All the Small Things

Sometimes it's the small things that can really brighten up your day. Here are a few I've enjoyed lately:

• $1 drinks on a hot day. Tim Hortons' iced lattes and McDonald's iced coffees are only a dollar all summer long. Yay for a refreshing and cheap (I'm looking at you, Starbucks) treat any time of the day.

 

• Blooming flowers on the fruit trees in our backyard. We have several fruit trees and last year, only the apple trees yielded anything so I'm excited to see what other fruits we might get this summer. I think we also have cherry and pear trees but I guess we'll find out eventually.

Apple tree blossoms (sorry for the smudge on my camera lens)

• Fiskars Telescopic Weed Remover. We have pretty large front and back yards, and unfortunately, inherited a lot of weeds. We're trying to be green and avoid adding any chemicals to our lawn (plus, I don't think it's allowed in our city) so we've been manually pulling up the weeds (well, I say "we" but Jay has done 95% of the work). Remember last summer when Jay was so excited to get his manual Fiskars mower? Well he still really likes it, but it does nothing for dandelions. It doesn't mow them down at all so they have to be manually removed. It's so satisfying to pull them out (literally thousands), and so dejecting to see them pop right back up (literally overnight). This tool has been really helpful, and did you know that dandelion roots can be over a foot long? Our old weeding tool definitely didn't pull up the root as much as this new one does. Now, it's still manual weed pulling so you know, it's not exactly brightening up my day but it has saved us a lot of time and labour.

Before

After

See how long the root gets? This was Jay's best weed pull of the weekend.

• Ikea Family card. Does everyone have one? You should get this free card next time you're at Ikea. It only takes a minute to sign up for it at a kiosk in store, and you get free coffee/tea in their cafeteria, and discounts on certain food and home furnishing items too. Get one!

Nathan says "I'm cuter than a picture of a plastic card"

• Ikea's BEVARA sealing clips. I was at my friend P's house and saw her using these to seal up an open package of nuts. It's so useful you'll wonder why you didn't buy these a decade ago. No more fiddling with twist ties or elastic bands. Plus I think it was $2.99 $1.99 for a pack of 30 so you can't really go wrong.

 

• New toilets! Our old ones were awful. You had to hold down the toilet lever for 10 seconds while it slowly flushed and it wasted 13L of water each time. I'm so happy we finally upgraded to new dual flush toilets that are quick flushing and only use 4L or 6L of water, depending on which flush you choose. The slow close toilet seats are a fun little splurge, too. Props to Jay for figuring out how to remove and install the toilets himself so we didn't have to hire a plumber.

So those are a few little things that are making my life pretty good right now. What are some of yours?