Nothing Less

I'm still trying to figure out my Adobe Photoshop Elements 6 for the Macbook Pro.  On top of finals week next week, it's pretty difficult to figure out the program and start my illustrations.  Yep.  A lot of people said that I'm very gifted when it came to the Arts department.  Sciences (which I need to do for the nursing program), I suck!

I was pretty stoked that Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince came out on DVD.  I thought about buying the Blu-Ray version, but I love having my movies uniformed.  I know, better quality, but the regular version is much cheaper.  Also, I wanted to buy the two disc set, but who watches the extras anymore?  I used to, but I just don't have the time to do it.... So I just stuck with the "movie only" DVD.  I bought some knee length socks to to keep my legs warm.  I would just buy plain knee length white socks, but I don't wear white socks.  I wear black and very colourful ones.  It was dirt cheap at Target... a three pack for $6.00.  I absolutely love them!

I love Sbux!  I love Sbux during the winter season.  Peppermint Mochas, Caramel Apple Ciders, Gingerbread Lattes!  I love their "Pick of the Week" too.  I picked up one of the redeemable cards from Sbux when I was grabbing a soy Green Tea Latte to wake my arse up.  Brandi Carlile.  Yay!  

I also made my mum an iTouch cozy this week as one of her Christmas presents.  Actually, she's getting two from  me.  I also made Snowy the Snowman this weekend.  I was so happy I got him done and committed the pattern to paper that I forgot to embroider his smile.  Actually, his smirk.  He's supposed to be smirking.  I guess I'll add it later.

Chipper is so cute.  He loves to run around my bed and eventually climbs up the headboard where I keep a lot of crap.    He's gotten a hold of my Sanrio Panda stamp.  Yep.  He started to chew on it until he realized it was plastic and moved on to the next one.  I'm hoping he learns that there isn't any food up there for him to eat.  But he's been doing it for over a year.  Michael says, he's not going to learn.  Oh well.

Our office Christmas party is coming up next Friday and it's going to be at RPM racing.  We get to go on this racing track and race each other.  I'm wondering what we're doing for gift exchange, if we are doing anything.  If we are, I guess I'll have enough time to make them a coffee cup cozy, speaking of which, I have to make for Michael's secretary.  I'd have to embroider a pig on it (since she loves....actually is obsessed with pigs).

It's Christmas!!!

Merry Christmas everyone!!!

It's raining again.  I'm happy that it's cold and raining.  I grew up where it's cold, wet, and moist practically every day of the year.  After moving to the California Valley, where the temperatures reach three degrees Fahrenheit, I miss the cold.

As the rain began to pour heavily, I curled up on my couch to read "The Host" by Stephenie Meyer.  I've been trying to read this book for over a year now, but I just can't seem to get into it.  A friend of mine said that it's a bit slow at first, but it gets better.  I hope she's right.

I looked at the weather outside and hoped that the rain would somewhat ease from a downpour to a light drizzle so I could sit outside and read.  I wanted to take some more photographs, but the rain kept on pouring.  Last week's rain was actually better since it wasn't pouring for over an hour.  I had some photographs taken last week.

I've wanted to bake pumpkin pie from scratch.  I don't want any of that canned stuff this year, so I chopped up the pumpkin Michael's mum gave us for Halloween.  I felt bad for chopping it up after she said that they keep until april.  But really, who wants halloween decorations during Easter?

As I baked the pumpkin to be pureed later for the filling, I've forgotten how long it takes to for it to soften up and I was running out of time.  I was almost tempted to make a break for the pantry and open up a can of that Libby's Pumpkin Puree.  I held off and I was thankful I did.  The pie turned out scrumptious.  Too bad I didn't have a photograph of the finished product.

Black Friday is actually here.  For those of you who don't know, Black Friday is this American past time of getting up at the bloody crack of dawn, stand in line in front of the store (some even camp out on Wednesday night) to do some shopping.  This involves a lot of running, pushing, and pulling over a product that's been marked down ridiculously low.  This year, Michael and I decided to forgo Black Friday shopping.  Instead, we woke up at 9:00, had a light breakfast, and made our way to Sears to buy my camera and some tools.  The next stop was Ulta to purchase my Bare Escentuals make-up.

Yay!  I have a new camera again!  As many of you know I gave my camera to Christina since hers broke and I'm using Michael's really old digital.

Product Description (From Amazon.com):

So...You'd think that after banishing an immortal and a fallen High Priestess, saving Stark's life, bitting Heath, getting a headache from Erik, and almost dying, Zoey Redbird would catch a break.  Sadly, a break is not in the House of Night school forecast for the High Priestess in training and her gang.  Juggling three guys is anything but a stress reliever, especially when one of them is a sexy Warrior who is so into protecting Zoey that he can sense her emotions.  Speaking of stress, the dark force lurking in the tunnels under the Tulsa Depot is spreading, and Zoey is beginning to believe Stevie Rae could be responsible for a lot more than a group of misfit red fledgling.  Aphrodite's visions warn Zoey to stay away from Kalona and his dark allure, but it also shows Zoey who has the power to stop the evil immortal.  Soon it becomes obvious that Zoey has no choice.  If she doesn't go to Kalona he will exact a fiery vengeance on those closest to her.  Will Zoey have the courage to chance losing her life, her heart, and her soul?

