Posts Tagged ‘Christmas’

Onward to 2010!

By Brit

I can’t believe 2009 is almost over. It seems that the year flew by. So many things happened this year both good and bad.

Our year started off in Matt’s old apartment. I made dinner. He lit a candle. It was amazing.

I went to Guangzhou, China. I went to fucking CHINA! Oh, and Japan too.

There was also a trip to El Paso, TX in there for work. I finally got my picture taken in front of an airplane engine, with a TERRIBLE haircut :/

Matt bought a house. We are still working on making it our home.

There were many nights and weekends spent at Matt’s parent’s cottage (hell, we even lived there a month).

Luce came to live with us for a month. She couldn’t handle when I was away flying, so she went back to live with my dad.

We watched every Tigers game together; we even managed to go to a few downtown.


I had not one, but TWO surgical procedures. Oh, and a colonoscopy.

I got a bunny for my birthday from Matt. Bubs C. Stand is the cutest bunny, EVER.

I got sick and couldn’t fly anymore. Lucy came back to live with us. We had puppy parties with Gryff, Aparna and REB.

Matt got me stuck on sushi. I now have an insane love for this crap.

We spent our first Christmas together (last year we were at our parents house alone).

I couldn’t have asked for anything more this year. It’s been amazing. I can’t wait to see what 2010 brings us.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

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This entry was posted on December 31st, 2009 under Home, Other.

Post Christmas

By Brit

Christmas is over. I didn’t kill anyone. I was yelled at a few times, it sucked, who cares. I made it through.

Matt and I drove back from Muskegon on Saturday night. The drive usually takes between 2.5 hours to 3 hours depending on how many potty breaks we have to stop for (it’s all the dog, promise). This time it took us just more than 4 hours, complete with barely visible snow covered roads and a stop in Okemos when the Chinese food Matt and I had for lunch came back to haunt him.

Note to, um, everyone: Don’t eat pork in restaurants, especially hole-in-the-wall Chinese restaurants.

We made it home, he was sick all night and is probably still getting over it a bit. But now he has the dubious honor of being the first person to puke in our new house, which I was hoping for (not!), but he won, or lost, whatever.

So, Christmas is over. New Year’s is coming … we are having house guests for the first time, ever. Em and her husband are coming for a wedding on January 2nd (who the fuck gets married the 2nd of January?) and they might be coming for New Year’s Eve. I don’t know yet, which is fine. Our NYE plans involve doing nothing, maybe cooking dinner, maybe not and playing video games. Fun stuff.

So, we made it through Christmas. NYE is nothing, and then everything will be back to normal, and hopefully, so will our house.

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This entry was posted on December 29th, 2009 under Other.

Holiday Travels

By Brit

This is the first year in 7 years that I have not been scheduled to work on Christmas, or Christmas Eve.

Last year I had the last half of December off (it’s a long story I’ll tell later) and got to go home for Christmas, which was nice. I even got to surprise my family. I told them that I had been assigned a trip to Tokyo and I wouldn’t be home until after the new year, as I was talking to my dad I walked into the house. It was pretty cool. He had no idea what was going on. I didn’t get to spend Christmas with Matt though, which was ok at the time because we had only been dating for a couple months.

This year is different. I have a different job. I live with Matt and this year we’re driving to Muskegon. We spent Thanksgiving with Matt’s family in Toledo, so this is kind of my Christmas present too. It’s a three-ish hour drive on a bright sunny day from Ann Arbor to Muskegon. Tomorrow doesn’t really look like it’s going to be bright and sunny.

We’re driving from the x on the right to the x on the left. Muskegon currently has quite a bit of snow. They get the lake effect and stuff Lake Michigan. It happens. We have about, um, 1 inch. There’s a winter storm watch starting tomorrow. We’ve got to get in before it starts. Yay. I can’t wait.

So, Merry Christmas! Happy Hanukah! Good Festivus! Happy Kwanzaa! Happy Winter Solstice! and happy any others that I missed!

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This entry was posted on December 23rd, 2009 under Other.

Christmas Presents

By Brit

This year because I’m barely working and Matt’s working from home, we’re making presents for everyone. Ok, I’m making the presents. He did help a bit, though.

