Ataun's "Farewell" Bash

February, Friday the 13th, 2009. That day marked Ataun's last day with Reorg. She started in Reorg exactly 4.5 years ago on August, Friday the 13th, 2004. Coincidence? I think not! I believe that Friday the 13th just happens to be Ataun's favourite day.

Well, if you know Ataun, you'll know that "Stewie Griffin" from "Family Guy" is her "Role Model" One of Stewie's famous catch phrase: "Victory Shall be Mine" is the same Motto that Ataun lives by. She relishes the fact that she will one day take over the world, through EVIL means or otherwise. Is she delusional or is she for real? Warning to all. Appearances can be deceiving. Ataun may look pretty and sweet, but what sort of sinister scheming and planning goes on inside that pretty head of hers?!?!?!? All I can say is, the day she does take over the world, you better be on her good side and she will spare you an easy and painless death. Sorry Ataun, please spare me but I do have to warn others.

All kidding aside, Ataun has decided to go back to school to hone her skills further and then return to the workplace, ready to pounce! So Watch out World!

On her last day, Ataun brought in some assorted sweets called "Burfi". They were so colourful and pretty and very yummy too. I'm not much for super sweets, but I really enjoyed the square pieces covered in chopped pistachio nuts. They tasted so creamy and so mmm....mmm....good.

In a tribute to her favourite imaginary friend, I made Ataun a "Stewie Griffin" Valentine cookie as her "Going Away" present. It depicts Stewie presenting her with a ribbon decorated Valentine Balloon that seemingly says "Ataun, Be Mine", but once the ribbons get unwrapped, it reveals the full message: "Farewell Ataun, Victory Shall be Mine". I hope that she enjoys the mixed messages and will cherish it.

As well, we presented her with assorted gifts for her upcoming "Scholarly Days" and beach wear for her trip to Cuba (the lucky girl). But I think the best gift of all was a Collage of some of the great friends she had made over the years. She leaves behind many happy and humorous moments. Life in Reorg will definitely not be so lively without her.

After work, many of her nearest and dearest friends that she had befriended over the short time that she was with us gathered together to wish her well. The private room we reserved for the occasion was jam-packed with people. Ataun is one popular gal! The few pictures I took at Ataun's Farewell Bash represented only a handful of the people who attended Ataun's Farewell Party, but I'm sure there will be many more posted by all the other well-wishers on Facebook and elsewhere.

There will be a HUGE gaping hole now that she's gone. So sad :(..... We will all miss her dearly. Ataun has been such a strong presence in so many people's lives, she will not be easily forgotten and we all hope that we will always be a part of her life in the future.

Farwell Ataun. Please come visit often.





Ataun brought in some sweets called "Burfi". So colourful, just like her.

A "Stewie " Valentine cookie for Ataun

Stewie's famous catch phrase: "Victory Shall be Mine" is Ataun's Motto to live by.

After Ataun took away the "A"s from her name, Beatriz spelled the word "NUT". How appropriate.

Ataun's "Farewell" Card

Best wishes from some of her friends who managed to squeeze their messages in.

Parting gifts & Cake for Ataun

A collage of friends she hung out with over the years

Ataun, back at the desk she started out in.

Caught her in the act, trying to lift a stapler. Notice, she is trying to look innocent?

The Bulletin Writing Team

The girls finally get to meet Mike from the Discount Brokerage Dept.

A bunch of friends raising their glasses to Ataun.

Ataun holding up very well, after her 5th shot.

Happy Valentines Day!

Valentine’s Day fell on a Saturday this year and that made it easy to celebrate with all the loved ones in my family. Our day began with a Valentine’s Day Brunch of pancakes, beef patties, & fruit (all heart-shaped, of course). I had a lot of fun preparing the Special Valentine’s Breakfast Brunch because I finally got to use 2 of the kitchen gadgets I got for Christmas. Afterwards, we exchanged Cards and Valentine Treats.

