jenn by lantern light

Here are the rest of the photos from Jenn's lantern shoot. Check out the green orb in the first few photos. I was convinced we had a supernatural presence with us during the shoot. The orb kept showing up in different places in at least 20 of the photos I took, and didn't seem to be a reflection or flare, from what we could tell. Cool, right?

Jenn, thank you so much for your time, patience and grace. You are a truly beautiful person.

october odds and ends

Montreal is full of cool things. Here were some of my favourites this month:

Antique vignette portraits at Style LABO, an awesome store full of wonderful (if pricey) treasures on Rue Bernard in Montreal's Mile End neighbourhood.



Having breakfast at La Croissanterie Figaro, which has (you guessed it) the city's best croissants and an atmosphere akin to the best Parisian cafés.

Puces Pop, a semi-annual pop-up market that's packed with arts, crafts, and food. It's held in the basement of a Polish church, so you can always count on grabbing some perogies or cabbage rolls to fuel your shopping. This year there was a bakery from Brooklyn visiting and they were selling fantastic mini cupcakes, such as the bacon cinnamon (hells yeah) variety below.

Just walking the streets of my neighbourhood in the fall has gotta be one of the purest forms of pleasure. The colours are so bright, everything smells amazing, and the people watching is world-class.

I love when it's the end of the warm season and multiple layers of ivy have covered the walls of many buildings in the city.

You can't beat the moody skies of October.

Hot chocolate on a crisp, cool day is heavenly.

And, there is nothing like stocking up on new reading material at one of the many fall book fairs in the city.

After being super busy and out of town for half of the past month, I'm looking forward to having a slightly more low key November, curled up with all the books, hot chocolate and cozy fall outfits a girl could ask for.

bold colours, warm blankets

Something happened yesterday that slowed everything down.

I was in the middle of a singing lesson with F, my 12-year-old student. I try to show her a few videos on YouTube each class, to give her some fun examples of whichever genre or artist I'm teaching her about that day.

Anyways, we were sitting cross-legged on the floor, watching Comme des Enfants by Coeur de Pirate when my friend Sara came out into the room carrying a big, red fleece blanked.

"She loves when stuff just comes out of the dryer," Sara explained as she tossed the blanket over F's shoulders.

F gleefully snuggled it around herself, then pulled the blanked over my back. The warmth of it embraced me while the clean laundry scent filled my nose. We just sat there watching the video (that was filmed in our neighbourhood) all cozy and quiet.

I felt entirely present in the moment, and I never wanted it to end.

Last weekend, when I was home for Thanksgiving, Brian patiently walked both of my family's rambunctious dogs for me as I wandered clumsily around the woods, snapping photos of the saturated colours and gorgeous light.

The silence of the forest is like a salve for a city girl's harried spirits. I just stood there, perfectly still and wanted time to follow my lead.

I use my camera so I never forget moments (or colours) like these. When I don't have my camera, I mentally snap off pieces of time and file them away for the darkest moments in the cold of winter.

guilt-free lazy days

It's the kind of cool, gray, late-summer Sunday that I just love. You know, when it's gorgeously miserable outside and it provides the perfect reason to stay cozy and warm with a good book and a big bowl of soup or these lemon buttermilk cookies.

fall fantasy

Autumn in Montreal is pretty spectacular this year, even if it has been punctuated with unseasonable icy breezes.

I'm fresh back from a weekend in the mountains, about a third of which was spent steaming in a hot tub while the cool wind and occasional drops of rain hit my shoulders.

sad sunflower

flavours of fall

I just spent an absolutely beautiful weekend in my other city, and in the country. Thank god for Thanksgiving. Nothing warms a girl's spirit like this kind of delicious food.

giving thanks for

Weather this warm.

leaves, not lattes = fall

While sitting in a coffee shop the other day, I watched the seasons change before my eyes. I was absentmindedly chewing on a cookie when two employees came and switched the posters in the window beside me. And just like that, we went from the summer's strawberry chillers to autumn's pumpkin spice latte. Forget solstices, we're now marking the seasons with the changing flavours of sugary beverages.

My new neighbourhood is charmingly European in many ways, and on good days I don't mind schlepping between its bakeries, butchers, cheese markets, chocolate shops, and fruit&veggie stands to collect my groceries in a step-by-step manner. But when I'm hungry and all I want is a President's Choice thingamajig, a one-stop-shop is not easy to find. Today for example, I tried to find the makings for a meal in the Fruit & Veggie store. Before I knew it I was lugging home a 10 pound bag of beets, with the best of intentions to make a mother load of borscht.

During the walk home, carrying my burden (and feeling my cheeks redden to match the beets when many a person stared at the huge bag), I felt the crunch of leaves under my feet, and wholeheartedly embraced fall, without the chiding of any $4 latte thankyouverymuch!

These photos — the first of a series of that will inevitably have a leaf motif — are of Carolyn, Brian's sister.