I found a recipe for peppermint bark and was all about making that. It seemed perfect, but if you know me, you know I have to have everything perfect. Breaking a sheet pan of peppermint bark into perfectly exact sized pieces just wasn’t happening. I went into JoAnn Fabrics for something or another and found these cute snowflake shaped cookie pans and knew I had something. I found some melting chocolate and candy canes and I was in business … making the cutest snowflake peppermint candies.

IMG_5099I made a BAD-ASS double boiler.

IMG_5100And then I added some vegetable oil and the chocolates melted.

IMG_5108And there was white chocolate, too!

IMG_5114Matt obliterated the candy canes and we poured them into the cute snowflake pan.

IMG_5106I used a candy piping bag to pipe the chocolates into the mold, though it was MUCH easier to use a teaspoon. White chocolate on the bottom and then the dark chocolate. I stuck them in the freezer for about 10 minutes for them to set and popped them out of the mold.

IMG_5119They turned out like this. Some of them are two toned. Some are just dark chocolate. Some are white chocolate. They all have peppermint candy cane crushed on top though.

Chocolate Peppermint Candies

1 package Wilton’s White Candy Melts
1 package Wilton’s Dark Cocoa Candy Melts
Vegetable oil
5 candy canes
2 silcone cookie pans in fun shapes.

Crush the candy canes with a mallot, place into a bowl. Spoon 1/4 teaspoon into each of the molds.

Melt one package white candy melts over a double boiler. Add 1/2 teaspoon of vegetable oil (it has to be oil, not milk or water). Continuously stir the candy, if you stop stirring the candy won’t melt and will burn.

Using a spoon, place 1 teaspoon of the candy into each of the molds over the candy cane pieces. Place into the freezer to set.

Melt one package dark cocoa candy melts over a double boiler and spoon 1 teaspoon over the set white candy.

Put back into the freezer to complete setting up.

Makes approximately 50 candies.

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This entry was posted on December 18th, 2009 under Food.

I Ruined Christmas … Already

By Brit

Yesterday, Matt and I went to lunch with his mom, Ginny and her friend, Pam (also, that was a HELL of a lot of commas). After an amazing lunch we went to my favorite store in the world, World Market. Ok, it’s not my favorite store in the whole world, just the United States. Either way, the store is badass. I bought quite a few things and got an awesome deal on all of them (so much so that I went back today to get more of one of the things). As we were leaving Matt told me that he got me a present for my stocking while we were at the store. I was excited, but I knew I didn’t have a chance in hell of him telling me what it is.

Fast forward to today when Matt spent the day with his parents in Toledo at a University of Toledo basketball game, and I went to dinner with Em, her mom and a gaggle of teenagers (she coaches debate and the tournament was over here … lucky me!). He came home and brought some goodies with him. This is totally normal, Ginny sends us the most amazing foods (last time it was Hashwi … a Lebanese stuffing with rice, ground beef, pine nuts and cinnamon, YUM!).

091205euroI went to move some things on the counter when and moved Matt’s Curling Newsletter he brought home from his parents house. When I picked it up I expected just paper, except there was something else in there. Fearing I had broken something the curling people sent him, I opened the plastic sleeve the newsletter was in and found a package of Euro note chocolates (that look exactly like the picture to the right). I thought for some reason that the curling people sent Matt the chocolates in support of the upcoming Olympics or something … it honestly didn’t make sense. I held up the chocolates and asked him about them and he immediately paused his video game shot up from the couch and got kind of pissy that I had found them. And then he called his dad to tell him I’d been snooping or something and found them.

I wasn’t trying to ruin Christmas, or find any of my presents. I was just trying to move some crap out of the way. And now? I’m in crap.

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This entry was posted on December 5th, 2009 under Other.

Christmas Time!

By Brit

It’s almost December and after Thanksgiving which means it’s DECORATING FOR CHRISTMAS TIME! Since I’m not going to be out strengthening the economy and making Christmas presents, I spent a little extra on Christmas decorations.

Matt’s parents were gracious enough to give us their old artificial pre-lit tree. It’s gorgeous, but the lights didn’t work. Ginny and I spent the better part of the afternoon taking a gazillion strings of lights off from the Christmas tree. It looks amazing now, I’m really excited with how it turned out. Lucy likes it too, she keeps sleeping near it, or staring at it.