The previous week, Derek and I had a lot of fun making some cookies just for this occasion. I gave some of the Valentine cookies away to my favourite Niece, Patricia and her very creative friend, Serena, whom I was fortunate enough to have finally met. Serena gave me a lot of ideas on how to pursue my love of arts and crafts and I thank her very much for that.

If you are interested to view some of Serena’s very whimsical artwork, please go to: http://www.serenadraws.com/ or visit her blog at: http://serenadraws.wordpress.com/about/

I also brought some of the Valentine cookies for a “Valentine’s Day/Family Day/Long Weekend/Goodbye to Ataun” Potluck lunch party held on Friday the 13th, at my workplace. I shall be posting a separate post for Ataun’s going away party tomorrow.

So, for our afternoon snack, we ate the remainder of the Valentine’s Day cookies, along with some of the Valentines Treats and served it with some “Love Spell” Green Tea. The “Love Spell” Green Tea is a Fresh Green Organic Sencha Tea containing some very fine ingredients such as Thai Papaya Chunks, Coconut Chips, Red Sugar Hearts, Pineapple Bits, Safflower and Fruit Flavours. The Tea looked beautiful and tasted heavenly.

For dinner, we had wanted to visit our favourite Vietnamese Restaurant (Kim Po), but their menu indicated that all their Vermicelli dishes are served with peanuts. We’ve been to this restaurant many times in the past and Derek, who is allergic to peanuts, had never suffered any allergy attacks while eating here. But with the new warning on their menu, we decided not to take any chances and to try our luck elsewhere. We checked out the nearby Richmond Court where it always serves good food with big portions and we weren’t disappointed in that department. Too bad we couldn’t say the same for the service. We had to ask three times for tea refills before one of the nicer waiters came along to serve us. All in all, I still had a lovely Valentine’s Day.


The amazing Kitchen Wizard. It's a salad server, strainer and flipper, all in 1. I actually used it for whipping eggs while making the pancake batter. I also got to used the Heart Shape Ring with a handle to form the heart shaped pancakes.

Special Heart-Shaped Brunch included pancakes, hamburger patty with cheddar cheese, strawberries and mango.

The Hamburger Patty with the Heart Shape cut-out was fun to eat also.

Colin and Derek enjoying their Brunch

Valentine Gift Exchange

Here are all the goodies for the whole family to enjoy.

I'm not sure what turtles have to do with Valentines Day but Derek insisted that turtles be included for this special occasion. It's all above Love. And Derek loves his turtles.

Here's a trayful of some of the cookies we created.

We served the cookies with this "Love Spell" Tea.

The food was really good at Richmond Court, especially the Beef Fried Noodles.

Here we are enjoying a romantic dinner at a local Chinese Restaurant with our kids.

Homemade Lasagna

About a month ago, Derek and his friend made Lasgana as their homework assignment for their Food & Nutrition Class. As part of the assignment, they had to go shopping to pick up all the ingredients and do a dry run at home before actually reproducing the recipe in class. One of the requirements was that they had to complete the dish and clean up within the classroom period of 75 minutes. To cut down on the prep time, they were allowed to use Oven-Ready lasagna noodles. They managed to bake the lasagna at home in well under that time.

Colin, as usual was eager to taste test any food that comes out of our kitchen. He took his first bite and we heard the distinct crunching sound of very crisp pasta being eaten, much like the sound of potato chips being munched on. We waited for his opinion and he proclaimed that it tasted good. Success!!! Well, almost. What the boys learned from their dry run was that the lasagna noodles needed to be fully covered with sauce right to the edges and corners. Otherwise, the noodles around the edges comes out tasting very dry and crispy. Not an unpleasant texture, but definitely not desired in the final product, as it is being marked by the teacher. I must say the 2 boys did an excellent job. They managed to make a very good tasting Lasagna on their first attempt. Best of all, they cleaned up the mess afterwards.

