Christmas with Chris

This was me and Chris’ second Christmas together as a couple. I was determined to think up some sort of Christmas tradition that we could share with each other every year, and I finally thought up something good. It was inspired by a sock monkey stocking I found at Sears when shopping with Amanda. I always call Chris my sock monkey, since he has this sweater he loves that looks like one. I bought the stocking, and then thought it would be cute to surprise each other with stockings full of little goodies each year. Chris liked the idea, and set out to find me a quintessentially “Heather” stocking. He put a lot of effort into it, and I am IN LOVE with what he came up with. It just so happens that the day he gave it to me, I was matched it perfectly!

We snuck away to a quiet room in my parent’s house and unwrapped them under the glittering tree. I had filled Chris’ stocking with a travel Bodum mug, a coffee card, some of his favourite candy, and treats for Sphinxy. Mine had some Starbucks chocolate covered almonds (my fave), Williams & Sonoma chocolate pomegranate seeds, a book holder, and a Daniel Wellington watch!!!!!

I have been coveting a Daniel Wellington watch for close to two years, and Chris picked out exactly the one I had hoped for (the Classic Lady Sheffield with a black band and rose gold details). Ah, he did good. His big present from me was a scrapbook of our last year together, and some crazy t-shirts (since I always shrink his). I loved this stocking tradition and have carefully stored them away for next year.

We also have a tradition of giving Chris’ canned goods to family and friends. Chris cans a lot – pickles, jams, jellies, relishes, etc. I love this, because I reap the bounty on a regular basis! But at Christmastime, it is a time to pry my hands away from the rare green tomato relish jar and be a lil generous. My contribution is fancy-ing them up. Last year we used slate cheese boards to display the goods, and this year I found cute baskets at Indigo. I bought a ton of labels from Martha Stewart’s new line at Staples, which immediately refreshed the look of everything.

They were a hit with everyone, I think because they are hand-made and people recognize the amount of work that Chris puts into making them. He’ll toil away over the stove for hours just to get 4 jars of something amazing, like roasted tri-colour peppers. I love and fully support this hobby of his!

I’m so happy we got to spend Christmas Eve, Christmas, and Boxing Day together this year!

Home for Christmas

I arrived home for Christmas in Fonthill on December 18th. My mom always makes the house so beautiful during Christmastime, and this year was no exception.

Every year I wrap presents in a “theme”. I’m somewhat of a gift-wrap obsessed person (Chris constantly makes fun of my gift-wrapping drawer and my re-using of all wrapping items). This year I found cute sweater/knit patterned wrapping paper at Winners, and used that to decide my “rustic” theme. I finished everything off with some rugged jute and cute country gift tags I got on sale at Anthropologie last year.

One evening, when my parents were out at a Christmas party, my little niece Kendra came for a sleepover. She’s basically my mini-me and BFF, so this was super exciting. We spent the evening making and decorating Christmas cookies, drawing tons of pictures, and watching Chimpanzee (the documentary-style Disney movie about chimps that is so so good).

I always love the pre-Christmas festivities the most, even more than Christmas itself. You know, baking cookies, watching a ton of Christmas movies, doing last-minute shopping, wrapping presents while listening to Christmas carols, etc. Love it all. This year was no exception – I think I watched more Christmas movies this year than ever before, like Serendipity, Elf, The Wishing Tree, and It’s a Wonderful Life. We had a lot of snow in Fonthill too, which made things seem even more Christmassy than in years past. No Christmas vacation is perfect though, and between my bedroom flooding in a major rain/ice storm, breaking my patella (by cracking it on the kitchen table while drawing with Kendra…dramatic, I know), and being gluten-poisoned every other meal, this Christmas definitely had its drawbacks. All that was made up for though by the incredible love of my family, the warmth of our home, and the joy in seeing Kendra and Maxx unwrap presents and eagerly search for their names under the tree!

My family celebrates Christmas on December 24th (it’s a Dutch thing) by enjoying a big steak and seafood dinner. This year we had shrimp cocktail, steaks, Caesar salad, mashed potatoes, and a ton of desserts. YUM. Then we all piled into the front living room to open presents. I bought Kendra and Maxx matching real children’s guitars, and hopefully one day my mom will be able to teach them how to play! Tyson and Krista gave me a calendar and a Starbucks gift card, and Chris and I gave them a basket chock full of canned goods made by Chris. I gave my grandma a framed graduation picture of myself, which had everyone laughing. What type of a vain person gives someone a picture of themselves?! Bahaha. Whoops. Along with giving my parents a two-night stay at a fancy hotel in NYC, I gave my mom a pale pink fur stole, and my dad the new John Grisham book with some of his favourite chocolates.

My parents’ big gifts to Kendra and Maxx were a hockey net (for Maxx) and a mechanical mom and baby furry cat (for Kendra). I love her expression in the photo above, when the cat starting moving around and meowing! Hahaha! Once everyone had gone home, my parents, Chris, and I retired to the family room to relax. Chris gave my mom a brand new Kate Spade purse (she cried.), and my dad a bottle of premium tequila (he did not cry). I always like opening my presents after the little ones leave, so that I can be fully present in their Christmas unwrapping during the short time it takes them to rip through everything. Plus I have a habit of savouring my gifts. You know, open one here, one there. It annoys my parents and other people who want to see me open everything rightnow, but I like to have gifts for days! Muhahah.

