26 posts tagged “presents”
i was able to get chaeli just before 1pm, today, and head home.
unfortunately, we've all got a head cold. but i count ourselves fortunate given all the horrible flu viruses making others in a much worse state then us. i'll take the sniffles over any of the other ailments anyday!
so it's just chaeli and i. we're about to head upstairs and get under the covers, while watching a bunch of dvd's. she picked that will smith sharks tale flick to start with. don't know why she loves that movie so much...
doug will be home for dinner and then it's an extra-early night for chaeli since she didn't fall asleep as early as i hoped last night. i'm letting her miss nap so she can get to bed early tonight.
as usual, we will wait for her to be in deep sleep before we move all the presents down to the living room and under the tree... and stuff the stockings to the brim!
then i'm going to go back to bed, put on 'love actually' (my personal ritual on christmas eve) and hopefully get more then several hours of good, solid sleep.
merry christmas, everyone!
this past saturday, we had our annual 'deep fried turkey and kid's secret santa exchange' party at steve and cor's house.
what a good party - i just felt like a huge release being there with good friends. laughing and talking and best of all - the kids are so good at playing on their own now. they spent most of the time in the basement with each other. ah bliss!
an important lesson learned within five minutes of arriving - even though i think people never read my facebook status updates, they SO read them.
within the first hour, the following facebook statuses by yours truely was discussed:
- that i admitted to staring at zac efron's 6-pack in '17 again'
- that i love red, orange and yellow peppers, but am not fond of green peppers
- that i almost went to see 'new moon' on my own
i think the highlight of the night was the guys chin-up contest. boys will be boys, after all.
afterwards, steve l. said, "i'm very disppointed with myself. hoa! i should hire you to train me back into shape."
to which hoa's reply was, "okay. but you HAVE to listen to me. if i tell you to do a push-up, you can't just say, 'bah! why bother?'"
hoa totally had steve l. pinned on that one because that's EXACTLY the type of thing steve l. would say.
and i think it's these little conversations of parties that seems to stick with me the most. the kind where a smaller group is off to the side, chatting and having a good laugh or two.
sometimes i wish i had that magical, twitchy nose like that samantha from bewitched. ah - when t.v. shows were a league of their own. in a good way.
and as much as i wished i had powers to make my closet, or any space in my house, either big or small, become instantly organized and clean in matter of a milli-second, the reality is, of course, that i can't do that. and even if i could, would i really be using my powers just to clean closets?
anyway, this is something i have been wanting to do since september but something always came up. and as we had no plans today, i decided to go for it.
two hours later, i am left with just my cd case and one half of a shelf piled of magazines to go through. and i just can't do anymore. two hours in a closet is enough! i will do that half a shelf and cds another day.
most importantly, i organized all the christmas presents that i bought. yes, that's right. you heard me.
not only do i organize my christmas shopping lists into spreadsheets where there is one spreadsheet for each - my familly, doug's family, doug and chaeli and misc. gift... not only do i create another spreadsheet to correlate with the other four, but this one being by store, either online or off, so i don't end up running all over town, hitting stores more then once... but at some point, i organize my gifts so that all the gifts going to thunderbay are in one or two large shopping bags, and i do the same for presents for chaeli, doug and my own side of the familly.
there is a chaotic period where i shop and just pile everything in the corner of my walk-in closet, still in their bags/boxes.
it was driving me crazy. now, they are all organized. all i need to do is pull them out in the order that they need to be wrapped - doug's family being the front in line.
yup.
i'm psychotic.
i admit that i was disappointed that i couldn't take part in nuit blanche this year. while chinese moon festival and my uncle's birthday were celebrated at my aunt and uncles home on the same nute as nuit blanche, that wasn't the reason why i couldn't go. after all, the dinner party ended around 10pm which would have allowed us to go until around 1am (since it's an all night event). but doug had to do the practical part of his course this weekend and had to be up fairly early. a part of me wondered if i should have gone on my own but no. i had to take care of chaeli on my own the next day. and man - it is not easy doing that when all you want to do is sleep!
next year. it's something i hope to do for sure.
