Window Shopping Wednesday: Mother's Day Ideas

With May 1st comes a slew of events in our family. Something about August just turns up the fertility apparently. There are lots of birthdays, including my Oma, my sister, Philip's dad, Philip's brother, and Philip!  

I've definitely been keeping my eye out for great gifts to celebrate all of these May babies, as well as Mother's Day. I've finished shopping for Philip, started for Jonathan, but still have my sister and father-in-law to go! 

I thought we'd talk Mother's Day gifts today for our Window Shopping feature, because most of us have Mother's while not all of us have brother-in-law Jonathan.




Each year I buy my mom a book. It's a tradition I started a few years ago, because there aren't tons of things my mom needs, but everyone can use a good book. I like picking out something I think she'll like, and then I write a note in the cover as a keepsake. I started doing the same with Philip's mom as well, because I think it's a nice tradition. I've already got their books picked out and high up in my closet in hiding (psst mother's this is not permission to snoop when you come over!). If you're still looking for a mother's day gift though, here are some ideas.

This cup and saucer set is so sophisticated and feminine. I love the mixes of shades of pink and gold! 

A magazine subscription makes a great gift, and some magazines (such as Real Simple, which I'm partial to and have subscribed to for a few years) even have promotions going on that make them a pretty good deal! 

Tuesday's with Morrie is my very favourite book in the world, and a recommended read. If your mom likes to read like mine does, this would make a great gift. 

If your mom likes to bake, this cookie cutter set from Ikea is about as adorable as it gets. Who doesn't want cookies in the shape of woodland animals? It's also super affordable at 3.99, you could put it in a basket of baking things for a themed gift.

A good old breakfast in bed never ceases to please, and this crepe square with ham and egg looks interesting. Some other things to do for mom: dishes, mop/vacuum, and fresh flowers are good too!

In our family, a scarf goes over really well. With my mom, sister, and I we had tons of scarves - moving out was quite the scarf dividing ceremony. This pretty Spring scarf from Stella & Dot is beautiful.

This card from Smock Paper is delightful, it's beautiful and sure to make your mother feel cherished. 

If your mom has a good sense of humor, this might be right up her alley. Some E-Cards has some hilarious cards, I picked one out for my mom while browsing for one to include here, I'll have to keep you posted on if she likes it!

Hopefully after this you'll be more prepared for Mother's Day (which is only a week and a half away by the way), I think most mom's would be happy with any of these beautiful gifts! I know I'm looking forward to celebrating with my mom's and making sure they know how loved they are. 

Would You Tues: About You

Out of curiosity...

How old are you?



Do you wear dresses or pants? (traditional gender roles FTW)


Do you live in Winnipeg?

More Money Monday: Step 3

Now that you've begun tracking your spending, and have identified your goals, it's time to get started on your budget! 

Step 3: Income

Step 3 is pretty straight forward, think about where your incoming money comes from and write it down. Easy as that! It should be a bit easier than other steps because it typically stays a lot more steady and it's easier to figure out than say how much you spend on entertainment or groceries. You may need to dig through the filing cabinet or look online at your bank account to find some of the information, but once you've found it you'll be well on your way. 

To get started, use this free printable and fill in the columns, following along with the points below. 

1. List the ways that you receive money. Some typical items here would be your pay cheques, getting a bonus from work, maybe you make a little bit of money on the side through contract work, being a Mary Kay lady or somesuch, or even babysitting. 
On our budget these lines include Cass' pay cheque, Philip's pay cheque, Philip's work bonus, our tax return. We also have a line for miscellaneous revenue to allow a place for any gifts or unexpected money we take in, and a line for payable which helps us to track money that we've received but know we need to pay back out right away (say, if we earned money that hadn't been taxed, and we want to make sure we aren't led into thinking that the money we got is all ours). 

2. Calculate the amount you receive each month or year for these items. You'll find that it's easier to list things like pay cheques monthly, and things like tax returns yearly. For the annual budget, multiply bi-weekly paycheques by 26 to see how much you're raking in each year.