Stars:  5 out of 10

My Review:  I'm really disappointed in this long awaited installment of the House of Night series.  They've put so much hype about how Zoey will deal with Kalona in the last book Hunted.  This book mainly touched on Zoey's dreams about Kalona and her sordid love affair with Heath, Erik, and Stark.  The only thing worth reading was Stevie Rae and the Raven Mocker as well as Stevie Rae's imprint with Aphrodite.  Although it covered bits about Kalona's history and Zoey's role as modern A-ya, it failed to capture my interest.  In the end, "Tempted" left most readers including myself wanting more substance; more action; more inner story.  The authors made a hasty ending with a cliff hanger.   It was as if they decided to stop writing.  They even had the audacity to put "The End for Now" at the end of the book.  I wouldn't recommend purchasing the book.  It wasn't worth the sale price of $10 I paid at Target.    I do advise reading the book so that you're not 10% lost when the next one comes out.  I suggest borrowing it from the library or from someone who purchased the book.  Don't buy it.  Spend that money at Sbux and buy a peppermint mocha.

More Sookie Stackhouse!

After I finished the last book, Dead and Gone, I was craving for more of Sookie.  Thankfully, Charlaine Harris came out with "A Touch of Dead."

I wasn't going to buy the book at first, but I needed my Sookie and Eric fix.

Crazy!  Cool!

Fall & Winter leaves mixed with winter berries!

The park and the little lake in Folsom is actually beautiful this time of year.  I'm surprised with my camera phone as well.  I took some really good photographs.  The sun was somewhat peeking out and I could feel my hands still getting cold.  So after taking the last photograph, I curled up on the bed of Michael's truck with a blanket, a large back pillow, and read my book.

I finally finished the "Time Traeler's Wife."  I really love the romance between Claire and Henry.  I was fascinated with it since I saw the movie trailer, so I went out and bought the book.  I figured, I can get the book finished in a week and watch the film.  Unfortunately, summer ended and life began.  Now that I finished the book, I can't wait until the movie comes out on DVD.  I especially love the ending (I'm not going to give it away)... it was very romantic.

One of my favourite parts of the book... 

After a nice long day at the park, I went home to try a new cookie recipe.  Instead of making the traditional chocolate chip cookie, I decided to substitute the chocolate chips for peppermint bark.  The first batch came out, but the next one really sucked.  It stuck to the pan and the dozen went straight to the ice cream topping jar.  The next batch, I sprayed the pan with PAM, so the melted peppermint wont stick.  It worked, but I think instead of using peppermint bark the next time, I'll use Andes mints.

It's amazing how once the month of November arrives, the christmas cups come out.  I was at school way too early in the morning and was feeling rather crappy, so I headed over to the coffee shop to buy me a soy chai, but instead, got the peppermint latte.

Mmmm... peppermint latte!

So, with the winter season soon approaching, I am itching to bake.   Last week, Michael wanted me to make the lava cake.  But after looking through my recipe book, I found that making the center of the lava cake takes a while since the melted chocolate must cool for at least two hours!  Needless to say, he was disappointed.

But today was a different story.  I knew how long it was going to take so I started making the filling for the cake at three o'clock in the afternoon.  Yes, I gave myself some time.  I washed all my ramekins (all 4 of them), took out my heavy duty mixer, and started prepping for the next step.

The filling didn't take that long to make, neither was the cake.  It took me a total of 20 minutes to make the cake.

For sure, I'll be making this again!

Mike was craving a Tsunomono salad that we had at Oshima Sushi just a couple of months ago.  It's composed of tuna and another type of fish.  He made the salad... it was yummy!

See the chunks of tuna and to make it more healthier, Mike added some Tofu to the mix as well.  He got his salad, but I wanted spicy tuna and the sauce for the spicy tuna calls for Japanese Mayo and chili.  I don't have Japanese Mayo so, I went and bought Japanese mayo.  It's really funny how it's packaged and what's more crazy is that it has to be consumed in 30 days after opening.

Of course, with any Japanese food, we needed to buy some masago and tobiko.  What's even more crazier is that they have wasabi tobiko!  It may look green...but it tastes great!

Here's our set-up for dinner.  It's make your own sushi night!!

Since baking the dark chocolate espresso cupcakes, I wanted to make an orange pumpkin cupcake, but there aren't any recipes out there.  So the experimentation began.  Someone told me that I should add some orange zest and all spice to the batter, but that's not really pumkin-y.  So, I decided to use canned pumpkin and orange extract to make the batter.

Okay, I know that experimenting sometimes doesn't turn out well, but in this case, it did.  Everyone said they could taste the pumpkin and not the orange.  I just need to add more orange extract the next time.  Michael loved it!  So, i'll post the recipe later or you can e-mail me of you want to try it.