So, tonight Derek decided to cook Lasagna for the family. Derek was the Chef and I was the Sous Chef. This time, we decided to use regular lasagna noodle (the kind that needs to be pre-boiled first instead of the "Oven-Ready" type) just to see if there would be a big difference. Of course, it took extra time, but we felt it was worth it because the texture came out perfectly. What I like about homemade lasagna as opposed to the frozen kind is that we can control what ingredients go into it. I find the frozen version, as with a lot of so called convenience food contains a lot of artificial ingredients and is very high in sodium. On top of that, it takes 80 to 100 minutes to bake it from frozen while it only took us about an hour or so to make it from scratch, even less time, if we were to use "Oven-Ready" lasagna noodle. Good Job, Derek! Looking forward to more family meals from our new Chef.

Derek pours the sauce over a layer of pasta while his friend grates mozarella cheese for the topping.

What a beautiful sight. The boys washing up.

The boys enjoying the fruit of their labour.

Here's Derek making the sauce.

Derek layering the sauce over the pasta.

Here I am lending a hand.

Ta da! 2 trays of Homemade Lasagna fresh from the oven.

Weekend Fun with Friends & Snow

This has been one of the funnest weekend I had this whole winter. It started with having the Nakamotos over for dinner on Saturday. Terry had wanted to expose her 2 girls to some Chinese New Years tradition, other than receiving lucky money, so we had them over for a belated Chinese New Year's dinner. However, our knowledge of cooking a traditional Chinese New Year meal is rather limited. The best that we could come up with was preparing some fresh rolls, filled with glass noodles (silver chain), golden needles (wealth), water chestnut (unity), Shitake Mushroom (longevity, sizing opportunities), and various assorted other ingredients.

After viewing a picture of some of the Chinese New Year's food that Dick's mom had prepared for us last week, Terry was good enough to fill me in on some of the food symbols I was not previously aware of, such as that a head of lettuce (saung choy) means to generate wealth, fresh fruits like tangerines (saung gwoh) means lively & energetic, and that whole fish must be presented in pairs to represent togetherness in being a couple.

Now that she piqued my interest, I searched the internet for more Chinese Food Symbolisms and I came across this link: http://www.nationsonline.org/oneworld/Chinese_Customs/food_symbolism.htm

Dick also prepared one of my all-time favourite dishes, "Haw Loong Woo" (Shrimp with Lobster Sauce). It's a dish he had learned and perfected from his training as a cook at his parents' Chinese Restaurant (Shangri-La Gardens) in Orillia. It's considerd to be more of a Chinese Canadian dish, and it proved to be a big hit with the Nakamotos.

After dinner, the girls had fun playing Karaoke Revolution with Dick. Terry & Ian also joined in the fun later.

The next morning, while making some Pillsbury Crescent rolls for brunch, I decided to have some fun with it. Since we are in the Year of the Ox, I thought of making the pastry into a the shape of an Ox Head. It was quite easy to reshape it and it was fun to do.

Later in the afternoon, we had one of the most beautiful sunny and warm days so far this winter. I had been looking forward to this day ever since the first snowfall. A day when the temperature allowed for the snow to be perfect packing snow to build snow sculptures! So now, the Snow Sculpture Building Contest is on!!! I had challenged Connie over at Beaversatile to this contest and have been waiting very patiently for this very day. Unfortunately, Connie appears to be not feeling too well at this time, so I hope she will have another chance soon to submit her snow sculpture entry. If any of my Facebook friends would like to join in this contest, they are most welcome and we'll take a vote at the end of winter to see who wins.

Winter isn't my favourite season, but this is one of the few things I enjoy most about winter. Let the Contest begin!!!!

A platter full of Fresh Rolls

Annette & Rachel singing "Sweet Home Alabama" & some Britney Spears tunes.

Terry and Ian sang a Frank Sinatra Classic "New York, New York" . They really pumped it up.

