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Friday, December 31, 2004
Happy New Year's !
Another busy week gone by. Can't believe a whole week since Christmas has already passed. Where has the week gone ? I guess I didn't notice being busy at work and all.
A lot of holiday stuff going on plus all my preparations to make sure that everything will run smoothly while I am gone next week. Yes, I am going on VACATION !!! I still have to go to work on Monday (and I know it will be super busy) but starting Tuesday I am on vacation.
We're going to New Orleans to meet up with my parents who are visiting from Austria. They are touring the South and we'll meet up with them in New Orleans. I have never been there and have always wanted to go so I am really excited. Plus who wouldn't be excited when the weather forecast predicts 75 degrees. God, it sounds like heaven. :) Plus all the yummy food and drinks - can't wait.
Speaking of yummy food when we got home today a little package awaited me on our doorstep. It was a Sachertorte sent directly from Austria. My former company Panalpina whom I worked for in Austria sent me a Sacher cake. So yum ! It's the best cake in the world !
Well, I hope everybody is having a happy New Year's. We're staying home watching movies, making some appetizers and enjoying some wine. Bought a bottle of champagne as well so we have something to toast with at midnight.
Have a great New Year's - see you all next year. :)
Posted by Hanna at 07:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack
Sunday, December 26, 2004
Merry Christmas
Merry Christmas everyone. Hope you all had a great Christmas weekend.
I enjoyed the weekend very much and wish I didn't have to go back to work tomorrow.
Christmas Eve we stayed home, had a lot of appetizer snacks and a big bottle of wine while watching movies and Friends episodes on DVD. A very nice evening.
Around midnight I persuaded Mike to let me open one of my gifts. He let me open one of the cards he got me which was just as exciting since it turned out to be a tea card. How cool is that ? It's a card with a teacup on the front and an inserted tea bag. I was in heaven. :)
Christmas morning I made myself a big mug of tea with the teabag from the card. While drinking tea we opened our gifts with Mike's sister and her kids. Santa was very good to me this year. :) I got a wonderful pink sapphire set (necklace, earrings & ring), tea stationery (for somebody that loves tea like I do that's truly exciting), some Woodstock stuff (the bird that is !), DVDs, more stationery, a Yankee Candle snowman lamp, shirts, "gobble plates" (turkey shaped plates - really neat), tea, picture frames and so much more.
Around 3 Mike's sister, her kids and us went to Mike's aunt's house. She just moved into a new house so it was nice to see what it looked like. I just have one word - HEAVENLY. It's absolutely gorgeous. I took some pictures (see below) because it's just beyond words to describe. It reminds me of those old English-style cottages. Wooden floors, fireplace, stone walls, clawfoot bathtub, A-frame ceiling, ... just perfect.
We spent the rest of the afternoon there chatting, eating, drinking and having fun. It's always nice to catch up with family and spend some quality time. We don't get to do enough of that in this hectic world.
Today we went to NYC to see the tree in front of Rockefeller Center. It has become somewhat of a Christmas tradition for us and it's not Christmas until we have gone to the city to see the tree. So we fought the crowds to see the tree and had dinner at our favorite Mexican place Chevy's in Times Square. Yum. :) On a side note the tree in front of Rockefeller Center has a Swarovski star on top this year - isn't it pretty ? As a proud Austrian I had to mention that little fact. :)
Tomorrow it's back to work and reality. Oh well, all fun things have to end at some point I guess.
Posted by Hanna at 07:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBack
Thursday, December 23, 2004
Garfield Moment
Now isn't he the cutest cat ? Reading that comic strip the other day put me fully into the Christmas spirit. I can't explain why but I just think it's too cute. :)
Had a good evening today. We went to Stew Leonard's (a really big grocery store that sells tons of yummy fresh food, sort of like a big dairy/produce place ... it's hard to explain) to get some food for tomorrow - Christmas Eve. We picked out some veggies + dip and some crab appetizer snacks along with a big bottle of wine from the liquor store. We'll veg out in front of the TV and maybe do a Friends marathon. I have all the released seasons on DVD so we have plenty to choose from.
Tonight after we went shopping I watched a movie called "An Angel in the Family", it was a Hallmark movie. I am so excited that we have the Hallmark channel now. I love those sappy movies, especially around the holidays. I have wanted that channel for ages so now we finally have it - yay. :)
Well, hope everybody is doing ok. Don't get too stressed out with the holiday preparations.
Posted by Hanna at 11:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBack
Sunday, December 19, 2004
What type of Tea are you?
Green Tea... You are Green Tea! Strong and very smart you prefer peace to violence and very rarely take action if it involves confrontation. But you make up for this with your keen insight and understanding of the world and people around you, you have a very mysterious nature. Many people see you as laid back and that may be true but you are very intelligent and make good decisions.
What type of Tea are you? {-With Anime Pictures!-}
brought to you by Quizilla
Posted by Hanna at 08:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack
Silly Cutie
Look at him - isn't he a cutie ? Oliver's new spot is on top of the toaster oven. Yes, you read that right - the toaster oven. He's smart so he figured out when I use the toaster oven in the morning to make my breakfast ... it stays WARM. And as we all know cats like warm places so Oliver decided that it was a good idea to curl up on top of it.
