There’s No Business Like Snow Business.

14 Feb

Oh hay there, friends!

I’m sorry I haven’t posted in a while, I’ve been slowly burrowing my way out of 9 feet of snow.
I’m not complaining, though. I love the look of brand new, sparkly snow, especially this year now that I have nice high boots to trudge around in. Snow is so much more fun when your socks are dry!

So, a couple of weeks ago, we had a wee Superbowl party which was Superfun (seewhatididthere?) and it covered my lentil quota for a month. We were eating chili and dip for DAYS afterwards. It also gave us a chance to have a SuperSlumber Party with our favourite super-couple Brodie and Ashley. I love when they come to visit. They make me want to be healthier. I took four pictures, because I am an amazing and dedicated blogger.

This weekend, the snow looked so purty that I took myself for a little walk to the park where I watched children and dogs play in the snow and then left because people were starting to stare at me suspiciously. Probably because I kept taking pictures of myself smiling like a fool. Over and over again.

On Sunday, my Supergood friend Celeste and I took advantage of our old-money heritage Groupon coupons and took ourselves to the Windsor Arms for brunch. I don’t know if you’ve ever heard of the Windsor Arms, but it’s where fancy rich people go to have high tea and probably sell their fur (that is what rich people do, yes?) We made up a back story which was that I was a Scottish famous blogger and Celeste was my hip friend from LA. I don’t know why we needed a back story, but it did add to the overall enjoyment of the day. It was soooo yummy, I wish I had 8 stomachs so I could eat more. The dessert table was craziness and it looked like a scene from a Graeme Base book. After we were done, we ran around gallivanting through the hotel because that’s what respectable people do at The Windsor Arms.

All in all, I feel like it’s been a fun couple of weeks, not so stressful, a nice change from the ordinary. The next few days marks Jamie and my Valentine’s dinner and the Family Day long weekend where I hope to relax and do something interesting!

Ugly: My team lost the Superbowl :-(

Awesome: Eating 70% dessert for brunch.

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Feeding a Cold: On a Wild Cous Chase.

24 Jan

Hi Friends!

Today, I was home sick and became riddled with the cabin fever. I watched several movies, took 1 thousand naps and watched the Food Network for the first time in years. I think the recent barrage of competition cooking shows has soured my taste for The Food Network. My mom and I used to watch Iron Chef, but that was back when it was the ONLY competition cooking show and everybody was still Japanese.

The only shows about food that I really like to watch are the ones that actually instruct you on how to cook. It seems that these shows are now the minority, the same way music videos are rarely ever seen on Much Music anymore. But today, whilst flipping through the channels, I stumbled across Jamie Oliver’s show “Jamie’s 15 Minute Meals”. I watched him cook up a delicious looking Greek Meal in (apparently) 15 minutes and was immediately inspired. I took a short walk to grab some groceries and tried my hand at his “Gorgeous Greek chicken with herby vegetable couscous & tzatziki”.

In the end, it was delicious, although somehow it took me 1.5 hours as opposed to 15 minutes. This is most likely because I do not own a food processor and when I attempted to use my Magic Bullet for the job, it started making soup, so I had to cut my losses and chop the rest by hand. Nevertheless, it was YUMMY. Jamie (my Jamie, not Oliver) agreed and we will definitely be making it again. Perhaps now that I’ve done it once and know what to expect, I could actually make it in 15 minutes! Just kidding, that will never happen.

Ugly: Being sickly and achy and gross.

Awesome: Finding a new healthy recipe that can feed us for days; re-discovering an inspiration for cooking new things; Tasty, TASTY couscous!

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A New Year’s Recollection.

20 Jan

Hi Strangers!!

Sorry it’s taken me so long to update! Now that it’s been so long since I wrote anything, I feel like I have so much insignificant/very important information to share! In an effort not overwhelm myself and my memory, below is an account of some things that have occupied my brain since my last post:

- New Year’s Eve happened! Jamie and I were in Kingston and we had a lovely dinner with Brodie and Ashley followed by dancing (specifically dance battling).

- My Mom’s Birthday! Happy Birthday mom!

- I took down all our Christmas decorations and have been having fun thinking about normal house decorating. Wish I could visit Houston – a blogger lady who I’ve been following for years just opened a new store called Biscuit full of awesome junk: www.peppermintbliss.com
I’ve been getting inspired by all her crazy colour combos.

