instagram roundup {nyc edition}...

it's sunday! it's sunday! before i can get too excited about leaving tonight, i'm heading out to breakfast with my parents and dylan, then i've got to to go head back to toronto, shower and do my hair (and hope that it stays decent overnight on the bus), and still PACK! though i did get a  brand spankin' new blue heys suitcase (though it was NOT that price, since it was on a great sale) which i'm excited to use, thanks to my parents :)  my old one had a broken handle and dylan got awful angry whenever i made him carry my suitcase (a lot) and the broken handle made it a little difficult. so in honor of us leaving for nyc tonight (9:30 pm tonight, let the countdown begin), i'll leave you instagrams: nyc edition though the years.

minuscule.2011.

 the view.

 trailer park lounge. chelsea. 2010.

 young love. 2008.

times square. 2009.

grimaldi's pizzeria. brooklyn. 2011. to die for.

nyc bound...

it's finally friday! i've put in my hours at work and the weekend is finally here. with all this sadness hanging around me lately, this getaway could not come at a more perfect time. sunday night we'll be on the bus heading to NYC! we'll be there for 4 days, but one of those days, we'll be taking a bus ride to washington! we're both pretty excited to see what a new city has to offer and to see some of the popular monuments and memorials.

 brooklyn bridge.

 laying in madison square park after eating some shake shack 2 years ago.

summer love.

the weather network has no idea what's going on and it changes from one extreme to the other-oh, sunny and 20degrees the 4 days we're there!? great! next day-rain all 4 days. oy.

also, i wish that roaming charges weren't ridiculous so that i could twitter and instagram while we're there ;) but that's not the case. the phones stay off, though we will have a little notebook with us :) see ya next week! 

phobias...

can we talk about phobias for a second? we all have them, some more odd than others. i think i've mentioned this here before, but my phobia is...

butterflies.

otherwise known as lepidopterophibia.

we're talking debilitating, cowering in fear, heart racing, can't breath..it's bad.  years and years and years ago (i was maybe 6 or 7), before i knew this fear existed, my mom and i waited in line in sweltering heat for the opening of the butterfly conservatory. as soon as we got in there, it was a nightmare and my phobia was realized. we left shortly thereafter.

last year at an antique mall. this was randomly hanging on the wall.

last week, i was taking chloe for a quick pee and i noticed a butterfly. oh great, i thought. the season is here. but then i saw another. and another. and they were literally everywhere; as common as the little brown bird. and they're all the black and red suckers. the next day, i took her on a walk and about 3 minutes in, i think i had seen more butterflies than i had in the previous 10 years. it was by far the worst walk of my life and i just wanted to get home. i couldn't even take breaths when i got in and then i vented my frustrations on twitter. i asked dylan, mr environmentalist, what is up with all these butterflies?! have you seen them?! there's got to be a reason! tell me! there's more than normal, i swear i'm not crazy! he said it probably had something to do with the climate, and to that i said, duh. but really, he didn't know. the next day, he posted this article on my facebook wall. basically, this is the gist of the article...

"butterflies may not grow on trees, but it's starting to look like they do. eastern canada is in the midst of what's believed to be the biggest springtime butterfly migration in history. hundreds of thousands of butterflies have made their way north--many more than usual and much earlier than expected."

yeah, that's right. the biggest migration in history. this summer may be my person hell. lets hope that is temporary. i can't handle walking the dog in fear every day! oh, and one other weird thing, i have a quarter sized butterfly tattoo on my hip. yes, it's true. it's something i got on a whim on a high school grad trip with friends (my best friend was basically like, lets get tattoos, here's one for you, and i was all, ok), and while i know it's weird, i definitely don't regret it.

so tell me, what phobias do you guys have??

it's official...

i'm leaving toronto. god, it was hard to type those words. i'm leaving a neighborhood, an apartment, and a city i love. given that it's been a year since i graduated and i've found no real work, i just can't stay here. i'm moving back home. i hate that i couldn't make it work. i hate that i'm leaving. and i hate that i'm going back to a city i really just don't like. *i'm listening to this song a lot lately it just makes me cry harder, but i'm in love with it*

i went and told my landlord yesterday and truly felt sick to my stomach all morning thinking about. as weird as it sounds, i felt like i was about to breakup with someone. i walked in his office and i think i managed to get about 6 words out before i started bawling my eyes out (oh god, here they come again). he came around from his desk and gave me a big hug (did i mention he's a great landlord and we got to know each other over the 5 years. oh, and he loves chloe). i tried to get my words out through the tears that wouldn't stop and eventually i did. we talked for a good hour and i think he may have even had a tear in his eye. last summer, he even tried helping me find work; he asked around to his friends and what not. like i said, good guy. i left his office and went back up to my apart and it felt really weird. it's all of a sudden so real and i don't like it.

the silver lining to this is that....me and dylan are moving in together. after almost 6 years of being together, and 5 of those being 'long distance' (well, an hour apart), we'll finally be in the same city again. make that the same house together, though we have yet to find a place. while i'm definitely excited about this new phase, right now it's kind of overshadowed by overwhelming sadness. i'll have more to say on us in the future, but right now i'm still kind of numb to the fact that i've actually given my notice and this is really happening.

