It's finally here!

It's my favourite time of year again - December!!! I love this time because I get to spend Christmas with my family!    As always, everyone is extremely busy during the few weeks leading up to Christmas - I have my final exam of the semester soon, and I need to organize and pack everything at the same time since I'm leaving for Dubai the day after (which, of course, means that I can't concentrate on my studies properly since I'm so excited and always thinking about my upcoming holiday!).

I will soon post a picture of my traveling outfit and my new carry-on bag that I bought recently;  I decided to buy a roll-away one since I'm tired of carrying a heavy purse through the airports every year... this will be much better for my back, I'm sure! 

Finally, this post wouldn't be complete without me mentioning FOOD in one way or another!  Recently I brought home some dinner from the italian restaurant "Mercatto" for my sister and I ... we shared their Zucca pizza, goats cheese and mushroom ravioli, and papardelle bolognese and we made some homemade salad on the side.  Everything was so delicious, especially the pizza which had butternut squash, spinach, fontina cheese, and walnuts so I had to recreate it a couple of days later (and it turned out pretty well)!

P.S. Sorry for the blurry picture, it was taken on my phone

I'm dreaming of a warm Christmas...

I'm back(!!) and hopefully getting back into regular posting again... as I've mentioned before, I travelled to Dubai for Christmas and I miss it so much already!  I have so many pictures and stories to share, so I'll start off with our Christmas celebrations:  

Christmas Eve:

Hot Chocolate on the balcony :)

Christmas Day:

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!!

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas, and enjoyed their New Year's celebrations!!  I hope 2012 will be a good year for everybody!  As you may have noticed, I have not had the chance to update the blog since I've been away on holiday... but once I'm back, I'll start posting regularly again in around a week. :)  Meanwhile, I'll leave you with a few select pictures from our trip and I'll be sharing lots more soon!

Christmas Fruit Cake

We had sampled some traditional fruit cake at the christmas market last week, and it was so delicious that we decided to buy some for my parents for Christmas!  These are some pics of the packaged cake...

Balzac's Café - Distillery District

These are a few extra shots I took while having some yummy hot chocolate at Balzac's Café, during our visit to the Christmas Market!

Toronto Christmas Market

Today, we spent the afternoon at Lowe's Christmas Market at the Distillery District in Toronto!  It's basically a street market with stalls selling traditional european products (local and handcrafted) as well as specialty beer, bakery treats, and a variety of food (including traditional oktoberfest sausages, hot chocolate, pretzels, baked goods, french canadian poutine, etc).  There was also a big Christmas tree set up next to a stage with carollers singing every hour.

At first, we strolled through the market and looked around (it wasn't as big as I hoped it would be, so in that respect, I was a little disappointed), then listened to a few songs the carollers were singing.  We were verry hungry as it was lunch time, and couldn't find a proper restaurant (which served something other than paninis, pasta or grills which seemed to be all there was there), so we ended up getting some Poutine from one of the stalls; it was sooo good!  After that, we visited one of the stalls selling european baked goods, where we sampled some fruit cake :)  At the end of our visit, we stopped by the Balzac café and drank some yummy hot chocolate!

As promised, here are the photos of the traditional european style market and decorations around the distillery district.  Also, you can check out a few videos of the christmas market here, which I will be uploading on my youtube page.

The Christmas Market is open from Dec 2nd - Dec 18... for more info about the market and the Toronto Distillery District: http://www.torontochristmasmarket.com/  and http://www.thedistillerydistrict.com/

More pics to come of Balzac's Café and the Christmas Cake we bought :)

Mobile uploads - Christmas in Eaton Centre

Took a few pics of the christmas decoration at Eaton Centre ... there was a lot but only managed to take a few photos since I didn't have any space on my phone!

My favourite! Swarovski crystal tree :)

I'll be home for Christmas....

I love Christmas!! It's my favourite time of the year, and so the Christmas decorations are already up!  Although we don't have a tree because we'll be flying home to be with our family in December, we still have a few festive decorations and lights up.. hope you like them :)