It's as easy as that, you now know more about your income than you did before. 

Extra Credit:

1. Now that you've tracked your income, look at your goals sheet and see if there is anything you can add that is income related. Do you want to make more money? How will you achieve it? Write these down in the "How I can drive this income" column.

If you're handy in excel (Philip is, I'm not), you can create your budget in the computer so that as you manipulate numbers you can see what it can look like with some of the differences you plan to make through your goals.

Sparks and Recreation

This Apartment Therapy link is all about games...something that Philip and I make a big part of our leisure time. You can find us playing a game at least 3 times a week, so maybe we'll have to make one of these. I'm especially loving the giant outdoor Scrabble board!

Since we've been talking about budgeting and finances lately, this blog post is a great addition to that. You can pay off your debt, and this is a great testimony to just that.

As Spring finally begins to arrive, some of you might be gearing up to do some gardening. This post talks about some of the great reasons to start a vegetable garden in your own backyard. 

Have a sticky label to remove? This DIY Goo Remover is a great solution, and the free printable labels are the icing on the cake. 

Hope you enjoy this weekend, I'm always tempted to buy rain boots when I see them in the store because they're so adorable but I talk myself out of it because "when will I wear them?". Today I would wear them. There are some very splashable puddles in our yard and I can't wait for it all to dry up so I can go and explore the yard we bought this house for. 

The Great Bathtub Caper of 2013

I had intended to leave this post room today for Philip, until something unexpected happened about an hour ago...as you can tell from the title, it was bathtub heist related. 

Let's start at the beginning...when we were gutting our bathroom, we had loaded up a trailer with some of the discards including the old vanity, bathtub, and some general debris. The trailer wasn't even close to full, so we left it for a bit until we could continue our project and fill it up. Philip was in the middle of Dinner Theater at the time so we didn't have a lot of time for gutting and were taking our time. It turned out it was my aunt and uncle's trailer and they needed it for a project, so they came to get it and we just emptied it out. Next to our garage there's an extra parking pad, and so we just put it there for the time being - like rednecks, we had a bathtub in our back lane now. 

For a few months now, it's rested there safely and securely, waiting for the long awaited journey to the dump. 

Yesterday as we were pulling into the garage, I noticed that the vanity was tipped. Didn't think a lot of it, wind was really gusting that day so just assumed it tipped through a combination of gusting wind and supportive snow melting away. It wasn't in good condition and was headed for the dump anyway so I wasn't worried enough to go check it out. 

This morning, it was soo nice outside, so I went to do a little walk around the yard, especially as I noticed that almost our whole garden is uncovered in the back! Yesterday only about 1/4-1/3 was exposed from under the snow, and now the whole thing is! Anyway...back to the tub. 

All of a sudden I was thinking...there's the tipped vanity...but where is the tub?? 

I could be wrong here, but I'm pretty sure someone stole our back lane dumpster bound bathtub. This is hilarious to me. I don't know why. It was peach colored  peeling, been outside in the Winnipeg Winter elements for a couple of months, and really really heavy. How did they pull this off without us noticing? 

We don't really mind, it actually saves us a trip to the dump because the rest of the stuff has been tagging along in the garbage bin each week as it fits, and this was the main big thing to get rid of. I wish they would have knocked on the door and asked, we would have easily let them have it for free and could have made a new neighborly bond out of it. Now instead we know there is a weird bathtub stealing neighbor on the loose! 

I'm happy for them though. They got a free tub, they're probably feeling pretty triumphant. I hope they're going to use it for something cool, like a super ugly backyard planter, or a toboggan! I hope that each time they use it they feel joy at their back-lane find. 

Thank you neighbors for saving us a trip to the dump, next time knock, if you're into weird old bath tubs we probably have some other neat stuff that would tickle your fancy...we could have been friends.

I hope this really strange Friday post was enjoyable to you, this stolen bathtub has brought me a lot of laughs today and I just thought I'd pass them on.