The first time I saw that I couldn't believe it ... it just cracked me up. He's such a silly cutie but definitely smart. :)
So how is everybody's weekend going ? I am trying to enjoy my day off today as starting tomorrow I will embark on two very crazy weeks at work. Everything's totally nuts right now, I will have to train somebody new on a pretty work/time-intensive position, oversee the whole Christmas and New Year's schedule and possibly pick up the pieces in a few other places. We'll see what happens I guess.
At least our tree is up, most of my gifts are wrapped and I am actually in a pretty nice Christmas mood ... despite everything going haywire around me. I'll just see where it all leads me. :)
Posted by Hanna at 02:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack
Thursday, December 16, 2004
'Tis the season
May I proudly announce that we have finally decorated our tree. :) Yes tonight was the night - we now have a beautifully decorated tree in our livingroom.
All the other decorations are up as well and our livingroom looks very pretty I have to say. I am starting to feel the Christmas spirit - better late than never. :)
I put up my little Christmas house as well and am absolutely in love with it. I have always adored those Christmas villages that you can buy and decided to start my own. I fell in love with Department 56's Dicken's Village. This past fall I bought my first house for my village at Hallmark. Hopefully some day I will aquire a whole village. (I plan to buy one piece a year - they're gorgeous but extremely pricey)
Posted by Hanna at 10:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBack
Monday, December 13, 2004
Another week gone by ....
Wow I can't believe that it's already Monday again - where did last week go ?
Last week seemed to drag on forever and every day seemed to hold something else annoying/stressful. We lost one of our biggest customers at work so that meant a lot of adjusting on everyone's part. Besides that my whole department seemed to be in a bad mood all last week and nobody seemed to get along - what joy. :)
Needless to say I really wasn't into the Christmas spirit. Well on Sunday I finally decided to put up our decorations inside the house and the tree went up today. We still have to decorate it tomorrow but I am starting to slowly feel the "Christmas magic" - let's hope it lasts.
I am off from work tomorrow so I am going to try and make it a stress-free, relaxed day, writing letters, lighting my scented candles, having lots of tea and just generally enjoying myself. Sounds like a plan right ?
Posted by Hanna at 07:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Monday, December 06, 2004
Yucky Monday
We got our second snow of the season today. It wasn't even much and didn't stick to the ground but it was just disgusting. Sleeting, freezing rain, some snow and cold ... not a very nice way to start the week.
Work was busy as well. Trying to do ten things at once as usual: Watching a new girl to make sure she is doing ok and doesn't need help with something while at the same time trying to look through resumes and talking to potential candidates for an open part-time position. I scheduled 4 interviews for tomorrow so let's see how that goes. I am going to be 2 people down tomorrow so that should be interesting. We'll see.
For now I am going to make myself another cup of tea and play some Sims. My Sims are always happy and it sure never snows in the game. :)
Posted by Hanna at 07:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBack
Saturday, December 04, 2004
Isn't it nice ?
While I was at work today Mike put together my rocking chair. It was Mike's birthday present to me but we just haven't had time yet to put it together.
I am definitely very happy with it - always wanted to have a rocking chair. To me they represent coziness, calmness and relaxation. Now all I need is a Thomas Kinkade painting to hang on the wall above it and I'm all set. :)
I know ...I know .. I am never happy .. but hey isn't dreaming half the fun ? ;)
Either way I am very happy with my new rocking chair and hope to spend lots of relaxed evenings in it. Even just looking at it it gives our livingroom a really nice touch. I think everybody should own a rocking chair. :)
During my lunch break today I managed a trip to the post office and was able to mail all my international Christmas gifts. One more thing checked off my list. :) I am gonna try and write most of my domestic Christmas cards tomorrow and then I should be almost set. .... until I think of the one last minute thing that I forgot (I seem to do that every year and have to scramble last minute to get it together)
Posted by Hanna at 10:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack
Thursday, December 02, 2004
Finally somebody that shares my views about sidewalks
Of course I haven't posted in forever again even though I claim in very post that I will do better from now on.
This past Monday I met up with Dinka. Long story short, she's an Austrian-Croatian that I met by coincidence when she applied for a job at the company I work at. The position was already filled at the time so we didn't hire her but I started to email back and forth with her after I realized that she pretty much shares my life-story. She's originally from Croatia but moved to Austria when she was a kid. She met her now-husband online and moved to the US pretty much around the same time I did. The only major difference between our stories is that she has a little daughter.
So Monday we finally managed to get together and went out for dessert at Chilli's. It was eerie how she has so many thoughts, opinions and experiences that are just so much like me. One of the very first things she said to me was about the fact that there aren't enough sidewalks in the US - and I SO agree. The sidewalk-thing has been a very sore subject with me for a while now. I totally think that there should be more sidewalks in this town and wish we had one on our street and in our neighborhood so I could go for walks.
It was definitely a fun evening and I hope we can become good friends as time goes on.
On a different note I finished all my international Christmas cards and mailed them today. I still have to write all my US and Canadian ones but at least the international ones are done.
I am doing ok with the gift-buying as well. There are a few people I am still missing but for the most part I am ok.
Can't believe it's Dec. 2nd already. That means only 23 more days until Christmas. Crazy. :)
Posted by Hanna at 07:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBack