Christmas Party #4 - M & G's

This last one was a potluck and white elephant gift exchange party held at Mikey and Garrett's lovely new house (which they share with Joshua and Victoria). The house is georgous, spacious and airy with hardwood floors and a fabulous old-style wood stove heater thing.

A couple of the gifts weren't exactly white elephant gifts (R unwrapped a very pretty 4-sided cube-shaped picture frame from Coach) but a couple of them were (like ours and Georgia's "With Love" ceramic flower-in-a-pot - see picture above). Seeing the faces of the recipients (G-man, Mikey and Ryan^2, respectively) was hilarious and quite priceless. A couple of the gifts may make a repeat appearance next Christmas...

Scroll below for some more pictures; click here for the rest.

I have short arms but the picture still turned out alright.

Playing Pit. I freakin' love that game.

Me and Mikey. Lay off the punch Mikey!

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Christmas Party #3 - R's Msft Party

So this didn't happen. Long story short: his team changed around and the one that he ended up on had their party the day he got back from Australia (and he was seriously jetlagging), so this party wasn't actually with his own team. Hence, it never happened. We ended up going out to dinner with Ryan, Jessica, Georgia, Julius and Jr for Jess's 21st birthday. Then we went out to R Place and got Jess drunk. Of course, everyone else also got drunk in the process but that goes without saying.

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Christmas Party #2 - The Ruins

My office party was held at The Ruins and it was really quite nice. I highly enjoyed myself but then wasn't terribly since I have some pretty cool coworkers. The Ruins is, apparently, a private supper club in Downtown Seattle and not just anyone can show up and dine here; you have to be either a member or be invited by a member. (That picture is of me with the horse that greets you at the end of the entrance hall.)

If it weren't for the small sign pointing out the parking spaces designated for The Ruins, we would've drove right past the warehouse that houses the club. The entrance hall was beautiful, whimsical and, quite frankly, a little. I didn't get to see the rest of the club (there's an almost-full-sized elephant in one room) but what I did get to see was elaborately decked out and really fantastical. The food was delicious and the dessert - chocolate torte with fresh berries and whipped cream - was to die for.

This room had an open bar where everyone mingled.

This was the dining room.

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Christmas Parties #1 - E & C's Christmakkah

Ah, the holidays. It's probably my favorite time of year, all that feel-good happiness with friends and family, and all the shopping that's involved. Woo! It's also the time of many parties and gift exchanging. So far, I've got two parties down and three more to go (as of today, that is).

Em & Charles's Christmakkah party was last Saturday and thank goodness Dem and I were able to make it down, what with all the snow, rain, hail, ice and flooding. First it snowed - almost blizzard-like by our West Coast standards - then it rained for two days straight. All the snow melted and coupled with two days of solid rain, our region flooded. Lovely. The flooding was massive and wreaked havoc everywhere: houses were destroyed, roads wiped out, livestock died and holidays ruined. I overheard one of my coworkers saying that some streets up north were flooded so badly that the salmon were crossing the road. See the salmon in the picture behind the truck? Madness.

The people here are amazing, really banding together to help those who are victims of last week's storm, not to mention all the men and women who worked a minor miracle and reopened I-5 so that Dem and I (and a whole truckload of other people far more important than us, such as emergency suppliers and emergency food crews) could get through. My sincerest thanks goes out to everyone who worked to reopen I-5. (In case you don't know, Interstate 5 is the major freeway here and a 20-mile stretch of it in Chehalis was overtaken by about 10 feet of water. Right smack in the middle of our road trip to Portland.)

Anyway, the E & C's party was a blast. We met a lot of Charles' friends, some familiar faces and some new. Mel was there, too, and I'm totally in love with her hair. She's a hairdresser and I think I may have to make an appointment with her next time I'm down in Portland. And there was tons of food. Fabulous. Hummus, roast beef finger sandwiches, sugar cookies, salmon on rye, yum! My only regret was missing out on Meg's amazing cupcakes *tear* because of the peppermint and Charles's deliciously sounding homemade apple sauce. Next time Charles!

