends i am beyond excited to meet/see! it's going to be a lovely week...the weather has been insanely nice too!