The kids having fun with "Mario Cart"

The girls could have played all night, but had to cut it short because it was getting way past their daddy's bedtime.

Raw Ox Head

Ox Head, fresh out of the oven. Yummy and Fun to eat!

Derek made a snow turtle and I made Stewie

Smiley Turtle & Stewie Griffin (Good vs Evil???)

Friendly Turtle. Awwww, so adorable....

Stewie scheming some evil plan to take over the world????

Happy Belated Chinese New Year

It's been awhile since I last blogged. It's a combination of being overworked at the office and not being motivated to spend time blogging. Well, I'm back!

I had a great time over the Chinese New Year weekend. It started on Friday Night when I went out with a bunch of high school girlfriends. Right after work, I rushed over to Susie's house for some quick pizza with her and Susan. Susan then drove us up to Yuk Yuks in Vaughan to meet up with Michelle & Christine to catch the 7:30 PM show. Susan was a bit disappointed with the YukYuk's show because the featured headliner, Ron Josol, a Philipino comedian, was replaced with a different comedian. The replacement was actually quite funny, but overall, we found that the comedians relied way too much on profanity for their acts. Anyways, it was a cheap night out since the discounted tickets for the show only cost $3 a person. Can't think of any live acts cheaper than that. Afterwards, the girls came over to my place to have some tea, dessert and other snacks. Apologies to my family (Dick, Derek & Colin) for enduring the girls'yakfest which lasted way past midnight. In my defence, I did suggest that the boys spend their time at the nearby 24 hour Tim Hortons, if they'd rather not partake in the Girls' Night Out/Girls' Night In party. But they decided it was best to stay in.

On Saturday, we visited my in-laws downtown, where Dick's mom cooked us a traditional Chinese New Years meal. It was nice to see my sister-in-law and her family and spend some real family time together with them, as we don't see each other as often as we'd like. As usual, Dick's Mom cooked a lot of food. The New Year's Feast included Roasted Suckling Pork, Whole Dace Fish (the kind with a lot of teeny tiny bones to represent togetherness and abundance). There was a dish with black moss seaweed which is a homonym for exceeding in wealth (Fat Choy) Kung Hei means wishing you, thus Kung Hei Fat Choy literally means wishing you prosperity. For dessert, she prepared some sweet steamed glutinous rice pudding (bubble soup) with sweet rice balls containing lotus seed paste - signify having many male offspring. (Well, we did get 2 and I think that's plenty).

On Sunday, we visited my parents at the Senior's Home. We were hoping to meet up with my sister and her family there, but due to the flu season, they didn't make it. We did meet up with my brother and her girfriend though, which was nice as I hadn't seen them in quite a while. I made my mom very happy by writing Chinese Greetings and signing all our names in Chinese characters in the CNY card. She was beaming from ear to ear when she opened the card and was very impressed to see that I have not lost my ability to still write some chinese.

On Monday, Chinese New Year's Day, we had an office potluck to round out the festivities. I contributed with a dish called Buddha's Delight. It's a vegetarian dish consisting of rice noodles, nappa cabbage, chinese mushroom, golden needle, wood ear, gingko nut, carrots, green beans and tofu. (that's my version). The long Rice Noodles represents long life. The gingko Nuts respresents gold nuggets. I actually like gingko nuts, because they look so cute and for the texture but my family doesn't. They all think it tastes too bitter. I don't know if it's because there was way too much better tasting food at the potluck, or if my dish consisted of too many foreign ingredients, but there was a lot left over. Oh well, all's not lost, as it just meant that I had enough leftover for another lunch the next day.

Kung Hei Fat Choy!!!! It's the year of the Ox. So, OXOXOXOX to everyone!!!!!



Celebrating at my In-laws

Paying respect to the gods and praying for a Prosperous New Year

Here are some of the foods presented for the New Year

The whole family gathers around for a Traditional Home-cooked New Year's Feast

Here are some of the beautiful red envelopes (lucky money) we received for the occasion.

