Things...
So, Facebook's being weird and not loading for me, which is really annoying because I'm a loser and really wanted to play my games... Oh well.
Christmas. Christmas was interesting. Nothing like I'm used to at home because family dynmics and holiday plans differ for the Brandons here in the land down under from what my parents do back home. I suppose the whole summer Christmas vs. winter Christmas makes a big difference, especially in the gift department, but it's still weird. I feel like a bad person for having that "I want to go home..." feeling when I've got so much for me here... But there's still so much that I miss and it's only been a year and a half... I can't be expected to just forget about the past 26 years of my life, can I? Maybe I'll be used to it after another 26 years... Of course, in 26 years I'll have kids to be accustomed to as well, hopefully...
Anyway, like I said, Christmas was interesting. I made a turkey! After my parents came out for Thanksgiving and showed me how they do it, I copied and tried myself for Christmas. The kicker? Everyone said my turkey was greeeeeeat. =P And lol John yelled at me for giving away the "secret recipe". His mother kept saying that even though I left the turkey in the oven for too long that it was still more moist than hers was. I, of course, immediately blurted out that it's because I stuck a whole stick of butter in it... =P I do that a lot, just blurt out things when I didn't know what I was doing at the time... Why can't I be that person who just smiles and looks like they know what they're doing? Meh. So yes, I made turkey and dad's recipe for mashed sweet potato and his stuffing which everyone loved. I put too much bread in it though, and it came out far too dry but it's a learning process, right? Next year hopefully I'll do it better. I'm thinking about making it a couple times during the year in a much smaller amount to see if I can't get it done better...somehow...something...stuff.
So John's family does a bigger family thing with extended relatives on Christmas Eve, and that was fun. All four generations of the Alexander family--John's mum's side--were there and Uncle Jeff dressed up as Santa and distributed gifts early so it was amusing to see the kids shying away from Santa and to find out who were the really brave ones. It's also really weird to hear a Santa speaking with an accent.
After that it was home time and then John and I woke up ridiculously early Christmas Day: 7:45am! lol. He was talking about how he always sleeps in on Christmas Day and then I woke up that early and since I did he decided he should wake up too I guess... So he had his coffee, I had some orange juice and then the family showed up! I can't beleive they were going to wake us up, but we spoiled the surprise and beat them to it. So it was open presents time and I got some really nice gifts. John splurged and got me a Nintendo DS because I've been talking about how I like Nintendo better than xBox, silly boy. I don't mind his xBox but now I have Pokemon! And it plays Gameboy Advance games too, so he found a bunch of games on e-Bay and wrapped them all individually (ugh!) and so I've got Super Mario World and a few different other Mario games (yay Mario!!) but my first goal is to get through my Pokemon SoulSilver first before I go buying more games. =P Even though I wants so many of them. I wants them!! And then his parents bought me a pen that, funnily enough, I already had because dad bought it to sign the guest book at the wedding. It's a blinged out mini-pen. Funny stuff. But then they also got me a diary for 2011 and some hair clips that I also already have. They're those ones that stretch across the back of your head and are made of elastic and do lots of different things...But it's nice to have more because they do work well and I've stretched a few of the elastic bits too far so some of them have broken but they're stil far from throw away status. The Pokemon game was a gift from my brother-in-law James (Jimbo!) and his girlfriend Amy. John's sister Tina (must stop referring to everyone as John's this or John's that and saying "MY") is a fundless college student so her present was her presence. =) My mother-in-law's mother even got me a gift, this little diffuser bottle of rose and patchouli(sp?) scented oil and it smells sooooo good. I'm sad that it's just a small bottle because it just smells sooooo pretty. And then of course my parents. They got me a bottle of perfume, sillyheads, which they do every year. I need to tell them to stop because I'm not much of a perfume person. I still have imps from BPAL that I bought long long ago that have still never been opened except to test the smell back when I first bought them. Anyway. My parents have a set amount of money that they spend on each of their daughters every Christmas. So instead of buying stuff with that amount of money like they do every year, they bought us a few things for the house and gave us the cash, put in a card in an envelope wrapped in a gift, of course. But still. Too much! The lovelies. But it's weird because I can't spend hardly anything because all of our holiday money is going toward the house, because we still need to put our fencing up and that shit's expensive. So my spending is curbed until probably birthday 2011. Wheee March.
New Year's our plans are to go fishing. Overnight. In a boat. If the weather stays nice and warm and my health doesn't go stupid--I'm getting a sore throat and have been coughing for the past three days but I don't feel siiiiiiiiiiick--then we're going! It's going to be scary for sure because John's never driven his boat in the dark before, but his dad's gone on overnight fishing trips so that doesn't scare me as much. It'll be the most interesting thing I'll ever do on a New Year's Even that's for sure. Hopefully--if John lets me go--I'll catch something interesting, but if I catch a shark in the dark I dunno how we're gonna take care of it... O_O But if my cold doesn't get better John's not going to let me go and then I have no idea what we'll be doing for the holiday. He did mention something about a whole day in bed. And he meant it. He was talking about pulling a mattress out into the family room and just watching movies all day, candlelight, ordering in for lunch and then making a romantic dinner together later in the evening... And of course...other things...