anyway, despite the disppointment, it was a wonderful weekend. chaeli stayed at my parents' place on friday night so the anal nerd in me spent friday night cleaning the house and reorganizing chaeli's summer to fall/winter wardrobe. just as i suspected, the pile of 'too small' clothes was three times bigger then the pile of clothes that fits her. but most of them were mix-matches of tops and bottoms that didn't all go well together. geez - that kid sprout up big time this year.
i also went through her huge pile of books on her night stand, which was so huge that half of it was on the floor underneath the little table. her usual bookshelf, which is very small and a part of her closet) was jammed pack. i had to put some of the bigger books on the very top shelf. i'm going to have to invest in a kid's book shelf to put her books away in. while i have no issues deciding on toys to give away, ones that she's outgrown, i have a pretty huge issue with getting rid of books. i do have a small pile of maybe 8 books i'm prepared to donate to her school, but that's about it. she's got so much more that i didn't even make 1/8th of a dent.
doug came home just near the end of my organizing and cleaning. we decided to head out for a late dinner at a local vietnamese restaurant. i had the lemongrass, grilled chicken, rice, shredded pork and fried egg. doug has his usuall vermecelli with an assortment of goodies in it - vietnamese spring roll, beef roll and shrimp paste on sugar cane. we shared a cold spring roll appetizer and some spicy, fried squid appetizer. what i love about vietnamese food is that it's so affordable. with all that we ordered, it only came to $35 after tips and tax.
saturday morning, i headed off to another power-pump class, making it the first time i've done three in a week. it was at 9:30am which helped getting my butt out of bed early. as usual, the class was great, though this instructor probably would not be considered my favourite one of those i've tried. she wasn't bad but her program was a bit too repetitive. not enough was mixed up which made it easier, i felt. i compensated by adding more weights to my routine.
afterwards, i headed up too shop for chaeli's fall/winter wardrobe. while i was at the mall, i also bought some stocking stuffer items for christmas. i was able to get everything done before 1pm which was nice - i had a few hours to relax and unwind before going over to my aunt's place.
dinner was great, as usual. my doctor and his wife joined the party as well and we had such a great night laughing and chatting away. the food was fabulous though i wasn't able to really dive into it as my appetite has shrunken. it was good, though. at one point, i was able to stop and remind myself that i was satisfied. that any more eating would have just been out of habit and pleasure. but that i would suffer later by being overly-stuffed. so rather having more steak or pasta, i opted to having a couple more of the grilled portebello mushrooms (which were just amazing, anyway, but light).
- when i went to university for the first time, mom started to give me (as a side gift) a care package for christmas. this would basically cover the 2nd part of my school year in terms of supplies - shampoo, soap, tooth paste, etc. of course, after i moved home, this all stopped. but now that i'm living in my own home with my own family, she still continues to do this. it was a bit strange at first - after all, i'm now taking care of my own family and can afford to buy my own toothpaste. but still, there's something sweet about it. i've come to look forward to my care package. it's not what's inside it that matters - but the symbolic representation it offers from a mother that still looks after her daughter. as we get closer to christmas, i remind doug that we don't have to stock up too much on things that i know we'll be getting from mom soon enough.
- i'm looking forward to fall this year. and i'm hoping that fall will stay a little while before winter hits. it's such a shame that my favourite season of the year is so short. but i do love fall. i love it's smell, the breeze and it's colours. it's also full of fun activities - hiking, apple-picking, farmer's market (during harvest time), thanksgiving and halloween. there's just so much to look forward to but unfortunately, not enough weekends to do them all.
- we're having thanksgiving at my parents' place this year. usually, my aunt and uncle always hosts both thanksgiving and christmas but we've decided that thanksgiving should be at my parents' place. they just bought a deep turkey fryer. i'm excited about that alone! mmm... deep fried turkey. for those who've tried this, you'll agree that it's not at all greasy. the skin is crisp and there's no grease clinging on the outer skin part only, but because it fries up so quickly, it seals the meaty area from getting greasy inside and locking in the juices.