My mom was so happy that I didn't forget how to write in Chinese.

My version of the Buddha's Delight to celebrate the Year of the Ox.

Why I love the Blogosphere

I love the Internet and I especially love the Blogosphere. The Blogosphere is like a whole new community for me where I can get to share ideas and thoughts with a group of like-minded people, in a fairly anonymous way. Some bloggers choose to remain faceless and some choose to use pseudonyms, but they always have something of interest for me to latch on to, once I have discovered them.

I started out following a few bloggers in the beginning, but that list keeps on growing because I get introduced to new ones through the first ones, or I just stumble upon them while searching on a subject of interest. For instance, I started with a handful of bloggers, such as my friend, over at “Just Maintenance” blogging about his wild adventures in Taiwan, while on a short term assignment teaching English to a group of young school age kids. Then there’s Connie, who is a very talented cartoonist, among other things, blogging about her frantic life as a University student and her secret desire to be a paparazzi? over at Beaversatile, and of course there’s my hubby, recently blogging about his adventures and misadventures? while travelling in China and visiting his ancestral village.

Another favourite blogger is “The Journal of the Girl who loves to cook”. I have been following her blog for the longest. She started out blogging about assorted favourite recipes, usually with an Asian theme, but then progressed to her love of baking and finally to blogging on her fledgling and what appears to be a very successful business of creating pretty awesome and cute looking edible cakes and cookies. Her work is truly AMAZING!!! I highly recommend you check out her Chinese New Years Treat Baskets at: http://cookingismypassion.blogspot.com/

I could go on and on, but I just want to say that in addition to my interest in all things funny, cutesy and arts and crafty, I also enjoy reading up on anything which is “Green-Issue” related, as well as topics relating to “Early Retirement Planning” and “Financial Independence”. Strangely enough, there is a strong relationship between “Early Retirement Planning” and “Green Issues”. Basically, the simpler you live your life, the less impact you have on the environment (Green Issues) and the faster you can reach your goal of “Early Retirement” since the less you spend or consume, the faster you can save up in order to give up your hours spent working on a job you may not necessarily like. “FREEDOM 55”, HERE I COME! I’m still trying for “Freedom 50”, but it doesn’t look like it’s quite achievable yet in this economic climate, unless I can convince my family to pursue an even more simple style of living.

Anyways, I happen to have discovered another blogger which is sure to become a favourite for me. I found his link from a recent “No Impact Man” post which talks about how the Japanese manage to live very happy lives by using only 40% of the greenhouse gas emissions generated by the average American. After checking out this blog: http://www.idratherbe.tv/injapan/, I’m totally convinced that living a SIMPLE LIFE is my GOAL for 2009. Once I have achieved “Financial Independence”, meaning I no longer depend on a weekly paycheck, my next GOAL may be to live out my life in semi-retirement, teaching English in some quaint town/village in Japan.

I leave you to admire some of the utterly enchanting photos I found on this latest favourite Blog depicting “Simple Living in Rural Japan”.

The Holiday Festivities continue....

To recap, my family and I pretty much spent almost everyday between Christmas and New Years attending dinner parties and eating, laughing, eating, laughing and more eating and laughing.

Special mention goes to a fabulous dinner hosted by the Nakamotos. My hats off to Terry who slaved over a hot stove, making a very delicious Chicken and Potatoes dish stewed in Coconut Milk, as well as Garlic Shrimp, and Pan-Seared Scallops. Hmmm... sooooo soooooo goooood. She also made some very fancy appetizers made of crusty bread slices topped with smoked salmon. Hmmmm, another big hit. We contributed with some Rumaki appetizers and chocolate & lemon squares.

