My Savvy Summer Guide to Ottawa Fashion, Music & Food

Dress: c/o London Times
Vest: American Eagle

Shoes: Aldo (old)
Bag: Rebecca Minkoff
Sunglasses: Westward Leaning
Bracelet: Forever 21 (old)

Belt: Forever 21 (sold out)

Photography by Finn

Hey, everyone! I'm really excited to write share this post in collaboration with London Times' Savvy Summer campaign. I, along with other bloggers from all over, have teamed up with London Times to share our favourite things to do, places to be, things to see, and everything else that summer in our cities has to offer. Read on to learn about my tips to truly experiencing Ottawa this summer!

As for the outfit I'm wearing, I've paired a tropical high-low London Times dress with comfy gladiator-type sandals from Aldo, faux leather belt with gold accent, and a denim vest. I've thrown on my favourite shades of the moment from Westward Leaning, too! We snapped these photos along Sussex Drive to give you a taste for what the beautiful city has to offer this time of year so I hope you enjoy. Let me know what you think in a comment and be sure to share your city tips for summer, too. xo

Music

Ottawa has its fair share of musical acts come and go all year long, but summer is its time to shine. Each summer Ottawa hosts one of the largest outdoor music festivals in North America - Bluesfest. This summer, Ottawa's Bluesfest runs from July 4-14 and features acts such as The Black Keys, Jimmy Eat World, Neko Case, She & Him, Passion Pit and more. The festival has multiple stages and is located a quick bus ride from the downtown core, so there's plenty to do both before and after as well! There's also Escapade Music Festival featuring tons of electronic dance music acts taking place over Canada Day long weekend if that's more your style.

Food

The Byward Market comes alive with people, music, and good food in the summer. The market is a historic area in Ottawa that is now filled with fruit and vegetable vendors, buskers, and all the restaurants and bars you can imagine. You'll also be able to take in a beautiful view of Parliament Hill! I love heading to Sidedoor Kitchen for delicious chef tacos, gourmet donuts, and the best hot and sour soup you can ask for. Other restaurants in the area I'd recommend you check out are E18ghteen, Blue Cactus, and Tennessy Willems (located in the Hintonburg neighbourhood).

Shopping

The Rideau Centre is Ottawa's main shopping centre and is located right in the middle of downtown. It has your regular mall stores like Old Navy, American Eagle, Town Shoes, as well as higher end stores including Coach, Michael Kors, BCBG, and others. It's in the process of undergoing a major renovation and will soon have a ton more stores including our first Nordstrom, too! For the ultimate shopping experience, however, I'd recommend visiting the shops along Sussex including Schad, Wolf & Zed, Trust Fund, and then heading over to Dalhousie to pop into Young Janes and Victoire.


So, tell me, what's YOUR savvy summer tip for your own city? Let me know in a comment or send me a tweet and include the hashtag #savvysummer so I can RT you!

DvF Harper Bags Tory Burch Messenger Bags Shoulder Bags Shopbop

The Best Nail Polishes for Summer from OPI

Just a quick post to share my latest YouTube video. I show my top picks for summer nail polish featuring the OPI Euro Centrale Collection, Germany Collection, and a gold polish from Nicole by OPI. Watch the video below. Hope you enjoy!

Rebecca Minkoff Resort 2014 Collection - My Picks

Images via Rebecca Minkoff

Let me introduce to you the absolutely beautiful Rebecca Minkoff Resort 2014 collection. I think this is probably my favourite collection from RM yet! The collection is an eclectic mix of bright neons, muted pastels, tweeds, knits, tartan, and graphic everything. It's soft, feminine, but punchy and a little edgy - it's basically made for me and needs to appear in my closet pronto.

Inspiration for the Resort 2014 collection came from the quintessential Rebecca Minkoff girl. This time around, the design team imaged the RM girl heading out on a roadtrip and taking in the changing atmispheres, culture, and music. With inspiration drawn from the Pacific Coast Highway, and punk meets pop.

Above are my top picks from the collection. View more about the Rebecca Minkoff Resort 2014 collection on the RM website.

Natural Looking Blonde Hair Inspiration - My Top Picks

Check out these images and others on my Hair Colour Inspiration Board

Going blonde can be a tedious, downright nerve-wracking process for anyone - regardless of what hair colour you start off with. Finding the right tone of blonde is a whole other story. There's platinum, ash, neutral, golden, honey-this, caramel-that... who knew there were SO many variations? What ever happened to plain old "blonde"? To help those of you out who regular ask about my hair colour or might be thinking of adding some highlights or going full out blonde for summer, I've put together the above compilation of some of my personal favourite blondes. They're natural looking, flattering, and there's a tone for any complexion.

