Toronto

My husband and I are planning on going the midwife route for our first child. I was wondering if anyone here has had experiences they'd be willing to share, good or bad, with any of the midwife groups in central or east Toronto? (You're welcome to PM me if you'd rather keep your thoughts private.)

Thanks!

This is a very last-minute sales post! I will be re-posting with added items on Wednesday! :)
Dresses, pants, shirts, etc. $5/$10!
Prices are negotiable if you're buying multiple items!

*Image heavy

( Skirts! )
( Dresses! )
( Shirts/Sweaters! )
( Pants! )
( Miscellaneous! )
Meet ups will be arranged at a mutually convenient time, along the subway line.
All of my items come from a smoke-free, pet-free home (although some of it may be a little wrinkled from storage!).
Feel free to ask any questions!

Includes: Lug laptop bag and a couple of purses

( Photos under cut )

Please comment if you have any questions or are interested! Thanks! :)

Various outlets have reported on scaled-down plans for the Pan Am Games. The Globe and Mail's story includes a summary of the new venues. In addition to creating "venue clusters" at U of T (St. George and Scarborough), York, Ryerson, and several of the suburbs, a large number of events are to be held at Exhibition Place.

Exhibition Place is increasingly a white elephant for the city and a frequent subject of municipal discussion. In the 1970s, the CNE attracted upwards of 3 million visitors; the figure is now closer to 1.3 million, shrinking further and further every year. Exhibition Place itself is a difficult venue to work with: more and more of its buildings have been either demolished or sold off to private companies, and for most of the year it sits more or less empty, a dead zone of parking lots and locked buildings. The Direct Energy Centre, Medieval Times and the Liberty Grand are prospering, and the Ricoh Colliseum remains a popular venue, but the remainder of the site (including most of its public land) is left unused for 50 weeks of the year.

What do we do with it? If you were planning the Pan Am Games, what would you seek to install or improve at Exhibition Place in order to make it more attractive as a year-round destination?

Is Exhibition Place a lost cause? (Is selling off land and buildings to the private sector the best solution? It seems to work well for the existing tenants...) Can it be salvaged?

Is it possible to save Exhibition Place without making it too difficult to run the CNE? (Is it time to end the CNE altogether? Should the CNE adapt itself to more modern tastes and sensibilities? How?)

How do we solve these problems?

I'm selling a Radiohead tikcet to their June 16th show for $120. Pickup is anywhere on the subway line. Thanks! :-)

I'm trying to locate a candy: it's pink cinnamon goodness outside and chocolatey mock-marrow goodness inside. Usually they're called chicken bones, and Ganong makes them. 

Please tell me you know where I can buy this candy in Toronto. Bulk Barn only has them at Christmas.

Hi Everyone,

I am looking for recommendations for Pediatricians preferably in the west end around Islington, but I will go anywhere in the GTA if necessary.
If you don't want to give the contact info here, then please email me at hiding234 at hotmail dot com
Thanks

I have a friend who lives in LA and she's collected cans and brought them to a recycling depot for cash. I know the Beer store takes back empties, but does anyone know if we have recycling centers that allow us to bring in items for cash?

Any recommendations of where to get lasik in Toronto?

The Globe & Mail is reporting that there's drama surrounding the plastic bag fee. The executive committee will soon consider a report on providing incentives for businesses to donate whole or part of the fee to a city program to rebuild our tree canopy, which is currently under assault from parasites.

The Mayor, for his part, wants to abolish the whole thing, because the people want subways "I believe the taxpayers don’t want to pay the five cents any more."

What are your experiences with the fee? Has it changed the city? Is it an inconvenience, or has it done good things?

I'm looking for a downtown or west end fabric store that has a large selection of fleece. I know its a long shot, but i've been into lots of places along queen and been unable to find the specific shade of green I need, so I figured i'd ask here.

Tia!

Has anyone seen these brands sold in Toronto?

Hi, Toronto! I'm looking for some mason jars and am having a hard time finding them. Everywhere I've been seems to only carry them seasonally. Do you know of anywhere that is carrying them at the moment? I know value village usually has them, but I need a bunch of the same size by the weekend so that won't work given the time constraints.

I'm also looking for mini-chalk boards. The cheaper the better!

Thanks for your help!

Long shot, because I failed at buying tickets when they actually went on sale, but...

I'm looking for 2 tickets to The Tallest Man on Earth in Toronto June 15th.

hello y'all! i'm selling my ticket to brand new's concert on august 02. i've been counting the days to see these lovely folks, but i'm leaving for a few months and can't make it back just for this. bah.

anyway, i bought it from ticket master for $45 but am willing to let it go for $30 obo. let me know if you're interested and we'll figure something out. thanks!