Dick and our 2 boys had a great time being in a virtual (All Girl Band) playing Rockband with the Nakamoto girls (Annette & Rachel). Dick had the most fun doing the singing part, as did I. I gave the drums a shot and did pretty good for my first try, but it was hard work. I was all sweaty after performing "Eye of the Tiger". It looks like Rockband is this seasons favourite among the teens and the young adults. Rockband was first introduced to me at the Seto Christmas Party, but I much preferred the Nakamoto Girls' "All Girl Band" version which featured music more to my liking. I wasn't too crazy about the heavy metal music played at the Seto Party.

I was most impressed with how gracious Rachel & Annette were as young hostesses. They certainly kept us entertained while Terry prepared dinner. Annette always had outrageously funny stories to tell us. Rachel was quite concerned that Derek was sitting on the sidelines at the beginning, reluctant to join in with the Rockband fun. She then engaged him in conversation, asking if he would like to visit a neighbour's pet ferret instead. By the end of the evening, the girls somehow persuaded Derek to join in and they had a blast playing the drums part as a 3 person player, each taking turns, one playing the left hand drums, one playing the right drums, and one person stepping on the drum pedals.

After our delicious dinner, Ian insisted that we drop by their neighbours' house a short walk away to go feed a couple of ferrets. The Nakamotos girls were asked to take care of the ferrets while the neighbours were on vacation. So all eight of us bundled up to pay the ferrets a visit. But alas, we didn't get to see them, because it turned out that the ferrets were already having visitors. At first we thought that the neighbours returned from their vacation earlier than expected, but they had asked some other friends of theirs to feed the ferrets as well. Those are certainly some very trusting neighbours as it appears they have given house keys to pretty much everyone on the block to go in and check on their ferrets!

While we were out, we decided to take a short tour of all the Christmas Lights that lit up the neighbourhood. Some of the Christmas Lighting were very impressive indeed. My favourite one was the house decorated with a inflatable Homer Simpson. A Classic!

Later on in the week, we visited my parents at the Seniors Nursing Home, where we briefly met up with my sister Cathy and her daughter. We exchanged gifts and stayed a bit snacking on some chinese buns and some putos (Philipino stlye steamed cupcakes) that the boys and I had made. My mom is not a very big eater and so she made me eat up a big portion of her lunch. It was very good food, considering it came from a nursing home. It was a plate of rice served with very tender chicken pieces and gailan (chinese broccoli). Yummy.

Well, another year has passed and a Brand New Year has arrived. I hope that 2009 will settle down to be a calmer period than the turbulence we experienced in late 2008. My family and I did not feel too much of the negative effects caused by the Global Financial Crisis, but still it was a little unsettling to hear of some of the doom & gloom experienced by some others all over the world.

I was very fortunate to have spent New Year's Eve with some very good friends who are just like family to me. A home-cooked meal featuring Roast Beef (with generous portions of rare beef made especially to suit our carnivorous family), Korean Beef, Stir-fried Shrimp, Roasted Sweet Potatoes, and much much more was lovingly prepared for us, not to mention all the various homemade appetizers like crackers with hummus made from scratch, crackers topped with brie cheese & caramelized, a baked brie cheese wheel covered with a savoury coating and topped with cranberries, and of course a sushi platter... to be followed by assorted dessert dishes and Champagne. After midnight, we chatted some more, while the kids watched a movie. We had such a great time that we didn't realize it was already past 3AM in the morning!!! This is the latest I've stayed up in a long time. Good Friends, Good times. Life really doesn't get much better than this.

I'm pretty sure this will be the last of all the over-indulgence and we will return to our regularly scheduled healthier and lighter meals. I must say, I feel very grateful to have been surrounded by such loving, warm and funny friends and family while ushering in the New Year. Much as I would have loved to post some photos of the occasion, my friends were too darn shy to allow it, so I'll have to keep these happy memories close to my heart sans pictures.

Chocolate & Lemon Squares and some personalized ornaments for the Nakamoto girls

It's a Homer Simpson Christmas

It's Rockband Time