Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas

I hope when everyone wakes up tomorrow morning they have a wonderful Christmas Day with those they love.  I couldn't be at home with my family this year, but I still feel very, very loved.  Thank you to everyone for their Christmas wishes!!

I know Christmas is not about the presents, but as I mentioned, Santa did stop by Singapore.  Since I couldn't be home to share it with everyone, I thought I would bring it to you!  I've put together a short video of my Christmas morning.  Short is arguable since it's almost 10 minutes.  I know my mom will love it, but for those of you who would like the short and dirty version - the pics below tell it all.

My Uncle Craig and Aunt Mary sent me some wonderful Ghirardelli chocolates - dark chocolate, peanut butter, white mint and caramel.  They all sound wonderful!!  I also received a new pair of earrings, which are much needed.  I'm plain-Jane when it comes to jewelry and once I find something I like, I tend to wear it forever.  So I needed some new earrings.  Love them - thank you!!

My mom sent a big box from the family back home with lots of little presents.  I have a new calendar of shoes! A new pair each day, which will be very fun to check out.  I got my customary stocking with all sorts of candy bars: Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, M&M's, Snickers and Hershey's bars.  Some Christmas socks, snowman poop (marshmallows) and reindeer poop (chocolate covered raisins) round out the other goodies.  Not pictured are some freezer pop containers.

I got some more earrings from mom along with a very cute jewelry box.

Rounding out my mom's box of gifts are several books.  I also got a couple books of my own yesterday - hoping to get some reading done while I'm off next week.  Mom sent me Dan Brown's and John Grisham's newest novels.  She also sent the magnet in the middle, Have a Little Faith and the 10 Best of Everything.  The 10 Best book lists the top 10 for various travel categories (e.g. golf courses, walks/hikes, islands, tennis venues, etc.).  I'm very excited to check all these out.  I got for myself The Economist - which I do enjoy reading; the Kite Runner based on a suggestion from Prevention RD; and the Secret Life of Bees (have not seen the movie, but saw the cast on Oprah and it sounds good).

Thanks Mom, Dad, Katie and Curtis for all the great stuff!!

Grandma sent along some new p.j.'s for me.  Always good to have :)!  Thank you!!

Last was Shaun's gift.  I think everyone is trying to get me to gain back the weight I've been able to lose since arriving :)!  I have so much chocolate!!  This picture doesn't do it justice.  Here's one where I've put it all in Tupperware.  It is overflowing from all of my Tupperware bowls!  I'm going to have to hide it all from myself so I don't blow up.  Thank you though!!  Candy here is so expensive I don't indulge.  I'm really excited about my York peppermint patties :).

That was my morning in a nutshell.  I only ate 4 donuts so far - with 7 still calling my name I thought that was a big success :).  It looks to be fairly sunny out, with the clouds moving in and out.  If the sun can stay around, I'll be at the pool this afternoon reading some new books. If the clouds win, I may try to see Avatar.  (I got in an hour of pool time before it started pouring with no end in sight. Now it has turned into a big thunderstorm.)

I know there are a couple of cards still on their way - the holiday season must have caused some delays.  I'll let those people know when I've received them. 

Hope everyone has a beautiful day tomorrow!!

*Here is the video.  The volume is pretty low and quality so-so because I had to take it with my camera.  There is also, unintentionally, an "oh my gosh!" theme throughout. :) Please enjoy if you choose to watch it; but be careful at the end - the final song gets a little loud.  It should pump you up with Christmas spirit though!!

'Twas the Night before Christmas....

...and all through Singapore people continued to shop :).  Well I was only out until ~7:30, but there were plenty of people still out and about.  It's now 10:00 though, so Santa should be coming soon.

My day was good.  I got to sleep in and wake up nice and refreshed.  Unfortunately, it was rainy outside.  I checked out the moving listings and the new Sherlock Holmes movie was playing at 10:45.  With the rain and the early showing, there were hardly any tickets sold (you can check online).  So I got myself going and went to the movies!  I really enjoyed it and recommend it to anyone looking for something to do this Christmas weekend.

I had to take a quick work call and headed back home.  I immediately checked my mail.  Still no cards or packages from anyone.  Bummer.  Although, I did have a voicemail from the first recipient of my online gift giving activities.  So glad you liked it!!

After my call, I caught up on a couple tv shows and looked around on the internet for somewhere to go next week.  THEN....the doorbell rang.  It was Santa disguised as a Singapore postal delivery guy!!  I had 2 packages!! 

Having recieved some packages, I now needed milk and donuts for a successful Christmas morning.  I headed back out, but at least now the rain had stopped.  Before leaving my apartment, I had to re-check my mail box for any other surprises.  Sure enough! one last package. 

Thank you soooo much everyone for thinking of me and taking the time to fill out the customs forms and ship it :).  I am waiting for tomorrow morning to open them all.  Then, make myself some breakfast - eggs, french toast, donuts and American 2% milk.  I had to go get donuts and milk tonight so that I won't have to run out in my p.j.'s tomorrow morning.  Don't they look soooo good??  I only ate one tonight - the peanut butter one.  It has peanut butter filling and is only good while it's still warm.  I know I bought way too many - but I do love my donuts.  Plus, I'm without all the Christmas cookies, fudge and candies that you all are probably indulging in.  I say that in a good way - LOVE Christmas sugar :).

I had also purchased some hummus while I was out.  I poured a glass of milk, got my pita bread ready and looked for a movie to watch.  I intended to watch Family Man, the only Nicholas Cage movie I like, but it must have been one of those DVDs that was stolen and I haven't re-purchased.  But instead, I came across Elf.  Such a cute movie for adults and kids!!  I ate a lot, watched the movie and now I'm bloggg before bed.  Not my typical Christmas Eve, but a good day nonetheless.