We'll see.
Christmas. Christmas was interesting. Nothing like I'm used to at home because family dynmics and holiday plans differ for the Brandons here in the land down under from what my parents do back home. I suppose the whole summer Christmas vs. winter Christmas makes a big difference, especially in the gift department, but it's still weird. I feel like a bad person for having that "I want to go home..." feeling when I've got so much for me here... But there's still so much that I miss and it's only been a year and a half... I can't be expected to just forget about the past 26 years of my life, can I? Maybe I'll be used to it after another 26 years... Of course, in 26 years I'll have kids to be accustomed to as well, hopefully...
Anyway, like I said, Christmas was interesting. I made a turkey! After my parents came out for Thanksgiving and showed me how they do it, I copied and tried myself for Christmas. The kicker? Everyone said my turkey was greeeeeeat. =P And lol John yelled at me for giving away the "secret recipe". His mother kept saying that even though I left the turkey in the oven for too long that it was still more moist than hers was. I, of course, immediately blurted out that it's because I stuck a whole stick of butter in it... =P I do that a lot, just blurt out things when I didn't know what I was doing at the time... Why can't I be that person who just smiles and looks like they know what they're doing? Meh. So yes, I made turkey and dad's recipe for mashed sweet potato and his stuffing which everyone loved. I put too much bread in it though, and it came out far too dry but it's a learning process, right? Next year hopefully I'll do it better. I'm thinking about making it a couple times during the year in a much smaller amount to see if I can't get it done better...somehow...something...stuff.
So John's family does a bigger family thing with extended relatives on Christmas Eve, and that was fun. All four generations of the Alexander family--John's mum's side--were there and Uncle Jeff dressed up as Santa and distributed gifts early so it was amusing to see the kids shying away from Santa and to find out who were the really brave ones. It's also really weird to hear a Santa speaking with an accent.
After that it was home time and then John and I woke up ridiculously early Christmas Day: 7:45am! lol. He was talking about how he always sleeps in on Christmas Day and then I woke up that early and since I did he decided he should wake up too I guess... So he had his coffee, I had some orange juice and then the family showed up! I can't beleive they were going to wake us up, but we spoiled the surprise and beat them to it. So it was open presents time and I got some really nice gifts. John splurged and got me a Nintendo DS because I've been talking about how I like Nintendo better than xBox, silly boy. I don't mind his xBox but now I have Pokemon! And it plays Gameboy Advance games too, so he found a bunch of games on e-Bay and wrapped them all individually (ugh!) and so I've got Super Mario World and a few different other Mario games (yay Mario!!) but my first goal is to get through my Pokemon SoulSilver first before I go buying more games. =P Even though I wants so many of them. I wants them!! And then his parents bought me a pen that, funnily enough, I already had because dad bought it to sign the guest book at the wedding. It's a blinged out mini-pen. Funny stuff. But then they also got me a diary for 2011 and some hair clips that I also already have. They're those ones that stretch across the back of your head and are made of elastic and do lots of different things...But it's nice to have more because they do work well and I've stretched a few of the elastic bits too far so some of them have broken but they're stil far from throw away status. The Pokemon game was a gift from my brother-in-law James (Jimbo!) and his girlfriend Amy. John's sister Tina (must stop referring to everyone as John's this or John's that and saying "MY") is a fundless college student so her present was her presence. =) My mother-in-law's mother even got me a gift, this little diffuser bottle of rose and patchouli(sp?) scented oil and it smells sooooo good. I'm sad that it's just a small bottle because it just smells sooooo pretty. And then of course my parents. They got me a bottle of perfume, sillyheads, which they do every year. I need to tell them to stop because I'm not much of a perfume person. I still have imps from BPAL that I bought long long ago that have still never been opened except to test the smell back when I first bought them. Anyway. My parents have a set amount of money that they spend on each of their daughters every Christmas. So instead of buying stuff with that amount of money like they do every year, they bought us a few things for the house and gave us the cash, put in a card in an envelope wrapped in a gift, of course. But still. Too much! The lovelies. But it's weird because I can't spend hardly anything because all of our holiday money is going toward the house, because we still need to put our fencing up and that shit's expensive. So my spending is curbed until probably birthday 2011. Wheee March.
New Year's our plans are to go fishing. Overnight. In a boat. If the weather stays nice and warm and my health doesn't go stupid--I'm getting a sore throat and have been coughing for the past three days but I don't feel siiiiiiiiiiick--then we're going! It's going to be scary for sure because John's never driven his boat in the dark before, but his dad's gone on overnight fishing trips so that doesn't scare me as much. It'll be the most interesting thing I'll ever do on a New Year's Even that's for sure. Hopefully--if John lets me go--I'll catch something interesting, but if I catch a shark in the dark I dunno how we're gonna take care of it... O_O But if my cold doesn't get better John's not going to let me go and then I have no idea what we'll be doing for the holiday. He did mention something about a whole day in bed. And he meant it. He was talking about pulling a mattress out into the family room and just watching movies all day, candlelight, ordering in for lunch and then making a romantic dinner together later in the evening... And of course...other things...
We'll see.