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What I Wore This Week

July 18, 2016Sara Leave a Comment

First I want to say that if anyone has sent me an email and I have not responded I didn’t receive it because I have officially replied to everyone that I have received. I noticed that several messages sent through my contact form got stuck in the server and never went through so I want to sincerely apologize to anyone this may have happened to and if you want to resend me the message then send it directly to me at hello@livelovesara.com this email goes directly to my phone.

It was Ribfest this week in town and it was conveniently located across the street, so this weekend was filled with award-winning ribs and funnel cakes. Back to your regularly schedules program of eating okayish and exercising this week. Our library which is also located across the street is on strike. So unfortunately I haven’t been able to take my kids to any of the summer programs they have running. This is leading to trying to find a way to cut down on the amount of screen time they have right now. I admit that they have a lot but my oldest has Minecraft classes where she builds in groups with other kids around the world. She spends a lot of time on these servers which is okay with me since I love Minecraft and team work 😉 It’s also too hot hang outside for very long in the concrete jungle, so I am thankful we have an indoor pool to get some exercise. Oh, and of course Pokemon Go because who isn’t doing it?

As mentioned on many occasions my kids are massive Harry Potter fans. There probably isn’t a day goes by that there isn’t a HP movie running in the background somewhere. It’s our nightly reading book with my youngest. I read them with Roo at this age and she has read the series I ongoing since. She just keeps re-reading and re-reading and listening to audio books. I’ve had to replace her Prisoner of Azkaban three times due to her wearing it out. I credit the series with taking her love of reading to a whole new level. So to say we have a lot of Harry Potter stuff is an understatement. I bought them quite a few of the HP lego sets a few years ago. They have been in a storage bin since we moved in to this place because there wasn’t room to display them, but we finally figured out a spot and opened the bin this weekend to see than many of them have fallen to pieces. I swear I almost cried when I saw that because I spent a solid 10-12 hours building all the sets for them on Christmas eve so they woke up to a Harry Potter Village. It involved many tears and massive amounts of wine to complete so to see it in a state was upsetting. We have started to slowly rebuild the sets, this time it involves not only wine, but crazy glue as well. Never again 😉

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Value Village Haul for June

July 13, 2016Sara 5 Comments

I said I would try to do a monthly purchase post every month when I bought new items for my wardrobe. I didn’t buy anything new in June so I decided to show my Value Village haul instead. We try to thrift shop once a week since their turnover is so great and there are always new things to go through every time awe go. If we get up and out the door early enough we drive around trying to hit as many as we can (which is a lot because there are more than a dozen in a reasonable driving distance that we can hit). I don’t usually find a lot of clothes in thrift stores, but I always seem to find some little stuff for the house that I like.

Wool/felt hat – This one is old, well-made and never appears to have been used. It’s a man’s hat but I have a big head so it fits, and is smoke grey with a black band. It’s the only wardrobe item I bought. $6
I like weird things. This is a stash box disguised as an old book. It is made from wood and felt lined. The image on the front is a copy of a medieval painting of St. George the Victorious (AD 275–281 to 23 April 303). I love things like this. Four years ago we were right at the worst we ever were financially. We were so broke that, that Christmas I decided to make the girls as many of their gifts that I could. As much as I hate sewing, I can do it so I pulled out my machine I hadn’t used in ages and went searching about for inexpensive fabric or things that can be pulled apart to use as fabric and got to work. I made dolls, doll clothes, masks, clothes, cloud decorations for their room (used this as a guide but made my own pattern), and a clubhouse. One of the only items I didn’t sew was a stash box I made for Roo like the one above, but I made it from an old copy of her favourite book (Prisoner of Azkaban) by following these instructions. It was tedious but it turned out really well. She still has it and uses it so I guess it was well worth the time and effort. $2.50
Berlitz Self-Teacher Italian version from 1950. I collect language learning books and I am always on the look out for old editions because the older ones always seem like they are the most thorough. $1.29
A set of 5 cafeteria style sectioned glass plates. Now I don’t have to hear “I can’t eat that, it’s touching” anymore. Anything that makes life a little easier 😉 $5 for all 5
A Hamilton Beach drink/milkshake mixer. You know, because I need the excuse to make a milkshake. I love the retro colour and the way it looks on the counter top. It also works well as a bribery tool. “Clean your room and I will make you a milkshake” works every time. $6.99

Grand Total: $21.28

Big spender.

Have you found any thrifting gems lately?

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What to pack for Spain and Italy

July 6, 2016Sara 9 Comments

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May Monthly Purchases

June 14, 2016Sara Leave a Comment

So I actually meant to make this post at the beginning of June but apparently my blog organization sucks. Which is code for typing things in notes on my phone at 3am when it pops in to my head and then totally forgetting I did it. It would probably work if I remembered to check notes periodically.

I thought I would start doing a monthly round-up of things that I purchased through the month for a twofold purpose,

1. to show you how much I spend on new items per month, and
2. to keep a record of this for myself as well because we all know how fast those debit charges add up when you aren’t keeping track.

It can even be shocking how much you spend on coffees alone. That’s one of the first things that a financial advisor will tell you to do when you start working with them is to keep a spending diary (not just for clothing but everything) that way both you and they will get a better idea of where the money goes and how they can help you make a plan to better it. Yes, I have been to a financial advisor.

