marvelous miscellany

A cousin of mine is due to have her first baby just a bit over a week before I am. I bought them a shower gift this morning, and had fun wrapping it and making a tag. I love grommets!
The quince branches are producing lots of leaves, but this is the only cluster of flowers to appear so far. I'll enjoy them just as much as if there were 10.
While I was in Halifax, I saw these flip flops and fell in love with them. I didn't buy them initially, but when the teacher I was with mentioned stopping back at the store, I decided to get them after all.
Another stop in Halifax was at Lee Valley. I LOVE this place! It's not a regular store... you go in and fill out a small order sheet either by hand or on a computer (if you know what you're looking for), pass it to the clerk, and they disappear into the cavernous warehouse and come back with exactly the things you asked for! Just like magic. They have very neat gardening stuff, tools, and an amazing selection of hardware for cabinets, doors, etc. I bought this completely biodegradable weed rug, which is made of corn starch. Who comes up with these things? I'm eager to try it with some of our vegetables this summer. I also am pleased with a set of four canvas totes I bought, which I took with me to get groceries last night. They have square bottoms, so they stand up nicely, and they're really sturdy, so they hold a lot of groceries. It's really nice not to consume the plastic bags, and it's not really a hassle at all. (I was so eager to remember to take the totes in with me and excited to use them that I left my wallet in the car last night. I realized as I was getting a cart, so it wasn't an embarassing situation or anything. Funny, though.) I think that North American stores should follow in European shoes - at lots of places there, you pay for the bags you use, so people take their own reusable ones. Only makes sense.

It sounds like I've bought the world this week, but I have one more exciting purchase to share - I stopped at Frenchy's this morning after dropping Adam off at work, and guess what I found? (You'll probably never guess, so I'll tell you.) The other pillow sham that goes with the duvet and sham I found a few weeks ago! How exciting. A little Frenchy's fated moment. I also found a few other little things I might post after they're washed.

Happy Saturday, and don't forget to set your clocks ahead tonight (if you go for that sort of thing where you live!) An extra hour of daylight tomorrow, yipeeeeee!