- there is so much to do in the next couple of months, including a live reading-performance from one of my favourite canadian author, stuart mclean. ada got us tickets and i'm psyched to go - especially as her and i have been talking about it for the past two years.
- christmas seems far away but really, it is just around the corner. i've started christmas shopping. in fact, i'm nearly done all my stocking stuffers (except for doug's) and need to focus on just the main gifts. the only person i've finished the main gift shopping is for chaeli. and that's only because when it comes to toys, especially popular ones, there's too much of a risk for it being sold out before christmas. plus, i bought her collector item toys from transformers, revenge of the fallen. some of them are already sold out. anyway, as usual, i plan to finish my shopping by early november so i have time to mail it to my in-laws. i have a great list this year and am excited to see how my ideas are received.
- christmas activities are also really high on my list which is part of the reason why i like to get the shopping done early and out of the way. this year, i'm wondering if i want to do the nutcracker ballet again. i didn't think i would want to do it every year but i feel like it again. it is such a great treat to experience. and of course, especially as this will be ada and hoa's last year in toronto, before moving out west, i do hope to go the the 'sleeping children around the world' charity concert. it's held eary december and kick-starts our christmas holiday season.
- this past friday night, we had last minute, unexpected babysitting. so, with the freedom to have a date night, doug and i both worked out (me at the gym, him outdoors for a run), meeting up at home afterwards. we felt like steak and lobster. and though i know we could have had a hundred different choices of where to dine, i suggested the keg mansion. our meal had us quite full so we decided to stroll through the village since it was just a block away from where we were. the festivities was gearing up towards pride week. there were a lot of people walking up and down the street... and better yet, so many people were sitting on benches and chairs outside various stores/cafes, just lounging, talking and people watching. some of the clubs were have drag queen competitions or just great music pumping out and into the streets. i saw one blond drag queen that looked so smart that i was tempted in taking a photo of her. i didn't though - didn't want to look like a tourist.
- on saturday, doug and i went to the gym for another workout and then headed over to an all-u-can-eat japanese restaurant to meet my parents, aunt and uncle. i'm pretty much content with the amount of sushi i injested though i feel like i didn't get my fix on spicy salmon sushi. afterwards, doug hitched a ride with my aunt and uncle because he had to go back into the city to do a recert for his first aid and cpr. chaeli and i went north to my parents' place and spent our afternoon plus dinner there.
- today, sunday, is probably my favourtie day this weekend. i woke up earlier then doug to fix him a father's day brunch (though he came down shortly to do the bacon - i'm a multitasker except while cooking). afterwards, we sat in the living room to finish our coffee while listening to some tunes. my aunt came over and joined us. then, we washed up, changed and headed out to get some flowers for our potted, patio garden. i just came in from potting five large pots. i pray this year, that we have more success then last year, when most of our flowers died by mid-summer. i should take some photos of them while they are still alive - just in case!
as for doug's father's day gifts, i bought him a travel set of shaving cream and after shave lotion, a large tub of shaving cream (that kind you use with a brush to lather up on your face) and the godfather trilogy.
he's quite happy considering last weekend, we celebrated his 40th birthday. i bought him a horrible histories book about scotland, the 13th warrior dvd and the mini-series dvd, lonesome dove. and, i bought tickets to see cirque due soliel KA at the mgm grand while we're in vegas. can't wait!
we had planned a week or two ago to take chaeli downtown via the subway. there's this really cool cheese store called 'about cheese' which our friend, yvonne, turned us on to. we're due for another cheese spree but the wind was just god-awful today.
instead, we decided to check out this local japanese, all you can eat, restuarant since we had a 25% off deal for it.
not bad. doug and i did a few rounds of the spicy salmon. it was potent but oh-so-good!
afterwards, we went to 'toys 'r us' to let chaeli use her birthday gift card she received from one of her peers. of course, she bought three transformers to go with her bumblebee and optimus prime. i secretly was happy she bought them. :)
doug and i treated ourselves too. we went to the sony style store and finally bought ourselves a very nice but not-to-expensive audio theatre system, which has the ability to plug into any mp3 player. the crappy boom-box we had in our living/dining room was close to being toast and we had been talking about getting a bit of a nicer one for over a year now. especially as now we spend a lot of time in the living room together as a family, listening to music while either talking or reading.
