Portobello West, Canucks Game

Wow, what a weekend!!! Weekends go by so fast esp. when you have a ton of things to do!

Saturday (all afternoon) consisted of helping my mom with the leaves in the yard and tiding up the garage a bit cos Kay and I are storing some of our stuff in the garage. We didn't get as much done in the garage as we hoped (after cleaning up all the leaves in the yard which took a few hours) cos it was getting dark and cold but we did managed to rearrange and throw some stuff out. Mom bought a new leaf blower / vacum and she was having a great time using it! Although I preferred the rake and the blower isn't strong enough to blow the leaves out of the yard (we had left the leaves too long in the yard so the pile was heavy and wet!), we had to rake all the leaves from the yard into the parking space and then use the blower to blow the leaves into the park. Gosh, what a tiring day! I am suppose to pay 1/3 of the blower but decided I didn't like the blower and I wanted to return it but mom likes it a lot so she wants to keep it. I am going to buy a new rake instead of paying 1/3 of the blower. She has two really old rakes and I think we could use a new one with a larger rake at the end. After the leaves, we got to the garage and did tidy a bit an hour, we had to rearrange Kay and my items around so that it wasn't taking up too much space or room. Actually, we don't really have that much in there only our bikes, portable (small) bbq and a few misc. gardening items but mom's garage is PACKED! PACKED WITH LOTS JUNK!! We will have to do a full cleaning in the summer but right now it's way too cold.

After all that, I decided to go online and check my ebay bids. I am watching a couple of items on ebay and finally ended up buying one and bidding on the other. Rhoda sent me a text in the afternoon asking me if I wanted to join her for Andy's hotpot b'day dinner at his sister's place by UBC and since I didn't have any plans plus Kay coming home with her BFF for a sleepover, I thought it would be nice to be out of the house while the two girls were home. I'm really glad I went cos it was a really fun night and those people know how to have fun! Lots of food and hot pot was so super yummy, great esp. the cold and busy day I had, soup and food, yummy!!! Plus these people know how to throw a party well ignore the fact that we were all wearing our jackets in the house cos the heat was turned off and we didn't realize until much later that the boiler wasn't even on!!! No one lives in this house (it's empty most of the year) and it's too bad cos the place is huge and beautiful! Andy's sister is thinking about expanding the house outwards cos there is so much space in the backyard. Wow, what a view, it's amazing! A view of the golf course (can't remember which one but not McCleery). It was a really fun night and lots of drinking (after dinner of course) and poor Andy, all that chai miu with the hard stuff got him out before midnite!! Thank goodness I don't know how to chai mui cos I'd pass out after two shots of that hard stuff!! Nah, just kidding, they were good to him! I just can't drink any more..... too old and not enough partying.... not complaining tho cos I wouldn't want to drink to pass out anyways! Not even on my birthday!! (more photos on my flickr account)

Sunday consisted of Shopping, Shopping and Shopping! Of course, NOT all for myself! Although I did end up with a new pair of pants from Barefoot Contessa on Commericial and a cute jewelery box (hand made in Vancouver) from Portobello West. We left the house a little later than we wanted to cos the girls wanted to come out with us to the Portobello West Art + Fashion Market at the Rocky Mountaineer Station. It happens every last Sunday of the month (except for December, xmas shopping!) and there are a ton of local and Canadian artists displaying all sorts of great things! The girls were done in 10 minutes, it's not their kind of thing and Rhoda and I probably went around a few times and we were done in a little over an hour. I picked up a few Xmas presents for some friends at work and spent within budget plus I saved enough to pick up a cute item for myself. The market is full and so many more tables and designers than the last time I was here! Gosh, it gets bigger and bigger every time I go! Love it, lots of great new designers and items that I haven't seen before and lots of great gift ideas! Will def. be back for some more Xmas shopping! After shopping around the market, we decided to stop over at Home Depot (to check out storage cubes) before picking up the girls from Starbucks, those two decided to leave and have a drink cos there isn't much else around there. Rhoda and I picked up a drink and then we headed over to Commercial Drive to do a little bit more shopping. Rhoda wanted to head over to Mr. Pets to pick up some stuff for Bosco and I wanted to take her to Barefoot Contessa where I ended up buying a pair of really nice pants (at a good price too!) and she picked up a really cute black jacket! I love this store, I am going to have to check out the one on Main street, apparently the one on Main is larger and has more stock and designers. After Barefoot, we headed up the street to Mr. Pets and Mintage (a consignment plus new items store that carries a lot of vintage items), I stopped into Cobs Bakery to pick up some bread (love their bread) and the little Italian deli to pick up pasta sauce. The one place we wanted to go but closed right after we find parking on Commerical is Fratelli's, the very famous and popular italian bakery that we missed out the last time. We were all very disappointed cos we were all craving for some sweet baked goods. After all that shopping, it was time to take Kay's friend home and Rhoda and I to make a quick dinner before the hockey game. I had won the corporate club seats for the hockey game and I love going to these games. These seats are incredible and it's always more fun to be at the game than to watch the game on TV. It was an awesome game (lucky for me, I've been to all WINNING games) and it was a really great day/night spending it with my BFFs :)