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Marian Keyes

Marian Keyes has been on my I'll-read-when-I-have-time list but after reading her November newsletter, she's gone straight to the top. She's lol hilarious, witty, and if her books are anything like her newsletters, I have read them.

Read her newsletter for yourself but be warned, you might start crying from laughter.

Now which book should I start with...

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R Is Home!

He came home yesterday. Hurrah! I've missed him so much and it looks like the feeling's reciprocated. Hehehe. And he brought me back a soft and furry kookaburra! So cute. He's turning into a me: he did a lot of shopping while he was in Australia! He's got a great eye for what looks good on him and I was quite pleased with his selections. :)

We had dinner then he went home to finish unpacking and I met up with Ryan, Georgia and Julius to see Hitman. I really enjoyed it and thought it was pretty cool. It's not Oscar-winning but as long as I liked it, I don't really care.

Now I just need him to set my laptop up...

And did I mention I spent the rest of last weekend doing holiday shopping? All I have left is my dad's present, and it just needs to be picked up from the store. Hurrah.

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Thanksgiving & Black Friday

Where has the time gone!? I swear, one minute I was just moving back from England and Taiwan (last Christmas, mind you) and now it's already been almost a year since! This year has gone by so fast, it's crazy. Thanksgiving was just last week and it was as yummilicious as ever. Except for the mashed potatoes. *Grimace* One of my favorite Turkey Day sides were totally not up to par this year. Despite that, it was a nice Thanksgiving...and Black Friday was as mad as ever.

It's become my family's Thanksgiving tradition to join 3 other families for a feast (all friends of my mother). We all trek up to the hostess's house and for turkey and all the trimmings, and then some! (Invariably, someone brings one or two Chinese dishes. This year, someone brought chow fun and my mom did an eggplant and Chinese basil dish.) I haven't been around for Thanksgiving for a couple of years - been running around the globe instead - so this is the first time I've seen the other families for a while. I caught up with the host and hostess, telling them about my experiences in England and how I found teaching in Taiwan to be boring after a month. Their daughters are at uni now (go Huskies!), so we exchanged some stories and such about UW and such.

The next day was Black Friday. Every year, I tell myself that I'm not going to join the hordes of people out shopping but who am I kidding?? Black Friday was made for me. Despite all the yelling at stupid drivers, I do quite enjoy the madness and, of course, I love the shopping.

Anyway, my sister went up to Alderwood Mall an hour after we came home from Thanksgiving dinner because they were opening at midnight (her idea, not mine, even if I did go along with the plan). It was ridiculous. I should've changed our plans when I saw the media up there earlier on TV. NEVER AGAIN. There were so many people, it felt like a packed Justin Timberlake concert at the Tacoma Dome in the mall. It was crazy. One of the shopkeepers told me that some people were running to the stores. Running. What the?! My patience was severely tested so we left after a couple of hours. My sister did most of the shopping as there wasn't much I wanted or needed to buy. Oh, but that wasn't the end.

We headed home, roused my mom and we trekked out to the factory mall in North Bend because she wanted to go to the Coach store. (They were open at midnight, too.) After about an hour and a half there, we headed home again. Mom went back to sleep, I took a 15 minute nap and then my sister and I went down to Target. I love Target. Of all the stores I visited this Black Friday, Target was the most rewarding and productive. It opened at 6 am but we waited in the car until the line outside died down. An hour later, we went to Bellevue Square, which opened at 7 am. My sister wanted the free snow globe JCPenny gives out every year to add to our collection and even though they'd opened at 5 am, they still had a lot left which made my sister's day. She bought a (RED) bag (now I want one, too) and some clothes. We made our final trip home around 8 am, and I crashed for 8 hours.

I woke up around 4 pm, called Ryan and headed over to his place. We had fried chicken, corn and biscuits for dinner and watched The Mostly Unfabulous Social Life of Ethan Green. HILARIOUS!!! David Monahan, who plays Leo in the film, is very good looking, too. Mm, hmm!

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