the last stop before heading home was baskin and robbins. i pretty much always get chocolate mint chip because while i'm not a big fan of ice cream (it's too cold!) i can't resist a kid's scoop of that minty, chocolatey flavour.
after dinner, chaeli got a chance to play with her transformers while doug and i enjoyed our new stereo system.
not an exciting day but a good day none-the-less.
yes, this is what i did.
doug bought me a group of seven, hardcover book at chapters for $50. he didn't think it would be $50 because the link i had sent him with my 'email to santa' linked to amazon.ca and was only $31.50. imagine his surprise, and anger, when he got to the store and saw it for so much more.
i said to him, "well... i warned you not to buy it in the store. i did say it was going to be cheaper through amazon."
"yeah," he started, "but by almost $20???"
"yes... by that much."
"oh come on! no way..."
"welcome to the world of shopping. actually... welcome to the world of amazon."
it's true that not all books have that much difference from the retails stores and online stores, but there can be a fairly big difference at times.
anyway, i told him not to worry. for one thing, i was happy that he bought it for me but that it wouldn't be much to return it to chapters. which is exactly what we did this past saturday. as soon as we got home, i went onto amazon, ordered the book as well as a dvd that was on sale.
i just started to read it last night and am loving it!
last year, i had a choice of buying a desktop, day-to-day sudoku puzzle calendar or a day-to-day scrap booking calendar (each page of that week went towards a theme). i went for the latter.
and did i use any of those weekly themes, one might wonder? of course not. except once - when i made my mother a birthday card. of course, i've saved the ones that i really like and plan to use but for the time being, i admit that i totally chose the wrong calendar.
this past christmas, doug bought a 2009 one for me and i was happy to see that not only did a get a 365 different sudoku puzzles, one for each day, but that it also was very square and compact, taking up as little space as possible.
what i didn't expect was that it's a sudoku VARIETY. which means that there are several different types of sudoku puzzles - one for every day of the week. and only one day of that week is of the usual kind. the others?
holy cow. i can't even do some of them! there's one that has 16 grids - 0-9 and A-F need to be fit within each mini-grid, as well as on each row and column. another is called sudoku jigsaw and the grids are not square grids but irratically and randomly created borders.
it is now the thirteenth day of the new year and i have more then half of the days of sudoku puzzles to try and solve - many of them are left half finished as i try to finish the easier one and get them out of the way.
AND I'M LIKE A MASTER AT SUDOKU!
i can't take it.
christmas day panned out to be excellent. chaeli came into our room to get us before heading down to see if santa had visited.
she then went into series of questions like, "how can he fit all those presents in that one bag of his?" and, "can santa hear what i'm thinking al the time?" as well as my favourite, "who has more power? santa or god?"
the questions stopped when she suddenly realized all the gifts that santa had left, not just under the tree, but in our stockings as well as three additional new stockings, also filled to the brim, left on our couch...
well, other then her and doug trying to figure out how to turn optimus prime into a truck...
after brunch, we sat around in the living room, allowing ourselves to take a closer look at our presents. doug read his new harry potter book while i did my favourite thing - organize everyone's presents into piles under the tree. i have this insane need to get some of the more worn-out christmas gift bags and putting each person's loot into their own gift bag. it's just easier - when it's time to clean up, all the little things are already in a bag, ready to be taken away.
at around 6pm, we went across the underground parking lot and was greeted with a 21lb turkey that just came fresh out of the oven. it was unbelievably huge. but what was even more unbelievable was that we actually ate half of that damn turky. HALF! crazy! and i had three servings of turkey myself. i had all the side dishes, too, but didn't go back for 2nds/3rds other then to have more of that yummy, juicy, white-meat.
my aunt's christmas decorations is always so beautiful. she's got a very classy taste and her tree is usually coloured with either a light, warm pink and gold or bright red and gold. this year, she chose the latter.
another year, another christmas.
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