Upcoming Plans 2024

Happy New Year everyone!! 2024 is already here. Honestly, I’m not sure how 2023 went by so fast but I almost always feel that way the last few years. A new year means some new plans and some new goals. While the last two years hasn’t exactly panned out extremely well or even achieved much of the actual goals, I’m hoping that as things seemingly are finding some type of rhythm that I’ll be able to implement blogging (and other things) more regularly into my life. It will probably never be like before but at least work up to gradually hit 2 to 3 posts a week would really be nice.

BOOKS

Goodreads Reading Challenge 2024: 30 books

Considering last year, I did 41 books consisting of some small toddler books and some children novels and did get a couple of full length novels done, I’m going to set a very ambitious goal of 30 books. This time, it consists of finishing the Roald Dahl collection I bought from Costco which has 5 more books, the last book of The Summer I Turned Pretty trilogy as well as the City of Ember books 2 to 4. I am almost done the Fox Volant of the Snowy Mountain and do want to work on some more Chinese Classics that I own to mix things up. Last year’s books I had set out to read didn’t happen at all but hopefully this year will be a little better in that sense. The funny thing is that I did some tidying and ended up misplacing my Kindle for the good part of the year then I never came across it again so hopefully I find it again and I’ll get back to some ebooks again but I already have it set up on my phone as well so its really no excuse at this point.

MOVIES

I touched upon this a little in the year-end wrap-up post HERE. After the most abundant posting phase of this month in October, I’ve concluded that it seems that I’m much more comfortable doing single post reviews nowadays than collecting a double feature. That’s not to say that I won’t do compilation posts especially if I go through a series of films that garner the treatment. Talking about marathons though, I’ve decided that I have to let go of some of the marathons as it just doesn’t seem feasible to do anymore especially for the holidays which is mostly a bunch of films that I don’t really want to watch. With that said, the mildly successful Halloween marathon in 2023 is getting me hopeful that I can actually keep up with the February romance especially since I have A LOT of romance films sitting in my backlog to watch .

With a toddler, its also hard to go to catch new releases and with some financial budgeting last year into this year, my main focus will be on streaming services specifically Netflix, Amazon Prime and Paramount Plus (they had a sweet 50% off annual subscription deal in December). Disney Plus might pop up if they have a deal for Disney Day or whatnot. Who knows, right?

Movies and Tea Podcast remains a heavy focus in the film category but I will start working on those lists posts that I’ve been meaning to do since we started 10 seasons ago (more than a 100 episodes now!). I’ll be reviving the Sunday Lists probably in one format or another. We have some exciting episodes in production right now that will follow the current Hayao Miyazaki season. Follow us on our Movies and Tea blog or whichever podcast platform you enjoy.

TV & Tranquil Dreams Podcast

As some of you have noticed, I’ve actually been more active with writing TV binges this year than movies. To be fair, I’ve been planning the switch to podcast for the Chinese Language dramas for over a year if not two years. While no actual episodes have come out, I’ve actually set up a lot of what I need and all that remains is to find time to record and edit which is where I’m struggling the most to do. With that said, TV binges will continue for everything else but Chinese language dramas but this year, I will launch the podcast, probably by March latest since real life work gets a little hectic in the first two months of the year.

In terms of TV though, I will keep doing the monthly recap of Reality TV & Documentary shows. I really enjoyed adding that segment in and it also helps to talk about some of the variety shows that I love watching and its a big part of what I watch during the year.

MONTHLY SEGMENTS

With the previous lead-up, monthly segments are now in 3 parts.

First weekend of the month is Music Obsessions. Last year, I changed my concept and started doing a deep dive into sharing one Cantopop artist per post. This year, we’re going the same path with a focus each month on a different artist but it will be my other music love, Taiwanese Pop which I think I basically know who to talk about already and opens the door for some artists that I like but want to dig further into their music.

Second weekend of the month is Reality TV Round-Up which is as the title says a round-up of the previous month’s reality and variety TV shows I completed including documentary series. Note the series part and not the documentary films (although I might move onto to do that as well if I feel the new trend if back to making documentary films and they are worth discussing).

Finally, end of the month is the What’s Up post. I’m hesitating on whether to keep the Adventures post since there honestly isn’t enough to keep that going other than my Toddler updates which is something of a personal diary for myself at this point. Let’s say for now that we’re just doing What’s Up and any announcements and updates will be listed there as well. It will open up the opportunity to go back to doing individual posts on whatever hiking or restaurant that I go to if I’d like.

OTHER PROJECTS

Avenue of Daydreams (HIATUS)

I’m honestly not sure if anyone is still on Avenue of Daydreams as I still get some visits every once in a while. While I want to keep that one going, it seems easier to just do it on Instagram at this point. Its something I’m still working on. For not, the hiatus over there will still be in effect. I have to choose how to use my time and right now, I lose my phone 5 times a day in my own house so taking pictures almost seems like an afterthought for most days. Do keep an eye out on Instagram though, I probably will update over there if I end up taking some fun pictures.