- I cut my hair real short and bleached it all! I’ve been thinking about making a change for a while (I’ve had basically the same hair for the past several years) so this weekend I took the plunge! It’s still a teensy bit yellow (we couldn’t do the toner because my scalp was unhappy with me), so I’m going back next week to make it even whiter! Betty White will be so jealz.

- Dance class! After the break, my super friend, Kate, told me about a dance studio near both of our houses. We tried a ballet class together which didn’t work out so great (the teacher was…unstable), but since then I’ve gone to a contemporary class and a Lyrical class which I love! I’m jumping in with both feet and joining the performance class so I’ll have a recital in April. Personal goal of the year: Try to take it seriously and not make fun of it. It’s really hard, though. There’s lots of “emotion”…

- I went on an amazing Value Village shopping spree. Among other things, I bought a Cristian Dior skirt for $6 and a sweater that has a bedazzled satellite on it…probably the best thing I’ve ever purchased.

Well, I guess that’s it till next time! I’ll try to post more often and with less weirdness…

UGLY:
My mom bought me an electric toothbrush for Christmas which is awesome, but it does not match the stylings of my beautiful peach and blue bathroom.

AWESOME: The DIY Electric Toothbrush cover that I made out of a can of cashews…That’s right, I’m crafty!!! So proud of myself…

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Holiday Hiatus?

30 Dec

Weird post, weird week!

So, I arrived in Toronto to spend some excellent quality time with Jamie’s family and had a great few days. We went to the gym (once…), ate leftovers and terrible treats and most importantly, spent time laughing and being silly together. Jamie and I were planning on driving back to Kingston on Saturday to continue Christmasing, after Jamie’s uncle Phil had left. Come Saturday, my poor Mom and Dad called to say they were both very sick with a gross flu that EVERYONE IN THE UNIVERSE HAS. Jamie was also sick with the cursed disease, so we hunkered down to spend some intense lazy, restful flu-cure time inside. I made it my mission to cure him of his ailments (and I was pretty happy to be doing nothing I have to say) and we had a great day of Upstairs, Downstairs (the new one), movies, ham and eggs, leftover turkey, and chocolate chip pancakes and bacon for dinner. It was actually the best. Unfortunately, I woke up today with the exact same symptoms everyone else had before they were launched into flu time city, so although I feel OK now, I worry it’s only a matter of time before the thing takes me down. So this pause in Holiday momentum has caused my brain to think that Christmasing is over, when in fact, it will start again once we get to Kingston on Monday. So I’m considering this weird limbo my Christmas hiatus.

During this hiatus of nesting and snuggling in blankets and tea, I also spent some time thinking about the current state of my apartment decor and how pretty it is now with all the Christmas decorations. Come January, I’ll have to put all the Christmas away and go back to real life, which makes me sad and in the market for ways to spruce. I started putting together a design board for my Living room, beginning with the elements I already have and know I won’t be losing any time soon: Brown couch (although less fancy than the one on my board), brown and beige walls, exact rug, exact bookshelves, brown dresser thing and ottoman. After I stuck in the basics, I started adding little accents that I know I either already have or can get for cheap. All of a sudden, I had this cool little design board which I’ve shared with you today, because for unknown reasons, I took absolutely no pictures in the last 4 days. I can’t believe I didn’t even document the chocolate chip pancake dinner. I am ashamed.

Ugly:
Forgetting to take bloggy photos! Throat burn, sniffle nose.

Awesome:
The recent days of extreme laziness have been amazing, despite my getting ill.
Even if I don’t end up realizing my little design board dreams, I had so much fun making it, I’m going to do the same thing for my other rooms!
Going to Kingston tomorrow for continued family time and New Year’s Eve shenanigans (hopefully neither of us will be too ill for shenanigans)!

Brown Living Room

Brown Living Room

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Every train at Christmas is The Polar Express.

26 Dec

It’s almost over! Official Christmas has finished, but the honorary Christmasing continues…

I’m currently riding back to Toronto on the train with my good friend, Kate (a lucky coincidence!). I’m returning from an amazing Christmas with my family, only to come back to Kingston in a few days with Jamie in tow. I get to spend some quality Toronto Family time in Toronto and then I’ll be going back to Kingston for New Years (and my Mom’s birthday).

Christmas was awesome. It always is.