so, on june 30th i'll be leaving the place i really grown up, where i spent my early 20's, the place i studied countless hours for exams, the place where i trained a dog all on my own, the place where i cooked so many meals in my minuscule kitchen, the place me and dylan made so many memories, and the place that was my own...i'll be leaving it 6 weeks shy of 5 years.

my home may be the city where i grew up and where i'm moving back to, but my heart will always be in this city.

instagram round up...

it's been a pretty dismal weekend here in the city. today i'm off to do typical sunday things, like vacuuming, laundry, and groceries (actually, the last 2 are already done). so i leave you with some pretty pictures and ones that may make you hungry. ps. now that picnik is gone, i'm too daft to figure out how to put pictures side by side. i can't find another site (i know of picmonkey, but still waiting for them to add the collage feature), and i certainly can't figure it out with photoshop or even paint. therefore, you get large pictures instead of 2by2.

the tulips are out!

pretty in pink.

banana pancakes; on the inside and on top.

canada got panera bread (which i hear enough of from bloggers on twitter!) so i had to stop in when i was out and i chose this-the 'cobblestone'. definitely delish, though i couldn't quite finish it.

our morning cuddles. she throws herself on top of me and wraps me like a scarf. my favorite part of the day.

out like a light.

dylan's slippers, my dad's slippers. quite the size difference! size 12 and 7 respectively.

i just thought this was cute.

how i would look with blue eyes (if i didn't faint when i put contacts in-yes, that happened, many years ago, and they were blue contacts!) using the  'eye colorizer free' app. also note, i was in the midst of doing my makeup for the wedding, hence the one eye being done (i was deciding whether the under eye liner was too much or not and taking a picture was the way to decide. duh).

toodles!

*updated: lainey told me how to do collages with a photobucket account, but now i'm just to lazy to go and change my whole post. but yay for now knowing how!

burger bar...

the other day, i had to make a quick trip back home to my parents for a last minute appointment. when that was all said and done, me and dyl decided to make a day date out of it and try a place i had heard a lot about recently, chuck's burger bar. this place most definitely did not disappoint! the portions were massive and you can't beat the price of the poutine. the only downfall was that i had asked for my burger medium-well and it came still pink in the middle. i had thought it would be cooked a little more, but next time i'll know better. i ate all around it and wouldn't have been able to eat any more if i tried, so it wasn't a big deal. the waitress had said they could have remade it (when she noticed it sitting on my plate at the end), but i assured her that i was ridiculously full and it was quite alright.

that's a lof of food.

 pulled pork on top of a half pound angus burger!!

a giant poutine. with massive homemade cheese curds. for only $7. what?!

we definitely couldn't finish the last bit of the poutine and we waddled out of there with very full bellies. i can't wait to get back there and try other things on the menu. but note: if you're in the area and stop by, be prepared that you may have to wait. there's only about 6 2-person tables and a small bar to sit at.

a wedding...

saturday's wedding was beautiful; high school sweethearts finally getting married. there were tears, lots of them. when they walked in the hall-tears. first dance-tears. the opening speech-tears. their speeches to each other-tears. their parents speeches to them-more tears. goodness me, luckily all the speeches were at the beginning and i was able to dry myself off and enjoy the rest of the night. and enjoy the night i (well, we, everyone) did. it was like a high school reunion with fancy dresses. the food was delicious, the drinks were flowing (hello whiskey, bailey's, vodka 7's and white wine), and the dance moves were crazy.

i have to say, the opening speech was pretty funny, too. they made jokes about how M (the bride) is delivering babies and saving lives on a daily basis (she's doing her residency) and then there's J (the groom) who's just a gym teacher haha. they also told J that if he needs to call in sick on monday, there were about 40 supply teachers in the room that could cover him (meaning that a tonne of our friends went to teachers college, and pretty much no one has jobs yet, regardless of graduating 2-3 years ago). then they got serious and said beautiful things about them, and the fact that it was never 'if' they would get married, but 'when'. like i said, laughter and tears.

walking to her groom.

 hitched!

 necessary bathroom mirror shot before the drinks start and my face gets flushed :P

 husband and wife :)

taking pictures as i'm holding back the tears (or at least trying to).

photobombed! 

...

bridesmaid on the end and look! i'm not the only blonde!

after many drinks.

dancing the night away as a married woman.

indicative of the night.

and they danced the night away.

weddings are the bomb, i tell ya. now it's just a question of who's next and when?! 

house on the hill...

last week, on a beautiful day, i took chloe for a walk up to casa loma. we usually walk around the grounds, take a break and people watch, and do the 200 or so stairs a few times for exercise. it never ceases to amaze me that there's this beautiful castle right in the city.

 fortress in the city.

cn tower in the distance. 

oh, the life of a dog.

tuckered out and full of grass (i had to cover her tag because the phone numbers on it were in plain view).

my, what nice teeth you have.

beauty.

the story behind the castle is actually quite interesting.

while we were sitting out front taking a break, a tour bus pulled up and a bunch of people got out with their cameras in tow. i tried to get out of their way, but i'm pretty sure chloe is in some lovely tourists pictures haha.