looking for some inspiration for the holidays? check out our 2008 gift guides–an elf is just a click away!

i knew when i saw smencils last year i had to have them. just the name “smencil” made me smile. if you’re wondering what the heck a smencil is…they’re great smelling pencils made from tightly rolled up recycled newspapers (no trees are used to make these pencils). They come in lots of great scents and just in: the brand new holiday version…gingerbread man, sugar cookie, sugar plum, candy cane and cinnamon. it’s so sweet to see kids come in and pick out their favorites and at only $1.50 per pencil (or a 5-pack for $7.50) they can buy ‘em with their allowance and still leave with change in their pockets.

kids of all ages love ‘em so if you’re well out of grade four, don’t let that stop you! they’re the perfect stocking stuffer for the kid in all of us!

i’m away in oregon right now visiting family for a few days and my poor colleagues are being inundated with boxes. nancy just called to say that duke (our UPS guy) was coming in with 11 boxes. oh my. the good news is that there are lots of special treasures coming soon…the bad news is, it’s going to be pretty messy until we can get through them all. stay tuned!

bandit has no interest in going in the cage. he sits beside it and eats nuts out of it but doesn’t go in it. we’ve now caught and released chippy (our other douglas squirrel) three times, caught 4 black squirrels (or the same black squirrel 4 times, we can’t be sure) but still no bandit! the good news is he seems to be doing well even with the icky thing around his little neck. here’s hoping he changes his mind about the cage!

 (for those of you wondering what the heck i’m talking about…we’ve been trying to catch a little douglas squirrel who got something wrapped around his neck so we can bring him to the wildlife rescue and then bring him back to the cove!)

hi everyone! how’s the fall knitting coming along? here’s an updated knit night schedule for november, hope you can make it–don’t forget to bring a chair!

Tue November 18 6-9PM
Tue November 25 6-9PM

someone tells you something and you forget? today a young couple who had lived in japan were in the shop and told me about a cool place to shop there but the name went in one ear and out the other (my excuse: it was the end of a busy sunday)…you might know that i have a love affair with japanese design and would love to go back to japan for some Room6 shopping. it’s so overwhelming (tokyo that is) so hearing where to go from the locals is always the best. if any of you have any tips for navigating the myriad of shopping districts in tokyo let me know. for now, i’ll continue to rely on my japanese connections in nyc and san fran who bring the goodies back from japan…it’d be fun to do it myself someday though…

speaking of japanese goodies…if you’re ever in gastown, you have to check out an adorable shop called occupied (on abbott) it’s chock full of japanese goodies that the owner (miss jenelle) finds in japan. neat-o.

this desk had just been unpacked from a crate of mid-century furniture from denmark (from a shop called full house consignment in vancouver) and i knew it had to come to live at Room6. the chair? that’s ikea…the bag? orla kiely! so many new stationery goodies too!

3 posts for november already…woo hoo! an update on bandit (read below to learn more about him): we’ve now trapped and released 3 black squirrels & chippy (sorry chippy!) but no luck trapping bandit. he eats the nuts out of the trap but has no interested in actually going in the trap. of course we can only have it set when we’re home and able to whisk him off to the wildlife rescue. if only he knew we were only trying to help.

this photo? i just thought it was lovely! i love the idea of making cupcakes for the holidays and these just make me happy. they’re made by a bakery in brooklyn called, baked. check ‘em out here: www.bakednyc.com. i’m looking into getting the cookbook for the shop…stay tuned!

i love feeding the birds at my house and because the birds (especially the bossy steller’s jays) knock the seed onto our porch, we get the cutest littlest douglas squirrels who come by to eat up the nuts. we’ve had one little guy named chippy since june who comes every day and eats off the ledge outside our kitchen window (under one of our feeders) and just recently another little guy (we’ve named him bandit) started to come by everyday too. as you can see from the picture, he (i think he’ s a “he”) got some sort of plastic wrapped around his little neck. ouch!

so today i visited the wildlife rescue to pick up a live trap in the hopes of catching him so we can bring him back to the rescue where they will cut off whatever it is and check him out before releasing him right back onto our porch! i’ll keep you guys posted on the progress. what a great organization this is: www.wildliferescue.ca they were so nice and helpful. come on bandit!