Hello. I’m still here. Barely. Last weekend was full of  busy fun. It was full of knitting, book club, cookie swapping, Christmas wrapping and novel-writing.

On Thursday, I took another class at Wabi Sabi to learn how to knit mittens. I have to say, mittens are probably my favorite thing to knit so far. They are much easier knit than socks and I find that I can see results quickly. Carole was mentioned that socks was her thing that she always has in her purse. I think mittens will be mine. I’m so happy with the way that mine are turning out. I can’t wait to make my next pair. (will post pictures soon)

This weekend was my first cookie swap. Have you ever done one before. It’s really fun. Everyone makes a plate of Christmas baking, brings it over to someone’s house, put the plates out to nibble on and then towards the end of the evening, you go around and take samples from each tin for yourself. I think I took too much of Amy’s. Thanks Amy. I promise, we’ll eat them all.

In other news, I’ve managed to kill all of my indoor plants. Not because I didn’t water them, I did water them. I think it’s that we don’t have much day light in our place right now. They didn’t survive very well without this light. I look at this as a learning experience, leave the plants outside.

At the A&J household, we’ve also decided to not do our advent calendar this year. I’m a little disappointed about this, but I’m afraid that our schedule’s this month would be accommodating to any extra activities. I think we’re still going to do as much Christmassy stuff as possible, but it won’t be a day-by-day thing.

I’m jealous of all you mommy bloggers doing the advent calendar. Have fun doing it this year.

Things around A and J’s house have been pretty status quo lately. I’ve been really busy trying to finish reading Eat. Pray. Love and writing my novel. I feel so behind. I really need to give it another push tonight.

While reading and writing, my knitting has been pushed to the side lately. I really should get back into it. There is a pattern that I would really like to do for my mom for Christmas, I just need some time to start it.

This morning the internet was down and my computer wasn’t working. I was in a bit of panic this morning. I was afraid that I wouldn’t be able to pick up where I left off in my book. Luckily, when A. woke up, he took a look at it and restarted the computer. Thank goodness it worked!

While the computer was not working, I start reading my next book. I am now reading a biography of Guy Liliberté. He is the creator of Cirque Du Soleil. I’ve only read a few pages of this book and think that (a) his ex-wife is nuts and (b) I love the saying within the first couple pages of the book. It says:

Pure entertainment is not an egotistical lady singing boring songs onstage for two hours and people in tuxes clapping whether they like it or not. It’s the real performers on the street who can hold people’s attention and keep them from walking away. — Andy Kaufman.

Christmas shopping needs to be done this weekend. Christmas crafting has not even made my radar yet. Although, I am looking forward to A and I’s advent calendar this year. Hopefully we’ll come up with some good ideas.

The holidays. Got to love them!

Here are some random things that have been running through my mind lately:

• Every morning, A. and I get our coffee at Tim Hortons. Most of the time, we are served by the same woman. She never smiles. Some days, I wish I could just give her some flowers to brighten her day.
• In my 26th year, I want to Eat, Pray, Love.
• I catch myself yelling VEGAS randomly throughout the day. Can you tell I’m excited?
• I bought a food processor, yea! I’m pretty happy about that. Now I can make wicked awesome banana bread.. and pesto too.
• What do you call a personality trait that needs to be worked on? I found out recently that I have two. Sometimes I tend to exaggerate and sometimes I can be overly organized.  I need to work on these.
• I love knitting. I just haven’t had a chance to do much of it lately. I’m getting a little stressed out that I won’t have some of my handmade Christmas gifts done in time.
• I love Christmas. I can’t wait to put up my tree. Is it weird if I put it up in November?
• Weddings. A wedding.
• I wish I had more time. We are always so busy. I would like to go visit my dad in November, but every weekend is booked up.
• I started taking this stuff called Udo’s Oil. To help me during my workouts… I keep forgetting to take it.
• Lately, I’ve found that food has no taste. I’ve been eating out allot and everything tastes gross. Why is this happening?
• I love having someone to sleep next to every night.
• I happy that I do not have a dog right now. However, I do enjoy babysitting our tenant’s dog once in a while. She’s great.
• I’m trying to think of good Christmas gifts for my friends. It’s hard when they don’t have a blog to write about the things they like. Get a BLOG.
• I love my mom. She’s been so great lately. I’ve never seen anyone give as much love as she does on a daily basis.
• It’s Tuesday.

