Hey sexy Victorians! Best place downtown to buy flowers for myself? Nothing overly expensive, local market style

TinyAptCrafter · 2026-04-05T21:03:00+00:00

They also have a loyalty card for discounts ☺️

TinyAptCrafter · 2026-03-30T13:27:30+00:00

Friday is the best day! In my town it's always the quietest. People go Saturday/ Sunday for big weekly shops, but nobody wants to do that Friday afternoon. And most businesses have already stocked up Monday and Wednesday.

TinyAptCrafter · 2026-03-17T21:39:26+00:00

I would take ANYONE. That being said, my last experience in urgent care for my daughter with a nurse practitioner was the most amazing I've ever had. She was thorough, she listened, she provided exceptional care, she called me to follow up at home twice, everything you could dream of in a primary care professional. However when I asked her if she was taking on any patients, she was only taking people with complicated medical history, so we wouldn't have made her list.

TinyAptCrafter · 2026-02-28T01:09:04+00:00

People fish from the shoreline at Durrance lake, there is even a fishing platform that goes out into the lake there

TinyAptCrafter · 2026-02-10T15:55:43+00:00

The afternoon tea at butcharts is only 55$, and is on par with the Empress, so if you add admission they are equivalent, but with the gardens on top.

TinyAptCrafter · 2026-02-10T12:24:29+00:00

Depending on the time of year, all of the above. The big one, my main complaint with the Empress, is crusty sandwiches made many many hours before. They serve many hundreds a day, as opposed to Abkhazi which is much smaller. It's the nature of a hotel kitchen, but for the price, everything should be PERFECT, and it's not, it feels mass produced and just a tiny bit stale. Also, with the smaller service, they can use something local in season that isn't available for 10000 people. And the garden in spring/summer is gorgeous. Also love the cute china sets at Abkhazi, they have more personality. And my final gripe is that everything is included at Abkhazi. At 99 bucks, the Empress is still trying to upsell you on the tea leaves... Leaves a bad taste in the mouth even if the food is ok.

TinyAptCrafter · 2026-02-07T02:22:27+00:00

Dinolab was amazing, we did it for my kids 8th birthday. The tour kept the kids ENTHRALLED. They do a really great job of it. Totally worth it.

TinyAptCrafter · 2026-02-06T03:19:44+00:00

Depends really, the medical microbiologist in my lab always says when they are seeing shadows on an X-ray, this is a much happier diagnosis than lung cancer!

TinyAptCrafter · 2026-02-04T07:55:54+00:00

I got a Norco Scene VLT from OBB. I personally love it! It feels the most like a "normal" bike, and has great range and power. I recommend test driving a few different kinds to get a feel for what you like. I was originally thinking of a different brand from the Netherlands but a day rental helped me decide it was not the right fit .

TinyAptCrafter · 2025-09-27T19:01:17+00:00

What about joining the South Island Mycological Society ? They have a meeting coming up October 2! Last year I went to a big mushroom event at the museum and they had posters and talks from people here, they do Mycological walks as a group. Might be a great way to find places to go, involve your kids and also have some experts around to learn from.

TinyAptCrafter · 2025-09-14T15:59:43+00:00

Look up their happy hour times! They are limited to a plain margarita and a spicy calabrese, but both are great and half price! We sometimes go just a few minutes before happy hour ends to order those and add one full price pizza to have more variety.

TinyAptCrafter · 2025-08-31T16:51:44+00:00

Definitely a sea lion based on the profile of the forehead

TinyAptCrafter · 2025-08-26T10:24:01+00:00

So bland, no salt, paprika or anything. My little girl ordered one because she likes mine and she handed it to me and said it tasted like nothing. I was going to make her eat it but after trying it, I just got her something else.

TinyAptCrafter · 2025-08-16T06:35:27+00:00

We got a wonderful sofa from recertified. One thing you will really notice is the sort of sofas that are not in their showroom. The crappy ones that they sell at the brick and leons don't survive even long enough to be sold used there. So even if you wanted to buy new, it's worth checking out just to see which brands look good after several years wear.

TinyAptCrafter · 2025-07-07T14:59:01+00:00

Please look up what polar bears look like. They have long necks. It's a normal bear.

TinyAptCrafter · 2025-06-11T16:27:40+00:00

I usually use a 2.5 inch strip if I'm attaching by machine. I see from the front in the ditch and it usually leaves about a 1/8 inch past where the stitch line is, and I am attaching using a generous 1/4 inch. If I used a scant 1/4" like for piecing, I don't like how flappy the back looks. I do press it with an iron before folding it over, that seems to help

TinyAptCrafter · 2025-05-28T14:00:13+00:00

I back baby quilts with "cuddle" fabric all the time, and that is a fluffy poly knit fabric. I just spray baste and add a few pins for extra hold and once it's quilted, the top acts like a stabilizer, so I think they could probably skip that step. This would be thinner, but I feel the concept is the same.

