The Beautiful Project

It's that time of year to gather up all of the beautiful cards that are new in the stationery world and create a post or two to help kick off the beginning of the holiday season. Today we start with a few we found online, we hope you'll like as much as us! Stay tuned for more holiday-inspiration! Let's take a look!

Decorator, Monica Karlstein of the Swedish-based blog, Hemmafix recently published a book close to our IKEA-hacking hearts called, 99 Hacks: from mass produced to genuine interior design. Although from what we can see, the book is only published in the Swedish language with no word yet whether the publisher will be publishing an English version; we still thought it was worth a mention because, really, hacks need no language do they? Also, these just might be the most beautiful hacks you've ever seen.  Let's take a look!

@thefive15

It's been a few years, but it seems the Halloween season has brought a surge of Blacklettering to the masses. When I think of blacklettering, Gwen Stefani has always been a big fan, but this fall, we're seeing it everywhere from wedding dresses to gig posters; the gothic script has been popping up on our radar in a big way.  Let's take a look~

One of my favourite things to do as of late is to hack recipes and make them a little more healthful.  From my Mom's homemade barbecue sauce (which I will share soon) to some good old fashioned chocolate fudge, I've been on a mission to take back our food from what has become known as the SAD, Standard American Diet.  Over the weekend I happened upon a program on the Food Network called Carnival Eats and was salivating at one particular dish, a fish pita that for the most part was pretty healthy actually, but still had a few things that could be improved.  I swapped out the pita bread for some cassava flour wraps and made a healthier chipolte sauce using plain coconut yogurt versus sour cream.  The corn salsa in this recipe is so fresh and delicious, you're going to want to eat it just like it is (as a salad), but I just made sure to use organic corn, as most of our conventional corn has unfortunately been sprayed with some really bad pesticides and in particular, one of the worst, glyphosate.  The ewg.org is a great resource for more info on pesticides/toxins in our food system.  I always follow their guides when shopping for produce and meats - they have a list you can download to your phone which is really handy when you're out and about.

For their October launch, IKEA designed a collection that creates a cozy atmosphere, with the intention of making people feel at home. VÄRMER coaxes people to share their personality in their home, and at the same time, connect to memories and traditions by cooking, eating, socializing and unwinding.

The collection lends to visiting Grandma's home with timeless and functional pieces for celebrating, giving a sense of belonging, offering a personal take on home for the season that is upon us. (Above. VÄRMER chair, $129 CAD).

Let's take a look!

Fall. A time for curling up with a good book, making brunch for friends, or taking a nice brisk walk. We've been craving some new tunes just for all of these occasions this month, and thought you might like a few new tunes to listen to as well.  Check out this easy breezy, carefree fall playlist we made for us all. Check it out below.

September, one of my favourite times of year, brings with it an abundance of beautiful fall fruit and vegetables. This year our neighbour brought us a huge box of apples from her Uncle's farm and searching through our recipe archives here on Poppytalk for recipe ideas, I was surprised to see how many actual recipes we had using apples.  From an immunity boosting Apple Cucumber Juice to Apple Cinnamon Drop Biscuits, here's a list of a few favourite healthy apple recipes over the years. Maybe you need inspiration too? Click through for the links!

We're finally back after our summer hiatus and to kick things off, I thought we'd show up with a few beautiful calendar and planners on our radar.  First off though, can you believe we're rolling up to 2020 in just a few short months? The thought of that is just crazy to me and for those of you old enough to remember, it seemed the 2000's was just like yesterday right? And remember all that Y2K hoopla we were dealing with? Luckily, the 2020s should be a lot easier technical wise and by the looks of all these new calendars we've come across and with the news we heard today, 2020 never looked so good!  Check them out!  (Above calendar from Poketo).

I don't like to quit.  Earlier this summer I set out on a "100 Days of Sunsets" project on our Instagram stories, and if I'm being honest, it has been one of the toughest assignments I've ever given myself since starting the blog back in 2005. The hardest part of this project (which I felt like quitting many times) and much like blogging, has been not getting bored with it, keeping it fresh, let alone putting content out day after day (one has to chase sunsets on the daily).

Attention all Field Notes collectors.  The latest collection in their arsenal of special edition notebooks is called the National Parks Series. After seeing the work from the artists of The Fifty-Nine Parks Print Series, and since their early days of wanting to create something acknowledging America's National Parks, they knew exactly what to do. They have just announced a collaboration on three 3-Packs of these American treasures with a few of the artists from The Fifty-Nine Parks Print Series. Fun fact too, is they are also donating five percent of retail and wholesale purchases to the National Parks Service to help preserve and expand their nation’s best idea. Let's check them out!