I hope everyone gets their last minute Christmas shopping done today and then enjoy the holiday and time with family and friends.  Safe travels to all of you driving, flying or just walking to the mailbox!  Heard there's a bit of ice back home.

See you tomorrow for Christmas!!

Package surprises and work fun

Have you been dying to know what was in my package?? :) I'm sure you've had sleepless nights since my last post.  Time for the big reveal.........

1. Paper plates!! :)

2. Q-tips....woo-hoo

3. Mini-snickers - YUM

Some explanations may be due.

1. If you could see my kitchen counter, you would understand.  I'm the type of girl that works better with disposable dishes.  I kept up a good habit of washing dishes regularly for the first month or so, until my reinforcement dishes arrived in my ocean shipment.  Now I'm back to the old habit of a good rinse to remove the stuff that causes mold but not quite good enough to eat off of.  I am too lazy I suppose.  Anyhoo, I found paper plates here, but they are expensive -$3.00+ for 50.  I had some in my ocean shipment and Mom kindly sent some more :).  Although with shipping factored in, these might have the $3 beat.

2. I can find no Singapore equivalent to the J&J brand of cotton swabs, Q-tip. It's just not out there.  I absolutely hate using the hardened cotton-end of a generic brand.  Hopefully 500 will tide me over for a bit.

3. Mom knows I love the sweets.  About 60 mini-snickers since Saturday morning and come Tuesday night I have 5....nope 4 left.  Still managing some weight loss though.  Have to love what a little walking in your everyday routine does for you.

In other news...

I drafted a post a while back but never 'published' it.  In early October I attended my first company function, the annual office party.  It was held out at a public place called the Barrage, which is at the outer edge of the island where the water comes in.  Sorry, don't have a better explanation than that :).  It was a bit hazy due to some fires in Indonesia (I heard), but you can see our view of the city skyline.  It was pretty neat. 

There were soooo many people there though - and it didn't include significant others.  Typically it is a more formal dinner and dance at a hotel, but this year it was more of an outdoor festival.  There were games to play and you win "money" that can be used to bid on prizes.  The games were impossible.  Here's one of my co-workers trying to kick the mini-ball through one of the holes.  You had 3 tries to get 100 pts or more, and the holes were worth 50 and 25 pts.  So you had to hit at least 2 of 3.  There was a similar frisbee game where you had to toss the frisbee through 1 of 4 square slots (think mail slots in doors).  I didn't see one person get the frisbee through.

There were a number of non-work people there (it is a public place) flying kites.  Can you see all the specks above? Some were neat, had long trains. Some had lights and in the dusk you could easily follow them. Some went up so high, you could barely see them any more.  The reels of wire on these things were huge!  Maybe I will take up the new hobby of kite flying ;).

Mr. McFeely brings Thanksgiving to Singapore

Random title I realize, but it's what popped into my head because....

...the Singapore Post may be the most efficient post.  Granted, there's quite a bit less of land to cover than other countries (think the size of Chicago and the suburbs - but not too far west), but I'm still impressed! 

My mom mailed a package and card on 6 November (they state the date opposite here) and it arrived yesterday, 11 November.  That includes one Sunday and basically losing 24 hours in travel time from Chicago to Singapore.  I don't get my mail everyday because it's usually only junk.  Seriously I've never received so much garbage mail, flyers, etc.  So I was excited today to see that it arrived - although I only got the card b/c the package was too big for them to leave.  I'll be picking it up on Saturday most likely, the 8:30-5:00 business hours at the nearby post don't exactly mesh well with my work schedule.  Any guesses on what I'll find?? :D We'll see this weekend.

It was a Happy Thanksgiving card with a very cute turkey on the front that I mistook for a chicken at first (it's a turkey for market, not a wild one w/ crazy feathers like you made with your hand in grade school!).  My mom's so cute, she always signs "Love, Mom & Dad" but we (my siblings and I) know that Dad has nothing to do with such things and often has no idea that she's even sent anything.  I can almost guarantee he is not aware I'll be opening a package this weekend - [sigh] oh Dad.... (no worries; he doesn't read the blog).

Regardless of mail, I had planned to post tonight.  I started the work day early and convinced myself to come home early (well 5:00).  I was able to catch some daylight and walk down to the grocery store.  It was SOOO humid tonight.  It rained in the afternoon and just hung around like it was going to rain tonight.  Good thing it didn't, because I was almost half a mile from home with no umbrella.

Anyway, it was a good walk.  Ran into some old Asian man who decided to talk to me despite me having my iPod in.  He was cute and talking about some stop lights that were being put up for him. 

Here are my purchases ($20) from the store tonight:

I've fallen in love with the snacksize Mars bars.  They are bigger than fun size but smaller than regular size.  And don't be fooled! These are really Milkyway.  Someone mixed things up here and 3 Musketeers are Milkyway; Milkyway are Mars; and I haven't seen any Mars.  (Snickers are Snickers)  I've also fallen in love with Gardenia raisin bread - raisin toast with peanut butter and honey...yum!  I eat a lot more oranges now, but usually manage to get an orange juice stain on my shirt - every time! The Edam is cheese - I'm hoping it's a cheaper option ($6.90) that is still palatable.  Usually, I have a smaller block of swiss that's about $10. The tomatoes are really cheap though, 17 cents per 100g - so my four small tomatoes were a total of $0.73 - that's less than US$0.50! The avocado was a treat that I thought I may like with my chips and salsa and on sandwiches.

Thanks to Mom for the card and package and now it's time to get some dinner going.  One more day to the weekend!!