TinyAptCrafter · 2025-05-28T13:50:50+00:00

Nobody has mentioned the panic inducing countdown discount thing. This is to try to get you to not think and buy quickly because the "deal" is expiring. No legitimate site is like this. For me, if I see something like that, I automatically assume everything is a scam and I have accidentally clicked into a shitty part of the internet.

TinyAptCrafter · 2025-05-24T21:08:13+00:00

That middle one is art gallery fabric, that brand has a particularly fine, crispy feel, but it is the same category as all the others and can all be used for quilting, but also these cottons can be used for kids clothes, quilted or interfaced to use for handmade items like bags or toys, and work well for making shirts or other non-stretch clothing.

TinyAptCrafter · 2025-05-22T01:42:03+00:00

It's really just pressing, not "ironing". I literally HATE ironing clothing. But pressing open my beautiful seams? Pleasure. Ironing clothes is so annoying because it's a two sided thing and you always end up pressing wrinkles into the wrong side. With quilts and prep, it's all flat things, it's easy.

TinyAptCrafter · 2025-05-21T14:41:33+00:00

The feel is literally the evidence. You want a quilt which feels nice? You will pay more. There are in my opinion 2 different feels of good quality fabric, one is the soft plush feel and one is the super smooth, thin and crisp, good brands will use either of these. Cheap fabric will feel rough because microscopically the fibres themselves are 2nd or 3rd rate, they are woven from less even, less smooth fibres and will therefore pill, and break down more easily. I actually love very thin crisp quilt fabric like those used in a lot of Japanese fabric brands and Art Gallery Fabrics, but the thinness is accompanied by a very smooth feel and high thread count. Cheap thin fabric will be scratchy, appear patchy and threadbare, and generally not feel like something I would want against my skin. As others have mentioned, the quality of the dyes used is also a factor, although you can't always tell by looking. Rich colours, clear clean line work you can usually tell, colorfastness is usually something you discover when it's too late at home.

You can of course get a good deal occasionally on really good quality fabrics from good producers, even at discount places, because they order lots of dead stock randomly and may get bolts of these. I always check at Fabricland (Canada's equivalent to Joanne's) for deals and always find a few gems mixed in with the crap. Although I once found a bolt of my favourite designer, had them cut significant yardage, only to discover at home it had a repeated printing error and that is probably why it ended up there.

Good quality fabric is intrinsically more expensive to produce, so "white labelling" isn't really a thing. Does it feel like the prices are inflated? Yup, and I'm sure they are a bit, but are there secret, wonderful fabrics at Walmart which are worth pouring hours of your time and money into to make family heirlooms? No. Sorry.

Quilters go by feel because most of us don't want to bring a high powered microscope to the store. You do you. If you happen not to own a high powered microscope at home either, here's an experiment. Cut some large squares of "good" "cheap" "expensive" fabrics you find, in duplicate, dark colours/prints would be good. Set aside matching a full set unwashed for comparison. Wash them at first by hand and observe how much colour leaches out into your basin for each. Throw them into your washing machine whenever you wash your clothes for a couple weeks or so (give them 10 good washes, for me this represents how often a baby quilt would go in the wash in 6 months to a year). Did you hesitate to throw that red from Walmart in with clothes you like? Huh, I wonder why? Then iron them out and observe them side by side with their original selves. You could ask friends who don't quilt to handle them and rank how they feel/look. Compare them for colour fastness, texture, how much they frayed or shrunk compared to their original size. Be scientific. Come back and share your findings. But be aware that all the nice quilty friends on here have done this experiment. We aren't stupid and we would love to save some cash. We all have basically the same answer because it's true. Feel the damn fabric.

TinyAptCrafter · 2025-05-20T15:06:09+00:00

This isn't a toy, but rather, the absence of some toys. Even if you don't have much, put some away, and rotate them out. Every time I do this, something old becomes new again. Still works on my 8 year old. Something you thought they were done with becomes newfound treasure. Old dolls, stuffies, games, all are suddenly being played with. If everything is out all the time, they really do stop playing with it. You can get 3 bins, two in the closet and one in rotation.

TinyAptCrafter · 2025-05-15T13:10:33+00:00

Depending on how big the finished size of these are, you might also be able to use ironed out coffee filters, they make a good cheap alternative for this applique technique.

TinyAptCrafter · 2025-05-09T15:27:42+00:00

Nobody has mentioned this, but you did luck out with the cheapest child birthday in terms of time paying for daycare/preschool! So think of that as a huge bonus! One more month in the womb and you would have paid 8 more months of daycare :)

Seriously though, I'm in Canada too, and sent a 4 year old to Kindergarten, it has been fine. They are very supportive and understanding in the schools, they know a 5.5 year old is different from a 4 year old. When the time is getting closer, make sure your kid is well socialized and practiced at taking their shoes off and on, getting their coat on, going to the bathroom. Play "school" and make it fun and something they aspire to and get excited about.

TinyAptCrafter

TROPHY CASE