Last night, I went to the Signatures Craft Show at Lansdowne with my mom. It was o.k. I found everything to be a little too $$.. meaning everything was more than I what I was willing to spend.

One thing that did catch my eye, was one woman selling  framed embroidery sayings. I didn’t buy any, but one of the quotes was so cute that I had to share it here. The quote was signed – Winnie the Pooh.

Yea it’s kind of cheesy.. whatever.. I like it

Happy birthday to ME!

What a great weekend. I’ve never been shown so much birthday love in one weekend.

Friday night, we had a big birthday blow out. We started the evening with ayce sushi and then drank and danced the night away at Pier21.

Saturday I got my hair dyed and style, because A and I had a wedding to go too. I LOVED their wedding. It was so simple and beautiful. They are so lucky, because the venue it’s self gave allot of decor without having to compliment it extra stuff. Also the flow of the wedding was great too. Everyone looked like they were having a great time. They did a great job.

Sunday we had brunch with my family. It was soo good. We went to Tuscanos on the QC side. Yum. Then for dinner we went to A’s parents and had a lovely pork chop meal, complete with cake and a candle.

Yesterday was my actual birthday day and it started with a Starbucks Bold coffee (thank you tori) and a balloon chandalier surprise in my office. I couldn’t believe it. It was so pretty.

In the afternoon, I did Body
Pump (I have to keep this new 26 year old moving) and went to my moms for dinner. Oh man was I spolied. Taco dinner (my favorite), cute kittens, great gifts and good company. You couldn’t ask for much more.

Well that’s my birthday weekend. Thank you so much for all the love you’ve shared with me, not only this weekend, but all year long.

Thank you

A. and I have a friend who is participating in this C4 Gallery: Contemporary, Conceptual, Compartmental, Community project today. If  you don’t have any plans tonight, come check it out.

The City of Ottawa is excited to launch the first C4 Gallery temporary art exhibition. Please join us in a celebration of Ottawa’s diverse artistic community.

Hintonburg Community Centre – Wellington Room
1064 Wellington Street
October 14 to December 14, 2009

Opening Reception: Wednesday October 14, 7 to 9 p.m.

The C4 (Contemporary, Conceptual, Compartmental, Community) Gallery will be a travelling compartmental gallery that houses temporary artwork and moves between neighbourhood community centres. Submissions will be on display for a period of two months within the C4 Gallery, a five-feet wide by three-and-a-half feet high cabinet similar to an old-fashioned library card catalogue.

Inspiration for the project arose from a desire to encourage Ottawa residents to see art in new and interesting ways, and to recognize artwork in unlikely places and sizes. Due to the temporary and rotational character of the C4 Gallery, it will not only provide a forum for edgy artwork that is site- and time-specific, but it will also become a means for community exchange and a networking exercise. It will connect communities through a swap of physical objects that are rooted in a conceptual relationship to the contributors, their communities and their relationship to the world around them.

This project will generate pride in Ottawa communities increasing a sense of ownership within city neighbourhoods; it will harness cultural identity by engaging the local residents, and contribute to quality of life thorough active participation.

The exhibit’s feature artists include:

Mary Bramley, Malinda Caron, Michelle Casey, Cool Youth Group, Anna Coulombe, Gabriel Dale-Hill, Liz Dodds, Doug Garrow, Hemant Gunhan, Catherine Gutsche, Mike Hinchcliff, Robert James, Vivian Joynt, Manami Kawahara, Analisa Kiskis, Zivana Kostic, Junlan (Ji) Li, Alisdair MacRae, Chris Maveety, Cynthia O’Brien, Nirmolak Singh Saggu, Shannon Whittle, Kelly Xu, and Amy Zhou

The C4 Gallery is both a pilot project and a new partnership between the Community Art and Public Art programs.