Let me know which you like best, and feel free to share any of your experiences with going blonde! Xo

Soya Boutique Introduces Its New Cayman Sugar Scrub

Items from left across: 

Vitamin C Serum, Repairing Serum

Anti Aging Moisturizer

Cayman Sugar Scrub, Tearfree Cleanser

c/o Soya Boutique

Last week I received the above bunch of products from Toronto-based beauty company, Soya Boutique. The company recently released a new product, the Cayman Sugar Scrub, and I've been really excited to try it out. In total, I've now tried the Tearfree cleanser, Cayman Sugar Scrub, and Anti Aging Moisturizer. I haven't used either of the serums just yet, but plan on trying the Vitamin C Serum out this week in the hope that it brightens my skin up a bit!

The Tearfree Cleanser is awesome. I have big eyes, and can never seem to avoid getting cleanser in my eyes. This was especially scary the last couple of weeks as I underwent laser eye surgery and had to wash my face with a cloth and avoid getting anything into my eyes at all costs! When I was allowed to wash my face normally again, I used the Tearfree Cleanser. It's effective while being incredibly gentle, and left my skin feeling soft to the touch and hydrated. Unlike some other cleansers, my skin didn't feel "squeaky" after - something I hate.

The Cayman Sugar scrub (new) helped me combat a mini break out on my chin and cheeks (allergy season has me sneezing, breaking out, and my eyes watering far more than I'd like) and smells amazing. It's very coarse so you only want to apply light pressure when using the scrub so as to not irritate your skin. It does its job well and sloughs away dead skin while moisturizing with its oils. The scrub is made from organic sugar cane, sea salts, organic extracts from aloe, avocado, shea butter, pomegrant and lavender - so it's calming, too.

The moisturizer is very light weight, and almost feels like it has a whipped texture. It left my skin feeling cool, hydrated, and didn't take long to be absorbed which I really like. There's nothing worse than being extremely tired but having to wait for your moisturizer to dry or else you get it all over your pillow case. The moisturizer says it's for both day and night use, but I prefer to use it at night as I like my Clinique for day. It's a little bit lighter and I feel it brightens my skin up prior to my makeup application. 

Soya Boutique was founded by Melani Chong, experienced cosmetic scientist. Soya Boutique products can be found within use at the King Edward Hotel Spa. The Soya Boutique products mentioned above are all made in Canada and distributed from the company's Toronto base. I hope you've found this review helpful and would love to know your thoughts, so leave them in a comment! xo

PS My Yorkie, Cole, wanted to get in on the action so here he is. He's such a little ham!

4 Hot Jeans from Rag & Bone

Portabello Trouser in Bleach Out \\ Skinny Heathway

Skinny Woodford \\ Skinny Kensington

I've been wearing and wearing my favourite pair of legging jeans for well over two years now and am seriously dreading the day they become worn out. I grabbed them for $45 from Old Navy on a whim and have loved them ever since. I feel it's time, however, to grab another pair of "oh my God I love them" jeans. For one, I'd like to have more options that I like more than "meh" and I want to be prepared for when the day comes that my trusty Old Navy jeggings are no longer wearable.

The top left are more of a boyfriend or trouser jean than my typical jegging, but something about them won't let me look away. I love the super light, bleached denim and think they'd look fantastic with sneakers, flats, heels, and just about anything as far as a top goes. The Portabello Trouser ($187) also has that street style rolled cuff I so admire.

The second pair is called Heathway ($242) and is from Rag & Bone's Skinny jean collection. I love the medium wash and whiskering, but don't know how much I could really dress them up. I typically am drawn more to super light denim or super dark denim, and skip most of the washes in between. There's something about this pair, again, that I just like though.

Third is the Woodford jean ($176) and is a dark but true-blue wash. I love them on the model, but don't think the colour is incredibly versatile. I adore the cut, however, which is why I think I am leaning mostly towards the fourth option - Kensington.

The Kensington jean ($187) is, in my opinion, the perfect blue/black wash and darkness. I could wear it with a blouse for work, dress it up for evening, or go all out casual. I also really like that the inside hasn't been dyed, so if I roll up the bottom and cuff the jean the lighter colour gives it some interest.

Which pair is your favourite? Which should I grab? Let me know what you think!

J Brand High Rise  Mother Looker Jeans REbecca Minkoff Denim 

My SBK Laser Eye Surgery Story

This post is all about my laser eye surgery. I've received lots of questions about it, so I figured I would type everything up into one post (and video) and put it here for you. If you're not interested in hearing about it, or think you might faint at the idea, don't click the "read more" bar. If you do want to hear my laser eye surgery story, then click it. Feel free to also comment, email, or tweet with any questions. I know it's a scary topic and am happy to chat!