day in traffic pretty much consisted of  only horses and carriages and this home  

began construction obviously there's no footage  of that moment but here we are we bought a house

dan and i started looking for a home even back  when i was pregnant but it can be a long hunt when  

things are expensive but she's here she's very  much unavailable to come to the phone right now  

because she's super under construction but i did  record some footage back when we got possession  

from it i think you'll get an idea of why we're  making all these changes so i hope you enjoy  

the home is located in the queen west area of the  city of toronto previously vogue magazine included  

queen west as one of the 15 coolest neighborhoods  in the world this is a fact that local real estate  

listings love to include when they run out of  things to say this home appears on archival  

fire insurance plans from the late 1800s so the  house is very likely over 100 years old welcome to  

the empty home tour this is a two-story home the  current setup is so that the main floor and the  

upper floor could be used by two total strangers  as independent units and hence that's why we just  

went through like a big heavy door the main floor  has two bedroom areas there's a galley kitchen a  

living room and a bathroom we'll come over to  the front bedroom it's got a nice sunny window  

a fan which i'm sure we will discover why that  is necessary once warmer weather comes in these  

old homes and a closet so you can easily see how  someone could enjoy this as their bedroom space  

previous resident used it as an office for us we  will be using it as more of a living room space

all right i'm going to take you over to the  living room area the living room area has  

these two hilarious windows that are not the  same height from where they start or where they  

end i'm not quite sure who planned these out but  it's pretty funny and the living room currently  

has a bathroom attached to it so since this is an  independent rental unit this is the previous one

are you done sweetie this is  the previous residence shower  

toilet vanity sink all that jazz my favorite  feature being the hollywood lights cute little  

three-way mirror vanity another fan in this  room as well a door that leads to the basement  

darkness for now there's a laundry unit down there  we imagine that this home has gone through a lot  

of renovations during its time and so at this  point i think very few of the original details  

are very noticeable but there's a few you  can find in the kitchen so one over here is  

this wayne scotting detail it's really nothing  glamorous but i think this is like a bead board  

style which is on the simpler side of victorian  area victorian era wall features back then wayne  

wainscoting was pretty much used for insulation as  well as extra protection for water damage hence it  

being in the kitchen but nowadays most people just  add it as an aesthetic feature like beadboard is  

such a simplistic design i think most of the times  when it was put in it wasn't even meant to be seen  

i don't think we'll be keeping it i also have  neglected to mention just how truly green this  

kitchen is the green countertop green painting in  the shelves one giant green wall there was a lot  

of love for green oh and if you come and turn  around this is the other more victorian detail  

that remains as well this doorway casing with  this bullseye corner block i've been trying to  

brush up on my interior design terminology  this is one of the probably most signature  

items on this main floor that's still standing  and the last one to see is this back bedroom  

the echo in this room is the least noticeable  because it has lovely carpet gray with all sorts  

of discoloration and chaoticness going on and i'm  standing on it in my bare socks so hopefully these  

are all good choices another fan in this room so  becoming suspicious with the number of fans here  

and what that might mean for summertime the plan  is to open it up to be a place for entertaining  

cooking while keeping an eye on marla and also  letting more natural light flow through the home  

with the walls removed the current bathroom would  be right in the middle of the living room so we  

are moving that to the side as a smaller powder  room we're excited to open up the stairwell and we  

want to add a back exit so there's a shorter path  between our parking spot and the kitchen all right  

upstairs these are definitely the original stairs  i don't think the carpet is original and oh more  

interior terminology this new all post is very  likely original along with the entire staircase  

railing this millwork is apparently a very common  victorian era thing our home is definitely built  

in the victorian times but it lacks a lot of the  really elaborate detailing and so we just have  

decided that whoever built this home was either on  a budget or had similar tastes no idea the upper  

floor consists of two bedrooms one bathroom and  one room in the back that is currently being used  

as a kitchen but technically counts as a third  bedroom this is the largest bedroom in the home  

i don't know if you can hear the creaky floors but  that's very original we really love this little  

window co closet is pretty small minimalist  life i'm down for it sometimes it's a thing with  

hardwood floors if you want to change up  the color you can sand them and repaint them  

but i think this one is all the way down to its  nails and so either we have to embrace the color  

that it is because it should not be sanded anymore  or we'd have to completely redo the flooring  

and that is a decision we are leaving for a later  time next bedroom is a little bit smaller it's got  

this super cute two-door detail these big blocks  of wood which the previous owner left behind and  

told us that they have been custom fitted to go on  the floor underneath the bed to make the bed level  

in this room because like many old houses this  room and whole house is slowly tilting down  

one little step watch your step we have  the bathroom we've got one of these little  

old vent covers down here which i find so  fascinating this is also a very original feature  

these baseboards nowadays you pay extra for  them to be this thick because nowadays we just  

want to save money and have as little material  as possible so we'd like to keep that the last  

room is currently a kitchen it's also currently  being used as a laundry situation this is like the  

room that really does it all for you our favorite  thing about this room though is that it has a back  

exit takes you across a little bridge and onto a  rooftop patio we'll be using that in the summer  