Selling tons of women's clothing (xsmall-medium), makeup (mostly from sephora) and shoes |(birkenstocks and tons more)

Photo heavy!

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Hey Toronto. So, I recently acquired a hand-me-down double bike trailer from MEC. It's quite nice, and in good used condition. But I have only one kid and very limited storage space. So I'm hoping to trade it with someone who has a single trailer but wants a double because they have 2 kids or 2 dogs or lots of groceries or whatever!

Anyone? I can throw in a hand-me-down rearmounted baby bike seat and a toddler helmet too!

The Star is reporting that a proposal is being floated at Queen's Park to require chain restaurants to report the caloric content of the items on their menus. The bill, proposed by the NDP's France Gelinas, has earned the endorsement of the Ontario Medical Association, and Health Minister Deb Matthews is reportedly "supportive" of the measure.

Similar programs already exist in several US states (including New York and California). The most common approach is to require that calories be listed next to the item's name, in the same font and with the same size and emphasis as the item's price.

The curious thing is that American implementations of this system have had somewhat mixed results: The Economist briefly explored this issue last summer and found that, in many cases, posting caloric information has absolutely no impact upon the choices diners make.

What do you make of it all? Would caloric information change your dietary habits? Is it just another number you could never keep track of? Does this idea have legs?

The Star reports that several city councillors are exploring a proposal by the local BIA to temporarily reduce Yonge Street between Gerrard and Richmond to a single lane of traffic in both directions. The lane reduction, which would last for one month during the height of tourist season (overlapping with the CNE and TIFF), would involve extending the sidewalks into the roadway by using planters and street furniture to protect pedestrians from traffic.

Councillor Kristen Wong-Tam (whose ward includes this stretch of Yonge) is in favour of the proposal, saying "We have the busiest street in Canada and the sidewalks are barely 2 metres in width in most areas …. Right now the sidewalks are so crowded that people are jostling for some real estate to just move one step ahead and they actually don’t have the opportunity to stand back and look at the store displays."

Councillor Denzil Minnan-Wong, a member of the Executive Committee, has suggested that, in the long term, it might be wise to convert Yonge into a one-way street: this would allow for sidewalks to be extended, and would also create room for a separated bike route.

What do you make of it all? Yonge is a busy street for traffic, but the sheer number of pedestrians (especially at the height of tourist season) can easily dwarf vehicular traffic. Has the time come to extend the sidewalks, even if it means drivers suffer? Would Minnan-Wong's one-way compromise be an acceptable alternative?

Serious question, is David Tennant in town? Because I saw someone on the subway like an hour ago who bore an uncanny resemblance to him. When he got up he looked a little shorter than what I thought he looked like on tv but that might be the magic of deliberate manipulation by the director. I would have taken a pic but my phone has that upskirt pervert feature where it makes a loud "ka-chik" sound when I use the camera.

A while ago someone on here was asking about where to get Vietnamese sandwiches in Chinatown. I mentioned a specific place south of College but I didn't know the exact name or address. I promised to find out the next time I was in Chinatown, so I am here to tell you all of the Vietnamese sandwiches to be found at Banh Mi & Che Cali (Sandwiches & Sweet Desserts) at 318 Spadina and Nguyen Huong Banh Mi next door at 322 Spadina. It's super cheap, around $2.25 generally and for an actual sandwich that will actually fill you up versus anywhere else where it would probably be double the price for a sandwich of the same size. 

By the way, they don't screw around when they ask you if you want your sandwich spicy, they put in the tiny peppers that feel like you're eating a flaming punch in the mouth. I think the sandwich lady also thought I was Vietnamese so she packed it in.

Is there a website where I can post a call-out for actors? Or a site where actors in Toronto might go to look for work? I just learned about Akimbo but I think they post call for submissions?

Thanks!

I've been looking for interesting ways of getting my exercise in lately. Not that doing 8 kilometres along mostly the Lakeshore Trail yesterday was so bad, especially in this weather; but I'd like to explore a few other options and see if I can work in a bit more variety. A few things of interest to me are:

1. Indoor rock climbing: I haven't been rock climbing in years - certainly not since I moved to Toronto. But I wouldn't mind getting back into it. Any good climbing gyms here? Google and Yelp suggest a few, but if anyone has any personal favourites, I'd love to hear about them!

2. Gymnastics: this is something I've never done but have been wanting to try for a while, and Google is not being particularly helpful tonight. Do such things as beginner adult classes in gymnastics exist? Are they readily available anywhere in the GTA? Or am I just a couple of decades too old to get started properly?

3. Indoor rollerblading: I haven't done any of this since I was a little kid. Scooter's in Mississauga looks like a good bet. Any thoughts?

Thanks, all!