For more information, please visit the City of Ottawa’s website.

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone! I hope you all had a weekend with friends and family. This weekend was pretty family packed, we looked at an income property, my mom helped me with my Halloween costume and continue knitting a few Christmas projects. It was great.

The big highlight this weekend was that A. and I’s parents had Thanksgiving dinner together. At first, I was a little nervous about the idea, but everything went really smooth and I had nothing to worry about. We are so lucky that our families get along.

In other news, our little Giant Tiger in Hintonburg caught on fire this weekend. I’ve heard that it was the old electrical wiring that started the fire. I’m really sad about this, because I was able to walk there easily and do my groceries and now I can’t. I hope it doesn’t take six months to fix. I need my GT boutique sooner than that.

Hope you had a nice weekend.

So I went to Beau’s Okatoberfest this year and was a little disappointed in the event. Actually, I was really disappointed with the event. I don’t want to go into too much detail about it, because I do like their beer and want to support them. However, if they are reading this, I think it would be a good idea next year to:

- Have more food vendors that will not run out of food at dinner time (watching the food vendors around you running out of food, then you line does just before you get there is not cool).

- Less line ups (waiting 45min in a line up to fill up a stein of beer is not fun) – More beer stations.

- Allow the food and beer wenches accept cash. (it sucks when you aren’t told how many food tickets to buy, get in a line, then find out your two tickets short and have to wait in another line to buy 2 more tickets, then wait in the food line again to get food)

- More organized line ups for buses.

- Play games and do activities that will keep people moving

At Oktoberfest, we had fun because there were 20 of us, not because of the event. I think next year, we’ll just go to the LCBO, buy Beau’s beer and have our own little Beerfest at home.

On the brightside, at least we got some cute hats.

TGIF!!

Finally! I can’t being to tell you how excited I am for the weekend. I have all this fun stuff planned and I finally have (some) time to do it.

Yesterday, I won tickets to absolute comedy, so a little group of us are going. A and I used to go to Absolute allot, I get excited now when I don’t know who is performing now. I’m looking for a good hard laugh tonight. I hope they can deliver.

Tomorrow we’re going to start our Halloween costume search. We still have no idea what we’re going to be in Vegas. Runners up (so far):

- The Flintstones (Betty, Fred, Wilma, Barney and Dino)
- Night at the 80a Prom with Principal Pete

That’s it so far. Hopefully I can find some good costumes on my search. Anyone seen any good costume shops around town?

Saturday afternoon is Oktoberfest! I’m excited to eat sausages, drink beer and have fun. Do you know anyone going?

Hope you have a great weekend.

The past couple of days have been pretty quite here. Monday night, A. and I made an Asian fest at home. I wish I could show you the pictures. I’ll try and upload them soon. We made TONS of sushi and TONS of won tons. The won tons that A. made were so amazing. Thanks D. for the recipe! Yum.

Tuesday night, we had dinner at my mom’s. She’s been busy working on the house and debating to join a photo club or not. Does anyone know of a good photo club for her to join in Ottawa? She’s looking for a group that is well organized and it looking to learn something from one another.

Tonight is the Hintonburg Annual General meeting; I’m looking forward to it. They always have good information on the events that happen over the past year, new developments in the area, (hopefully) a construction update and a few more things. It’s really nice to know what’s happening in your neighbourhood. It gives you that sense of community when you attend these things.

I’m also hoping tonight to go to the gym after work. It’s been over a week since I’ve last been. That’s bad, that’s really really bad. I’ve got to get back into it. Going to Las Vegas is just around the corner and I need to step up my gym going in order to fit into a cute costume for Halloween.

The rest of the week is pretty tame. Thursday night is my sock knitting course and Friday, no plans as of yet. A. is working on a friend’s roof this weekend, but on Saturday we’re going to Oktoberfest at Beau’s Brewery in Vanleek Hill. There are probably about 20 of us going. It’s going to be a blast. I can’t wait. Are you going?