time for barbecue and fun and hosting and my  last favorite feature of our upper floor is a  

skylight currently covered in snow this feels  like an homage to our current studio loft  

that also has the skylight but this skylet is  even better because it has two little latches  

so i think we can go up there we will  definitely figure out that situation  

we'd like to add an ensuite bathroom and the  back bedroom will be redone into my sewing  

studio we will definitely also try to figure  out a ladder setup to get to the skylight  

and the rooftop patio will be its  own project once winter is over

in the last year we basically tried every meal kit  that we could get our hands on at least in canada

the reason we did that was because it was such  a good choice for helping us adjust to becoming  

parents as soon as marla entered our life we just  lost a whole bunch of time that we used to have  

available to go to the grocery store to plan our  meals the tendency to just get take out or get  

delivery increased but it just felt so bad because  it's hefty on your food bill and the meal kits was  

a fun experiment we got to see if we actually had  a favorite and we did and then i was so happy when  

they offered to sponsor this video it is hella  fresh in case any of you have never tried a meal  

kit with hellofresh it is fresh pre-portioned  ingredients with seasonal recipes delivered  

right to your doorstep and then yeah store  them in the fridge every week i love unboxing  

the delivery and seeing the beautiful recipe  cards and i got my whole collection right here  

we've kind of gathered our like greatest hits  collection that we can remake whenever we want and  

from cooking these week after week you start to  get the hang of a lot of kitchen fundamentals like  

what staples should you always have in stock what  types of textures and flavors pair well together  

i now have basically memorized how long it takes  to bake all sorts of different types of vegetables  

because i've done it so many times it's kind of  the cooking level i dreamed of achieving where  

i just had more innate knowledge instead of  every time feeling like i had to look a recipe  

out honestly for me it's like an at-home cooking  class the teacher has prepared the ingredients  

prepared the recipe marla's awake we get to  enjoy the final product and because of that  

every week i also really love going inside the  website to pick the recipes i'll purposefully  

pick ones that have ingredients i've never  tried techniques i've never done before it's  

like the closest i've ever been to cooking  school and i'm loving it today we are making  

beef and roasted red pepper ragu with spaghetti  but actually before starting i will always  

put the recipe up here with some magnets so  it's really really easy to refer to a pasta  

is probably one of the easier recipes that they  have but we always include one really easy recipe  

every week so that in case we're really tired  or really short on time there's still a simple  

option the other thing i like to do is to remold  the bag into a little countertop waste bin which  

makes meal prep go a little easier one more thing  i like about this recipe is it contains something  

that's also marla friendly whether it's carrots  sweet potatoes any other type of ingredient that  

she can feed herself i'll just leave a little  bit off to the side so we can all enjoy together  

for us hella fresh has helped meet so many of our  goals we wanted healthy we wanted home cooked we  

wanted fresh ingredients and we're getting all of  that and we've made meal prep so fast and easy on  

top of that the recipes are so tasty there are so  many recipes to choose from so you don't ever feel  

stuck making the same thing over and over all of  their produce gets from the farm to your doorstep  

in under a week it's very fresh since everything  is pre-portioned it is cut down dramatically on  

our food waste which feels really good from a  sustainability perspective so many times where  

you throw out food waste that's gone bad from  your fridge and you just feel bad because you  

paid money for it and then never ever got to enjoy  it now instead virtually no food waste enjoying  

fresh food and learning new things all the time  which i did not think i would have time to do  

if you want to try hellofresh go to hellofresh.com  use the code wendy16 you'll get up to  

16 free meals and three surprise gifts let's  dive in such a simple recipe but still so tasty  

currently my in-laws are on hello fresh  my best friend is on hellofresh we're like  

swapping recipes telling each other our little  tricks that are making the whole thing even more  

fun and enjoyable and overall i'm just grateful  how many times thanks to hellofresh we have had  

happy and non-stressed meal times because  it was just really easy to put together

hello here with marla she's enjoying her lunch  today on the menu it's mozzarella and i've got  

some toast and strawberries for her too and saku  is here i love it when all us oh can i fit us all

i love it when all those three girls gather  today i'm super excited because on the weekend  

we found out i don't know why we didn't think that  these exist but there's a door store in toronto  

that sells antique doors and our house has an  antique door but it opens in the wrong direction  

so we want to get a door that opens the correct  direction but it also would be nice to sell our  

antiqua door to them also feels exciting to get a  secondhand door i just think the older doors have  

so much more character and interesting history  to them so we're gonna go check out some doors

i've gotten a quick tour of the door situation  most of the ones on this side open to the left we  

want those ones that open to the right this place  is so cool we got columns chandeliers gorgeous  

large frames lots of mirrors little corner chair  classic vintage pieces mantels you could like  

make a fake fireplace that's a diy idea oh my  gosh look at this one wow this place is nuts

this one here for example is pretty  much exactly the size we want  

12.50 i'm gonna try to pull it out and take a look

this one also basically the  right size it's a little pricier  

makes sense because the stained  glass window is so much bigger  

and it's got more wood detailing  down below the wood also feels nicer

you