The next morning, we had a big pancake breakfast (which Chris slept through), and I unwrapped my stocking from Santa and the rest of my presents. My dad had hand-built me a coffee table, out of a beautiful walnut slab of wood and some reclaimed steel and bolts. My uncle helped, and the bolts were all from a table built by my great-opa. It is truly a beautiful work of art, and it is all the more special because my dad built it. Here are some other things I received this year: the Mindy Kaling book, “I am Malala” book, the Smitten Kitchen cookbook, a Martha Stewart file folder for organizing all my important papers, and Clinique make-up. My parents bought Chris an awesome Columbia thermal tweed jacket/shirt, suspenders, and cuff-links. Swank-kaaay. By the way, doesn’t he look like such a gentleman in the photo above, sipping his port in his little bow-tie?

For Christmas dinner my parents made a big turkey, with all the trimmings, and marmalade-glazed green beans. SO GOOD. It was a pretty low-key and quiet evening, just the way I like it. We spent most of the night fixing some damage done to my bedroom in the flood…not exactly what we had in mind for Christmas, but it was made nonetheless entertaining by a certain boyfriend of mine who discovered my high school collection of CDs and felt the need to blare Backstreet Boys while loading all my stuff back into the room. It was hilarious, complete with vocals and tight dance moves. Love my man.

On Boxing Day, we drove through an icy wonderland up to Grafton to celebrate with Chris’ family. They have a huge boxing day party with 30 people! It was awesome, and I loved seeing everyone again. Chris and his brother-in-law wrestled in the living room, we watched all the nieces and nephews open presents, and indulged in way too much amazing food. All in all, a wonderful Christmas holiday!

Broughie Christmas 2013

I met Karen and Meghan the day I moved into Elgin Hall at the University of Western Ontario, during my second year of university. We would be living together in the “suite-style” residence that year. Little did we know that we would become super close friends and end up living together for three years, travelling to Hawaii on a big vacation together, and going on weekly girls’ nights five years later in Toronto. Needless to say, we have a great friendship and these girls are like sisters to me.

Here are some flashback photos of our final year at Western. We lived at 187 Broughdale Avenue…”Broughie” as we like to call it. Every year we had a “Broughie Christmas” where we would cook an entire turkey or chicken dinner, complete with mashed potatoes, green beans, cranberries, rolls, stuffing, pie, etc. etc. etc. We’d exchange gifts, admire Karen’s Ugly Santa Collection, and watch some sort of Christmas movie. For years this tradition lapsed, as Karen was off in Montreal being a super amazing biochemist, Meghan was bouncing between Nunavut and finishing her Masters at Western, and I was in the Netherlands and then completing my MBA. But then, by a miraculous stroke of luck, we ended up all in Toronto at the same time. This is when the girls’ nights began, and our friendship picked up where it left off. Don’t you love those types of friendships? The ones where you can go months without seeing or speaking to each other, and then bam, you get back together and it’s like no time has passed?

For last year’s Broughie Christmas, I hosted the girls at my apartment. Meghan (aka Serpy) made a festive punch, and we enjoyed hors d’oeuvres and chocolate covered strawberries.

If we look a bit bedraggled in the above photo, that’s because we were. That punch packs a punch. Anyway, this year we decided to do more of a potluck style thing. Karen brought a crock pot of beef stew on the subway (during rush hour, which caused many people to comment on her delicious-smelling stew), Serpy of course brought her infamous punch, and I prepared hors d’oeuvres and sugar cookie dough to make Christmas cookies. We all sat around my island, devouring the stew, sipping the punch, and catching up. Amanda brought over some wine and cookie decorations, which were a hit as well. Then we spent the rest of the night making the finest creations we could out of the thin gluten-free cookie dough I whipped up.

Above: Ecstasy Santa makes his annual appearance at our Broughie Christmas celebration. Below: Karen and Amanda creating some beautiful cookies!

Karen’s Rob Ford cookie creation, above! Ha ha ha.

Needless to say, it was another successful Broughie Christmas. Here’s to many more years of good friends, re-living undergrad memories, and festive punch!

Ottawa: High Tea at the Chateau Laurier

On my final day in Ottawa, April and I visited the Chateau Laurier for high tea. The Fairmont Chateau Laurier is a beautiful old hotel in the middle of downtown Ottawa, and it looks like something straight out of a fairy tale. After wandering the cavernous hallways, and checking out the wood-clad bathroom (straight outta the Titanic), we traipsed into the tea room to indulge.

Initially we were going to visit for brunch, but when April heard that they offer a gluten-free high tea, we were all over that. Usually high tea is all about sandwiches and scones, which obviously have gluten in them. April got the normal high tea, and I had the gluten-free one…and we both agreed that the gluten-free one was better!

To start we splurged on champagne to eat with our fresh fruit.

As we sat in the beautiful sunroom, watching the snow falling sporadically across the city, kept oohing and aahing over the beautiful details at the Chateau’s high tea.

We each chose a pot of tea. April chose the darjeeling, while I stuck with something more mainstream, an earl grey. Then it was time to daintily dig into the three-tiers of wonderful treats – freshly baked scones with strawberry jam and clotted cream, raspberry mousse, warm banana bread, and finger sandwiches made with salmon, chicken salad, egg salad, and cucumber. Everything was so delicious. The gluten-free tea was phenomenal, and the scones were a highlight. I kept wondering aloud whether it was actually gluten-free, semi worried that it wasn’t…I mean, it was just too good to be gluten-free!

We left with full tummies of clotted cream, and dashed through the cold on our way home. Then it was time to pack up, head to the airport, relax in the Porter lounge, and take my 45 min jaunt back to Toronto island. What a whirlwind trip packed with amazing experiences and so many new memories! Thanks April!