Game Warp Podcast

While Game Warp isn’t exactly in hiatus, its definitely been a tad slow. The goal is to get more written game reviews on the blog as I work through my Steam backlog. If you haven’t been over there, we have a lot of podcast backlog as well as written reviews, you can find it HERE.

PERSONAL GOALS

The scary personal goals come up and I’ve been thinking about this a lot since every year I’ve basically been wanting to do the same thing but this year, I want to be able to touch back to the things that once brought me joy and I think still would if I had the time to do it.

1. Workout: I’m trying to work up to being able to do some consistent workout sessions over the week, something doable like 2 to 3 times would probably do me a world of difference. I did it sporadically back in November and early December but somehow its fallen out of schedule.
2. Streaming: The annual goal that I never achieve because I just haven’t found the right timing. Finger crossed that I’m able to do it even if I do shorter sessions in the beginning. It would help with the working through Steam backlog situation.
3. Cooking & Baking: I’m not going to lie that I’ve been living off some pretty basic meal ideas when its just me and my toddler which involves a lot of blanche and air fryer cooking but I remember the days when I’d be excited to try out new recipes and bake sweet and I’ve basically given up most of it except for the random few times during the year.

FINAL NOTE

There you have it, the goals and plans for the upcoming year. There’s a lot of constant change in life and yet, this whole maternity leave and being a stay at home mom (at least partially since I do work at home but less hours than pre-toddler days) has really helped me connect with myself. Blogging is not my main focus right now but I am going to try my best to keep it up as its something that I still enjoy doing. With that said, that’s it for this upcoming plans! I don’t think I’m being too ambitious but only time will tell!

Wishing all of you the best in 2024!

Adventures & What’s Up December 2023 Year-End Wrap-Up

Welcome to the final post of Adventures & What’s Up. Past years I would usually just split the post but with an 18 month toddler running around, I can only find time to do things in very small naptime and bedtime windows so splitting it seems like an ambitious feat. I haven’t done opening paragraphs for these posts in a while but I felt this one deserved a little “warning”. Sit tight, this is going to be a long one as we dive into some little December Adventures, What’s Up and straight into all kinds of year-end wrap-ups!

ADVENTURES

Toddler Update

Triple V reached his 18 month milestone. This milestone was pretty great because he also achieved a lot including the wonderful teething of his first molar which took a while but also brought on some rough nights. Pair that with his 18 month vaccinations and its been quite a wild ride in emotions. We’re definitely seeing him understand more and repeat a few more words so that he can express himself better. His second Christmas was also a quiet one where we changed up our original Christmas plans especially since our snowstorm hit us early in the month and there wasn’t a lot of snow (even as this post goes up). Its been rainy more than anything. Triple V is starting to find his security toys with an attachment to a plush monkey. Other than the general worry of whether he is eating enough since he’s running around all the time, Triple V seems to be doing alright.

Holidays + Boxing Day Haul (not really)

December was pretty crazy overall. Between kitchen renovations and Christmas set-up, its really been hectic and tiring with a little toddler running all over the place and starting to pull tantrums. I can feel those terrible twos approaching every single day. This month has a snowstorm that knocked out power for a little bit and broke a third of our tree, hangout with my friends and tried out a restaurant and then there’s the holidays which I talked a bit about before. The main star was Triple V who got most of the gifts as we gifted ourselves the kitchen renovations and my mom got all of us something. Triple V came out with something to read, play and clothes.

As for Boxing Day Haul (which I honestly forgot about until I reviewed my last year’s post), there wasn’t a whole lot:

• Amazon: Diapers and Lotion
• Steam: The Great Attorney Chronicles, Underground Blossom, Crime O Clock
• Uniqlo: 2 pairs of pants

WHAT’S UP

Books

• Mon Amour Pour Toujour
• Joyeux Noel, mon tout-petit!
• The Kissing Hand
• Where The Wild Things Are

Currently reading: Fox Volant of the Snowy Mountain

I tried so hard to finish Fox Volant of the Snowy Mountain before the new year but I’m about 100 pages away at the second short story included in the novel. The actual story itself is finished though which is pretty fun. As you can see, my reading still consists a lot of reading to my toddler. We picked up a few little books here and there which were fun to read. He’s a big fan of the Caroline Jayne Church illustrations especially for I Love You Through and Through and Ten Tiny Toes which we’ve been reading over and over again and learning body parts, etc.

