Can you really love a pair of boots THIS MUCH???

How I came across Frye boots I really don't recall. I only heard about them last week sometime - I think while perusing blogland. Once I googled them I became completely obsessed. I have wanted motorcycle boots for probably 15 years. I have never really seen any, or at least none I wanted to spend my money on. Until Frye came into my life. I have spent every evening since then scouring the internet trying to figure out how/where to get my hands on some. I debated about getting some on EBay but I really wanted to try them first to make sure I knew what size to get. After some extensive googling I found out that Holt Renfrew (the Canadian version of Saks) carries Frye. So this afternoon I snuck out of the office with my sidekick Val and we headed to Holts to see what Frye boots they carried. I should have known I would not be able to leave empty handed. Sure enough I came home with these:

They are so freaking cool I walked around the office to show my colleagues (who are all guys besides Val, that's how excited I was). I got one of them worried that his wife was going to see them on the blog and want some too. LOL. So now I own a brown pair of Frye Harness 12R boots. Now I'm on the hunt for a black pair of another model. I have several in mind....

Cat #4 - Phoebe

In the summer of 2006 my boyfriend and I had 3 cats at the time (Milo, Cheeks and Lucky) and we decided to get another. One day at work I was looking through my department's classified ads online and found a woman who had 2 kittens that needed a home as she was about to take them to the Humane Society. I knew right away we had to go see these kittens, and I knew deep down that we would end up taking them both home with us. Sure enough we did. We named the kittens Phoebe and Joey. They were adorable together - they snuggled all the time (see photo #2) and groomed each other and Phoebe suckled on Joey constantly. A few months after we got them, Joey became very sick and we took him to the emergency vet. We were told he likely had FIP (an incurable and fatal disease) and we had to put him down that day. They were only about 6 months old at the time, which made his fate so gut-wrenching. Phoebe missed him so much, and started suckling on Cheeks and Lucky. Fortunately they obliged. She is still a big baby, and loves to cuddle with several of the other cats. She is very curious and LOVES to be tied up in the backyard on her harness. She has remained very small and looks like a kitten. She's very photogenic and I love capturing her on camera. (Check out her Flickr set here).

Cat #3 - Lucky

It was mid-October about 5 or 6 years ago when my boyfriend Jeff and I were driving through a small town outside Ottawa looking at houses. Jeff insisted on a pit stop on the side of the road because he couldn't hold it in anymore and walked into a forest for a little bit of privacy. A minute later he came out and as he got near the car, he stopped and turned back toward the forest. He walked back to the forest as he had thought he heard a strange noise and came out with this little black and white kitten, about 4 months old. We drove to a couple of homes nearby and either no one was home (it was Thanksgiving weekend) or no one knew the kitten. So we took him home and went back the following weekend and again, no one knew the kitten. So we kept him and named him Lucky. Suitable name I'd say as I doubt he would have made it through the winter. Lucky is quite a character, and he's Jo's favourite. He will walk around the house and howl (I don't know how else to describe the noise he makes), especially if I just yelled at him for bugging Cheeks. He LOVES to sleep on shoes, and on his back. He snores, and he's pretty hefty. That's Lucky in a nutshell. (Check out his Flickr set here).

A twist of fate

For those of you who live here in Ottawa, this post is for you. I stopped into one of my new favourite shops today on my way home from work and I had to plug it here. A Twist of Fate is located on Somerset St. close to Bronson Ave. It's run by a super nice girl who hails from Peterborough (and unfortunately I don't know her name). She lives above the shop with her totally adorable kitten (whose name I do know - Sophie) whom she often has hanging out in the shop with her - a completely welcoming distraction. If you are into ethnic items from all sorts of countries you'll love this. She sells jewelry, clothing, tablecloths, knick knacks, lighting...a little bit of everything at VERY reasonable prices. I've managed to find goodies to bring home each time I've been there. (Check them out below). So if you're in the neighbourhood, do stop in.

Cat #2 - Cheeks

Here's the story of how Cheeks came to live with me. About 7 years ago my boyfriend Jeff and I moved into my co-workers former apartment in a lowrise in Lowertown. Cheeks was the neighbourhood stray, and had been for what we heard was about 8 years or so. One day a woman in the building next to ours was apparently wandering around with a recycling box apparently trying to catch him so bylaw could pick him up, claiming he was spraying in her basement apartment window. The 2 neighbours who had been feeding him found him and got him to the vets where he was neutered and got all his shots etc. Then they came to me and asked me to take him in because their cats didn't like him. I reluctantly agreed. Turns out him and Milo didn't get along so well and still don't. But they mostly keep their distance. Cheeks LOVES being inside, LOVES hanging around in the backyard (with me supervising) and LOVES sleeping in patches of sun and on the heat vents. He is a very VERY lucky cat. We named him Cheeks because he had the fattest face and had huge cheeks. We assumed it was from eating garbage and god knows what, but we learned that this is a trait of un-neutered male cats. He no longer has big cheeks but he learned his name fast so it stuck. He loves Jeff like crazy. When Jeff comes over Cheeks always climbs on him and lays down. It's really sweet. (Check out his Flickr set here).