091129tree

This the first time I’ve actually had a full size tree that I can do what I want with. I could do all white lights because I’m ANAL and have pretty ornaments of two colors because everything has to match.

We even put lights on the balcony. Oh yeah, they have a wireless remote on them so that I can turn them on and off without getting a shit-ton of snow in the living room. I’m so excited for it to snow!

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This entry was posted on November 29th, 2009 under Home.

It’s Never Too Early

By Brit

To think about Christmas, right? I mean, I can always think of things I’d love to get for Christmas. Here’s my list so far.

091109olivetree

Yes, that is an olive tree. Through Nudo, you can adopt an olive tree in their grove for a year. What an awesome idea. The best part? In the spring and in the autumn, they’ll send you the olive oil from the respective harvests. It’s a bit spendy, but you get olive oil, from your own tree! I love everything to do with olives, so this is an obvious choice.

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091109mixer

A KITCHEN AID MIXER. Duh, it’s on every woman’s wish list. I just can’t decide if I want the cobalt blue or the tangerine. The blue is pretty, the orange is pretty, and it’s Matt’s favorite color – which will give me some bonus points (not that I need any though). I used my dad’s Kitchen-Aid last week when I was home, to make french bread. I couldn’t believe how easy it was! It’s probably the most extravagant thing to have in the kitchen, ok maybe not, but it’s something that I will have, someday.

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091109crockpotA Smart Pot Crockpot. Set it and forget it! I’ve never had one, but I’ve always been intrigued by starting something in the morning and then magically, when it’s dinner time, it’s ready! That’s pretty awesome. Even better that now I’m working and Matt’s at home throughout the day. He doesn’t like to cook much, and well, I don’t like to ask him because I like to do the cooking. This solves all the problems. (It’s also now the correct crock pot, there was one I wanted specifically, but I couldn’t remember. Em helped <3)

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091109wiicard

A points card for the Nintendo Wii. Our Beatles Rock Band is coming tomorrow (WE CANNOT WAIT! SERIOUSLY), and we’ve already made a list of the songs we want to download. I think there are like 100 songs already. Awesome. Pat Benetar and No Doubt here we come!!!

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091109greys I love Grey’s Anatomy. LOVE LOVE LOVE. There’s really nothing else to say about it. I don’t have season five though. I used to spend hours every week watching Grey’s. I’m in love with it. I can’t wait to watch the episodes I haven’t seen in awhile again. At least we know that Meredith and Derek are together now and I don’t have to wait to find out what’s going to happen, right?

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091109pwIt’s the fricken Pioneer Woman. I’ve loved her website for years and now she has a cookbook! She makes the most amazing foods, and takes amazing pictures. Ginny and I have decided that there’s probably really like four of her running around that ranch and that it’s really in Utah and Marlbolo Man is  some kind of mormon with fifteen wives … seriously! How else can she keep four kids in homeschool, keep her house clean AND cook and take amazing pictures. Ok, maybe I’m jealous.

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091109bookcaseIKEA’s Expedit shelving unit. I’m in love with this. I’m planning on turning it on it’s side and then using as a quasi side-board. It’s really another thing for storage. We need a lot, a lot, a lot of storage, and this will fit the bill, at least for a little bit of storage. It’s so pretty and it’ll look great with my Fiesta dishes displayed.

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091109boxspringUm, we don’t currently have a box spring for our bed. We tried using the double sized box spring from Matt’s old bed under my queen mattress, you can imagine how well that went. It’d be nice to have one and not worry about ruining the mattress we have. Really, that’s about all I can say about that.

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091109cameraA Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-H20. It’s a 10.1 megapixel camera with 10x optical zoom and super steady shot image stabilization. My camera takes shitty pictures. I’m not going to lie, they’re terrible, and grainy, and embarrassing. It wouldn’t hurt to have a 16GB memory stick for it too, right? This is the one thing that I really, really, really want for Christmas this year (hint, hint, MOM – I know you read this).

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091109ringI wouldn’t say no to this either :)

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This entry was posted on November 9th, 2009 under Other.