Because we are still at the point of decorating our condo our weekends mostly exists of shopping. Plus Christmas is coming, so now it also includes Christmas shopping. The already started to install the Christmas lights on our building and the streets, so our condo needs to be christmassy to.

On Wednesday we went to Absolute Comedy together with Martin and Sabrina. It was Pro-Am night, so there was stand-up comedy from both professionals as amateurs and it was really fun, some comedians more than others but it was a great night. We also ordered a so-called “Stein” which its 1 liter of beer and you can keep the “Stein” where the beer is in. And it is just so cool that tis was only a five-minute walk from our condo.

On Thursday I went together with Martin to the Canadian Tire Christmas Showroom which is not far from our place to look at all the Christmas stuff. You did not hear me say that our Christmas tree is not beautiful, but as we are in Canada now we to “canadianize” it. And this showroom is just the place to do that. So much Christmas stuff in all different colors. I could not decide what to buy so I will go back here together with Sander to buy some more stuff.

On Friday I decided I wanted to try and bake some chewy chocolate chip cookies. But when you wanna do that, you need chocolate chip and I did not have those. So after I went for a run in the morning I decided to walk to my favourite shop in Canada so far, which is the Bulk Barn. They sell everything you need to bake, so you can call it baking heaven. I used a recipe from marthastewart.com and it was really fun baking them and according to Sander they tasted good to. So I think I am going to bake some more of these cookies in the future. As Sander arrived home after work he picked me up at our condo and we drove tighter to the Canadian Tire Christmas Showroom and we bought stuff to “canadianize” our tree. As most of you know our tree is now filled with white and glass ornaments, we now decided to add the color red to the tree, so we bought “some” new stuff int his great store.

finally it was weekend and we continued the Christmas Shopping and we drove to the Yorkdale Mall to buy some more ornaments at Pottery Barn and Crate & Barrel. We also we going to create something at the wall which leads to our bedroom and therefore we needed some shelves and picture frames. On Saturday evening we made it a lazy evening with movies and relaxing on our sofa.

On Sunday we went shopping again, but I already told Sander this week that I wanted to go somewhere we were not before and maybe also not only furniture shopping, so Sander found a shopping mall a bit further away in Burlington, the Mapleview Mall. The only condition was that I would drive there. So we left our condo and I drove to Burlington, which is like 45-50 minutes. We got something to eat there and did some relax-shopping at Victoria’s Secret, Roots and some other shops. After a couple of hours we drove back to Toronto and also stopped at Staples, the Beer Store and  Bulk Barn. Also this evening we could make our “Wall of Memories” ready because we found a place nearby to print the photos we wanted in the frames.

A new week had begun on Monday and this was the day our dining chairs we ordered a Crate & Barrel arrived. So finally we have some decent chairs to sit on at our dining table and when we have guests over at our place they do not have to bring their own chairs. While I was waiting for the chairs being delivered I had the idea to bake so-called “kruidnoten”. In the Netherlands now is the time Sinterklaas and with go the kruidnoten. I found a recipe online and they were not that bad, but I don’t think I am going to bake them again. I liked the chocolate chip cookies more…

Tuesday, my last day off 😉 Tomorrow I will start an English course across the street at Hansa Language Centre. So today I enjoyed the last day of really good weather (16 degrees and a lot of sun) by going for a run and in the afternoon I baked pizza. I needed to go in bed on time, because school starts at 09:00 am. I am joining the English Intensive Program, 4 hours a day for 16 weeks following grammar, reading, speaking and vocabulary classes. ope it is going to improve my English skills.