Happy New Year!

I hope everyone had a good 2008. I should totally be asleep right now as I am leaving for the airport at 4:30AM but I decided to do this before I actually go to sleep. For today's post, I am going to write about some of my favourite things of 2008. Some of them have or will have their own posts but for now it's just a list. In no particular order,...

• Panera Bread (American restaurant, really good sandwiches and soup. One of the things I miss most about Boston)
• Joss Whedon TV shows (I discovered Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, and Firefly this year. Also, Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog was awesome)
• The Sims 2 (for PC)
• Television Without Pity (Snarky recaps of your favourite shows, what more could you want?)
• Tina Fey as Sarah Palin
• Neil Patrick Harris
• I discovered some new and amusing websites this year. See my blog roll. I also enjoy www.tvtropes.org
• Twitter (I don't use it often but I like reading what other people are saying)
• Hulu (although I can't use it in Canada)
• Flamenco (That's not a new favourite, but I saw some amazing flamenco performances in '08)
• Living with my sister (It's been an adventure, especially with her doing a new thing everyday. It kept me on my toes)
• Using acronyms for phrases even if it's shorter to say the actual phrase (ex. btw for "by the way")
• Quoting random TV quotes in casual conversation (It's a sickness)
• Having an actual TV and using a DVR to record certain shows. (Awesomeness)
• TV Shows that are online (How I caught up on TV when I didn't have one)
• TV on DVD

I probably have a few more favourites but I am getting tired. I hope everyone has a great 2009!

Hush little baby

Today my family and I went over to my cousin's house to see her and her kids. She had a baby in May that I had not met yet so it was exciting to meet him. I managed to get to hold the baby for quite a while. I love holding babies. They are so cute and cuddly. I hadn't held a baby in quite a long time so it was nice to hold one again. My niece is getting a bit old to hold like that and tends to protest and try to get away. The baby's getting pretty big and is starting to look like he's about to crawl. Today was especially nice because I got to hold the baby for a long time, but didn't have to actually have responsibility for feeding him, changing him, or putting him to sleep, and I could leave him at my cousins when we left. So woo!

Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!

I hope everyone that celebrates Christmas has a good one. Thus far, it has been a pretty good one for me. I ate good food. Saw my family. Opened my presents. Won some games, and sadly lost some others. It's been a good day. Tomorrow is full of more good food and family interactions so that will be fun. I am trying to think of my favourite part of today but it has been a very good day so far so I am coming up with a bunch. I really enjoy some of our family traditions. First of all, I love apple strudel. We have it for Christmas every year and joy of joys I did not have to be the one to make it. It was made before I arrived on Monday so yay. Today I also enjoyed seeing the presents that everyone received and our tradition of opening one present at a time in ascending age order. It worked quite well for the people over five years old. My four year old niece just unwrapped gifts continously because otherwise we would have been there all night. I enjoyed spending Christmas Eve with my Aunt and Uncle's family. I also enjoyed the $10 gift exchange. Each of us buys a $10 gift and put them in a pile in the middle of the room. We each choose gift to unwrap or steal one from someone else. I believe there are a number of different names for it. Sadly, there was one missed tradition this year. I don't know if it's tradition so much as something that seems to happen nearly every year. The tradition: someone forgetting to wrap a present and put it under the tree. Everyone got the appropriate gifts this year so that's good. A couple years ago, my aunt forgot to wrap one of her kids presents so she had to run back upstairs to grab it. The present was a pair of gloves, and in her haste, she ended up giving him two right gloves.
Merry Christmas Everyone!