I have never been one to spend tons of money per month on myself. Even when I was young and had a disposable income I didn’t spend that much even though I worked in a mall and spent my breaks “shopping”. The temptation literally surrounded me and in hindsight I am proud of keeping a reign on it because it could have been bad.

My purchases for May were my cross body from Urban Outfitters for $64.00, lace up leather flats from Zara for $49.90, and some black pants also from Zara for $35.90.

Grand Total: $149.80

I also bought a Poäng chair (in the black-brown wood and Finnsta Gray cushion) and yellow Ofelia throw from Ikea but that doesn’t count in my clothing budget. Plus, we actually needed a new chair so it wasn’t an impulse buy.

Do you have any good organizational apps or suggestions to help me get my shit together?

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What I Wore This Week

May 31, 2016Sara Leave a Comment

We seemed to have bypassed spring and went straight to summer over last week. When most people think of Canada they think that it is cold all the time, or that our summers don’t get very hot. They do. In Southern Ontario where I live it’s not a dry heat either. It’s the super humid, air so thick you can’t breathe kind of heat. Where you stick to the furniture, your hair goes really frizzy, and you don’t want to venture out of the air conditioning. Last week and this weekend the temperatures hit 38°C (100°F) which is way past my comfort zone and makes me worry what it’s going to be like in July and August if it is this hot now.

This led me to reevaluate my wardrobe and find another hole, some lighter fabric tanks are missing. I was able to find a nice lightweight, loose tank with crochet (I think it’s crochet) straps and border across the top at Value Village on Sunday. I think this will be a nice comfortable option to wear on days like today.

I love Value Village but you really have to dedicate time to it because there is so much to go through. I was lucky and found the top relatively quickly because Merle usually doesn’t wait patiently after a certain amount of time and I get rushed and miss things. Thrifting has really been a lot more misses than hits for me lately which is probably due to the quick season changeover and everyone having the same idea as me. Sundays are usually our dedicated thrift days. I go through and purge the apartment during the week and we make a donation on Sundays as well (I aim for every Sunday but I usually like to wait until the donation bag is full first which sometimes takes a few weeks). When I moved the rooms around last weekend I was able to get rid of a lot of stuff, and for every medium bag (ours is usually one of those blue Ikea bags) that you donate you get a card for up to 30% off your purchase. Purge, donate, and get 30% off your purchase. Sounds good.

Do you like thrifting?

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Exceptional Customer Service from Ikea

May 30, 2016Sara Leave a Comment

Reunited with her friend she thought was lost forever.

For the many years that I worked in retail it was repeatedly drilled in to our heads that a person who had a bad customer service experience would tell twice as many people about it than they would when they had a good experience. Today I am going to tell a lot of people about a good experience I had this weekend at Ikea. On Friday we made a quick trip to there to pick up some bedding because we were having guests and while we have lots of sheets, we are quite slim in the blankets/duvet area. Merle brought her favourite stuffed animal, a chipmunk she named I.T. Bone with her. She brings him everywhere. Everywhere. So it was bound to happen right? After 4 years of bringing him everywhere we were bound to lose him at some point and that point was Friday.

I don’t know if it was because it was wasn’t as busy as usual on Friday morning or because shopping at Ikea brings out the part of you that wants to run in to every fake room setup and try out all the closets, bathrooms, and kitchens. Whatever the reason at some point as I was following the arrows to the designated area I wanted to go, and the girls were weaving in and out of places looking at everything like they haven’t been out of the house before, and we lost him. I didn’t realize until we reached the warehouse part so when we tried to retrace our steps it was pretty much impossible to remember every nook and cranny that they passed through. I knew looking was pointless but I thought that maybe someone had found him on the floor and placed him up where he could easily be spotted. I was hoping anyway. Nope. This is when reality set in for Merle and she realized he might be gone forever and she got really quiet and cried. We went through a few more times, but when I realized that searching was futile I checked out our purchases and made a stop at the lost and found on the way by just in case someone turned him in, but to no avail.

Tom works near that Ikea and promised her that he would stop by daily to check the lost and found since the guy who helped us said that sometimes it takes a few days for things to show up and be brought down there. I was kind of feeling powerless which seems like and over reaction over a stuffed animal but when it’s your child and it’s something they treasure the most in the world you do what you can so I went on Twitter and Facebook. I didn’t know which one was the best avenue so I posted a similar post to each (well, twitter has a character limit but I got the gist across) I tagged Ikea Canada in my Twitter post and then posted to the Ikea Canada Facebook page. I received a response via Twitter really quickly letting me know that they had contacted the store where we lost it and they will be in touch once they hear back. They said it probably wouldn’t be until Monday but I heard back today (Saturday) at noon that he had been found and was in the customer service office waiting for us. I messaged back with the time we would be there to pick him up and we did. When we got there everyone was polite, courteous, and seemed happy that they found him for her. This meant a lot to us.

While this may not seem like a huge deal to some people this was huge to a 5-year-old little girl who felt like she lost her best friend on Friday.

So thank you Ikea for going above and beyond what I was expecting. Thank you for helping ease her heart that day. We won’t forget.

Your loyal customer before, and now even more so,

Sara