Christmas eve was our annual dinner at Grecos, a Greek restaurant in downtown Kingston where we always get a festive Saganaki (flaming cheese). Then we drive around looking for fancy Christmas lights (this year was disappointingly sparse) and return home for hot chocolate and stocking hanging!

Christmas Day was more goodness as usual. Cinnamon Buns and bacon for breakfast, opening stockings and presents and helping my mom with The Feast. The only difference this year was that my dad had the flu and after presents were done, he spent the rest of the day in the basement sleeping and coughing. Poor dad :-( My grandma, grandpa, my uncle and his lady friend came over for The Feast and then it was over and it was time to play with my new toys! I mean…adult presents…

So today, I’m leaving the Kingston world of lazy Christmasing for the Toronto World of active Christmasing: Going to movies, going to the gym, going places in general. And I love my Toronto family, so I can’t wait! But I feel the need to stretch out my limbs first – I’ve been slothing for so long, my muscles may not remember their purpose…

Ugly:
Not much. The cold. Kingston is a cold, cold place.

Awesome:
Everything except the cold. My Forever Lazy came in super handy in Kingston, as the Forever Lazy philosophy lives strong there. Spending time with family, watching Christmas movies, eating chocolate, all the things. All of them.

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The Annual Ladies Christmas Party: Eggnog Snog Blog

17 Dec

The title would imply that this blog is about kissing Eggnog in British speak. It is not. I lied.

This week has been pretty crazy work-wise, so I was very excited to let my hair down and host the annual Ladies Christmas Party this weekend. This party has been been an annual occurrence for the last 6 years at least, and it’s always the most festive, fun time with all the girls. Over the years, this party has featured Gingerbread Playboy Mansions complete with “The Girls Next Door” cast printed out and stuck on the plastic lawn, Christmas Tacos, viewings of straight-to-video Holiday Movies starring the Olsen Twins, gifted fart machines and infamous photos of all the attendees pretending to sleep or pass festive gas. Needless to say, it’s always my favourite Christmas event.

This year’s potluck festivities included delicious contributions of KFC, 4 layer dip, yummy strawberry salad, a cheese plate and puff pastries as far as the eye can see! And for the finale, Sara brought homemade cheesecake pops which were decorated all festive-like. We watched Love Actually and spoke in British accents and then watched Little Women and laughed at Claire Danes (sorry Kari!). There was an awesome gift exchange where we all stole and received gifts (which I did a terrible job of documenting…) and all left with fun presents!

This week is my last at work before the Holidays, and I’m hoping it will be less frantic and provide a nice, gradual transition into the break (It won’t, but a girl can dream). After that, it’s a trip home to Kingston to celebrate with Family and some Holiday time with Toronto family too. Maybe I’ll have so much free time, I’ll blog a little more frequently! WON’T THAT BE A CHRISTMAS MIRACLE?!

Ugly:
The “Forever Lazy” I received in the gift exchange. It might be ugly, but it’s philosophy is beautiful.

Awesome:
The cheesecake pops. And seeing all my ladies – Merry Christmas beautiful ladies!

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There Can Be Only One…

4 Dec

Um…did you notice my blog is snowing? It is. I’m making it happen with my Christmas magic.

This weekend I had a crafty-fun time at the One of a Kind Christmas Show at the Direct Energy center! I love seeing interesting, creative works of art and craft, even if I don’t buy anything. It always inspires me to pick up a paintbrush or a crochet hook, look at it intensely and then put it down as I slowly back away until next year’s bout of insanity.

This year, I went with Kate and Cheryl and I bought food. Some food I can’t talk about because it’s Top Secret possible Christmas presents. But if I end up eating it myself, I’ll tell you what it is. I did buy a bottle of my favourite Smokey Balsamic vinegar which I buy every year. I like to pretend it’s for making salad dressing, but mostly I just dip bread in it. IT IS DELICIOUS.

I also went to the Frida and Diego show at the AGO, thanks to Kate! I didn’t take any pictures for fear of being tackled, but I have to say I loved the exhibit. It was super inspiring, and I never realized how much I loved Frida’s work. I guess I just hadn’t been exposed to it much, but she’s just my cup of Mexican tea.

Ugly: The nasty headache/cold monster I continue to battle…so far I’ve held strong…

Awesome: A great weekend of artsy fartsy inspiration. After the Frida exhibit, Kate helped me buy paintbrushes and a piece of wood and now I’m a gonna paint me some purty pictures!

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