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I’m having a nice lazy morning after two action packed days in a row.

On Friday I was really really tired. I had a third bad insomnia night in a row. Anyway we were having people over so I spent the day tidying up a bit, and preparing food for 11 people. I made butter chicken, and saag aloo (potatoes with spinach), and Rosemarie made cheesecake, and Kate made an enormous salad. I think everyone enjoyed the meal.

After dinner we started our gingerbread houses. My family and the Monnon’s family have a big tradition of decorating gingerbread houses together. We must have been doing it for maybe 8 years? This year we had Rose and I, Natasha and her bf Richard, Sam (Eric’s gf), and Callum (Kate’s son).

We also set up the computer so we could Skype with Bill and Suzanne who are down in Florida. They saved their gingerbread house to decorate at the same time with us and we left the cameras on for an hour! It was really neat that they could almost be there with us.

This years gingerbread houses were pretty epic. Jane brought over all of her extra candy and we just had so much it was ridiculous. I covered every surface of my gingerbread house and so did everyone else, and we still had bags and bags of candy left on the table. We ate so much candy we all felt sick, and people even got hiccups. It was like we were drunk on candy. It’s three days later and I still haven’t touched my gingerbread house because I STILL feel like I never want to eat candy again! AND I REALLY LIKE CANDY!

The finished products were so good. We were all very creative this year!!

I made a board games house. Can you recognize it?? I hope so!

I tried to make the other side like Carcassonne, but it’s a little more abstract.

Rose also made an epic nerdy gingerbread house. She made a rock climbing wall!!! She says those are the real knots and everything. She also marked out a couple different routes. I love it!!

Nerdy sisters.

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I am pooped. I haven’t been sleeping well. Why am I so bad at sleeping???

It’s been fun here so far. It’s also been really cold, like -15ºC, and then another 10ºC of windchill. I haven’t experienced this weather in a long long time. Maybe rainy Vancouver isn’t so so bad.


We played Wasabe. Rosemarie and I tied.

I think it would be fun to actually gather all the ingredients in the game, and every time you complete a roll you actually get to make it and we all get to eat it. That would be awesome, except some of the ingredients are strange like urchin and blowfish.


On Wednesday Rose and I went for a quick snowshoe in the forest behind our house. We didn’t go very fast. Very leisurely.


It’s hard to make a snow angel in snowshoes.

The Haberl kids dropped by for a quick visit, and then we had dinner with Kate’s kids.

Yesterday was good. I met up with Lauren and Sarah Swan for shawarmas downtown. I consider shawarma an Ottawa thing. We were going to go trampolining after that but then decided not to, and to get bubble tea instead. Sarah knew a good place that lets you substitute the tea with water, so no caffeine. The place also can serve the bubble tea hot, instead of icy, which is much more appropriate on a day like yesterday.

I actually ended up ordering a strawberry yoduly bubble tea with pearls, which had no tea at all. It was made with drinkable yogurt and real strawberries and was extremely extremely delicious. I want to go back to that place!!! This is the place, if you are in Ottawa and want to check it out: http://www.letseat.at/MySweeTea

After bubble tea I met up with the Ace Gang for our first reunion since Christmas 2008, I think. (The Christmas we were all in Sydney together.)

It was fun catching up, and we went out for dinner at the Clocktower near Leslie’s place and my bacon, apple, and dill sandwich on a potato bun was really yummy. We took a picture, but I don’t have a copy. I would make a terrible photo journalist.


Oh and here is Rosemarie with her secret santa gift in Vancouver. Scott made her a sushi kit with every single possible thing she would need to make sushi: rice, nori, sushi mat, rice vinegar, wasabe, ginger, chopsticks etc etc. I think she liked it.

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Merry Christmas! (If that’s your thing.)

It is neither snowy, or hot, so Christmas feels weird to both of us. I heard it snowed in Ottawa, and it HAILED in Melbourne, so sounds like both our families had a white Christmas!! Funny!!

Scott made me a nice breakfast and we opened our stockings and presents. I got a new board game called Wasabe!! You make sushi! I also got some weights and a sriracha t-shirt. Coooooool. Scott got a new wallet and some belts and pyjama pants. We also each ordered some more clothes today from boxing day sales. I ordered a coat and Scott ordered a Bill Murray t-shirt.

Christmas is very spread out this year. I’ll be heading to Ottawa in a couple of days, and Scott has to wait until after I get back on Jan. 5th to get his Secret Santa gift.

We had a good video chat with all of Scott’s family yesterday. Everyone always gathers at his parents house so we got to talk with a whole lot of people. I think Scott is pretty excited to see them all in February.

Well anyway, hope you’re having a nice day too!

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I forgot to post yesterday!!!

Too busy painting and playing games I guess.

Our Christmas dinner was really nice. The turkey was a lot smaller and easier to manage, so it turned out really moist and tasty. We also had stuffing, yam and potato fries with chipotle sauce, and spicy green beans. Mmmmmm.

We also watched Never Let Me Go. It was kind of weird! But it held my attention and made Christmas Eve pass a little quicker.

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I did some Christmas baking today. Double chocolate peppermint cookies. Mmmmmm. I made them in the morning so I could at least try one.

My breakfast tomorrow is going to be all chocolate!!!!



We made sushi last night. To be honest it wasn’t our best effort. The ill-formed salmon ones above were made by me, and the slightly nicer veggie ones were made by Rosemarie. We had so much there was enough for all three of us to have sushi for breakfast!!

Scott should be home from work any minute, and I need to put the turkey in the oven NOW!! All for now.