Disney On Ice - Princess Wishes

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Wow, what a show!! I got free tickets to this show from a coworker because his daughter told him that she was too old to attend these shows. The tickets were free cos he received them for free and he didn't want me to buy them from him. I have never been to a Disney On Ice show and always wanted to go but I figured this one would be for little girls cos the show is called Princess Wishes. But to my surprise, I really enjoyed the show and Kay, who I thought might be too old for it, really liked it as well! We had 4 tickets and I invited Rhoda but forgot she was already going to this show with her little sis. Those two go every year, it's a tradition and she purchased tickets months ago. Since I had 2 extra tickets, I asked Kay if she wanted to invite her BFF, Nana and I would invite Karen, Jess's friend. Rhoda offered to give us a ride cos they were driving down. The show was at the Pacific Coliseum and it's not easy to get there by transit so that was a super nice gesture. Although these tickets were free, they weren't really cos I ended up buying $50 worth of stuff!! I had to buy the girls the princess crown mouse ears with cotton candy (cos they were cute and I couldn't resist the girls' pleas), a box of cold popcorn and of course, I needed a souvenier so I bought myself a Disney On Ice water bottle filled with yucky lemonade. The show was about 2 hours long with an intermission and Karen and I were suppose to meet Rhoda and Jess during that time but we ended up having a smoke first and losing them in the crowd. After the show, we met them outside and it was FREEZING, thank goodness Jess drove us cos there would have been no way for us to be home by 10.00 pm if we took the transit! Kay and I liked the show so much, we are planning to make this a yearly tradition, next year though, we are going to get tickets with Rhoda cos she gets the tickets a couple months ahead and at VIP prices!

Commercial Drive

Kay and I headed down to Commerical drive this afternoon to check out Mr. Pets cos we are planning to switch Ari over to a more natural diet. We also wanted to shop on Commercial cos there are so many neat shops and delis on Commercial. We ended up walking into quite a few placed, Barefoot Contessa, Mintage and Wonderbucks which I love, lots of great things for a great price! It was a nice day to walk it cos the sun was finally out. We did end up at Mr Pets and I spoke to someone about Ari for a little over 30 minutes. They are great, these people really know their stuff and I am def. going to try (slowly) changing Ari's diet to a natural diet. Maybe not raw diet but def. steamed diet. I love walking and shopping at the little boutiques and although it was getting cold, we made one last stop at Fratelli's Bakery but the line up was so huge that we decided we would do it the next time. It's a famous Italian bakery on Commercial Drive which I really wanted to try but it was getting a bit late and we still had a few more errands to run before heading home for dinner. We ended up making a pit stop at Poutine shop and Kay ordered a small size for us to share. Boy it's super yummy and maybe one of the best I've had in Vancouver! I really wish I had brought my camera cos it would have been a great day to shoot photos of Commercial Drive, it's such a great little street buzzing with people. Lots of nice coffee shops too not your average Starbuck's (which they did have) to go to chill and relax with a friend. Will def. think of heading over there the next time I have a friend who wants to have coffee after work. A great day with my girl.

Christmas Craft Market

I love this Christmas Craft Market that happens every year! Today, I decided on taking a "sick" day off work so I could have an extra long weekend! (It's been a very stressful and long work week!) But I had plans to meet Rhoda so I had to meet her at Canada Place after work, we decided to meet around quarter to cos there is a coupon for 2 for 1, kids under 12 free. Kay decided to come along and gosh, the line up was insane! I have never seen it so busy before, it's def. becoming more popular over the last year or two. We only spent about an hour and half there and I did good. I didn't end up buying too much for myself but I did buy this gorgeous leather waist pouch by Matteo Mio for carrying small items when I'm going to the hockey game or berry picking. Over the summer, I went berry picking and I carried my huge Louis Vuitton handbag, silly me, I know. Rhoda picked out the colour and it's just gorgeous. Only $80 and handcrafted in Montreal. Love Montreal's style. I almost bought a dress from Momo but decided that it wasn't about me and today I was trying to pick up some presents for co workers. I ended up picking some sweets for my boss and for myself. I picked up some amazing rustic italian herbs, basil garlic pepper and dill garlic sea salt from Maisoncote which smelled wonderful and inspiring, now I can't wait to use them! All these spices are made locally in Vancouver, going to try to the dill garlic sea salt and basil garlic pepper on chicken when grilling. Yum yum! We also couldn't forget Ari and we picked up some healthy snacks by Kali Wags which we tested with him and he loves them. Overall, it was a great shopping night and I love spending time with my two bestest girlfriends, Rhoda and Kay. Wish I had photos but I, hate to admit this, too lazy to take photos, edit and post! Sorry!

Anducci's

What a great night I had tonight with Rhoda and friends. It was so nice of Rhoda to invite me to their dinner which they have monthly cos she knew I hadn't seen the babies in a while. Little Jordan and Baby Isabella have grown p so much since the last time I saw them! Jordan has become such a big boy and he is so much fun! Isabella is becoming such a darling little girl.

The babies are so cute and the food so yummy!! It was great to see Grace, Isabella, Travis, Lisa and baby Jordon, who's not such a baby anymore. Very cute!

Anducci's is never disappointing, love the pasta! I can't believe they have expanded and now a location is close to me! Yum yum, will def. have to go and check it out again soon, I love pasta!

(More photos on Flickr)