Movies

• The Great Mouse Detective (rewatch 1986)
• Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (2022)
• Onward (2020)
• Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny (2023)
• The Grand Budapest Hotel (rewatch 2014)
• The French Dispatch (2021)
• Soul (2020)
• Luca (2021)
• Ciao Alberto (short 2021)
• Thor: Love and Thunder (2022)
• Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022)
• Dune (2021)
• Krampus (2015 rewatch, Review)
• How The Grinch Stole Christmas! (1966 rewatch, Review)
• Disney Classic Holiday Stories (2005 rewatch)
• Gremlins (1984 rewatch)
• Spontaneous (2020)
• Sorcerer (1977)
• Bullet Train (2022)
• Aguirre, The Wrath of God (1972)
• Reptile (2023)

Its been a pretty great month of movie watching even if its been a relatively bad month (make that a year) of writing up reviews. I am thinking up a new structure to keep myself more motivated but honestly, motivation has nothing to do with it. I’ll talk more about that in the upcoming plans in the next few days. If I were to put in recommendations for this month, I would honestly recommend everything except Aguirre, the Wrath of God, because its just not my genre of film. I watched it for a Movies and Tea podcast related episode which should be going up very soon. Reptile was decent but was a little predictable as it seemed to give some hints that gave away what they were trying to build up to for the finale reveal, however it reminded me how great of an actor Benicio del Toro is and how I should really be watching more of his films.

With that said, there were some great films here like Bullet Train which was just the ultimate joyride and probably the most fun I’ve had watching a film this year much like Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness and Thor: Love and Thunder which reminded me how this new phase might be an excuse to bring together a bunch of characters and properties but is also a lot of fun, something I haven’t really felt for MCU films for a long time. Then there’s some underrate Pixar films released during the pandemic that I felt was overlooked like Onward and Luca. Finally, we can’t end this year without at least talking a little bit about the new Indiana Jones film, Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny which was a fantastic ride back into Indiana Jones thrills. At the same time, catching up with Spontaneous really puts Brian Duffield on my map as a director to look out for since he is basically 2 for 2 in his directed films (and that’s not even talking about the film he has written that I’m also a fan of).

TV

• Light Chaser Rescue (追光者, 2022)
• My Life With The Walter Boys (Season 1, 2023)
• Here We Meet Again (三分野, 2023)
• Time Flies and You Are Here (雁归西窗月, 2021)
• Sweet Home (Season 2, 2023)

Currently watching: Singing With Legends S5, Asia Super Young, A Date With the Future

I’m currently in a mad dash to finish A Date With the Future before my WeTV sub ends in 2 days or something. I wish the TV series was less soapy so it would be more bingeable but I chose to watch it over something else so the completionist in me wants to see if it can redeem itself. In the currently watching though, I’m really enjoying Asia Super Young since I honestly missed these idol competition shows. Its like a one stop shop to see the potential of the young talent in the industry and see what type of international boy group they put together. Its still the beginning so there’s still a lot of time before any opinions are form. I do say that the break its taken over the last 3 years or so has given time for some talented young men to pop up. As usual, Yuehua’s trainees are wiping the floor and rightfully so but there’s always some dark horse that pops up during the season so I’m interested to see what will happen.

With that said, I finished a few series this month trying to catch up on some series. Light Chaser Rescue and Here We Meet Again (yes, I’m a fan of Janice Wu) was really great. The former is exceptional because its more unique but Here We Meet Again has some great chemistry and comedy. Sweet Home Season 2 also landed and the review will go up soon but while I started out slightly disappointed at the beginning 2 episodes or so, it really does find its footing when the scope of the film turns back to what its so good at building, the world and the people. They already have Season 3 greenlit so it does end on a cliffhanger.

Games

Currently playing: Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney, Geometry Dash, Crime O Clock

I’ve been replaying Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney on the PC remake in the trilogy and almost done the first game as I’m in the middle of the last case. Its always such a joy to play especially since its been a few years since I’ve revisited it. I guess its a month of revisiting games as I dove back into Geometry Dash also to get some fun music. I actually went back because I remembered seeing that there would be a 2.0 update in November but it didn’t seem to happen yet. The game is still a ton of fun and the music is great so I’m honestly pretty happy about finding the reason to jump back in even if I have 500 games in backlog to play instead of replaying games but I guess that’s how life works. On that same point, I also ended up checking out a demo of Crime O Clock which has a great concept as they add a little story and time mechanics to the hidden objects genre in a clever way.

2023 YEAR- END WRAP-UP

There’s no doubt that 2023 was kind of ridiculous. There’s been a lot of changes in many ways. A great portion is a growing toddler demands a whole new routine every few months, if not more frequent, making it hard to really commit to a lot other than sleeping since I guess I’ve only got myself to blame for setting his sleep schedule so that he constantly wakes up early and rarely sleeps in (sleeping in means until 7am instead of 6 or earlier). I honestly didn’t achieve a whole lot of my goals but a lot of the set-up work is all done and just waiting for the perfect timing to get things moving along. As usual, no blog stats this year but still, the normal breakdown of totals.

Total Films Watched: 158 films
– 33 rewatches
– 9 short films

Total Books Read: 41 books (majority children’s books)

Total TV series: 75 seasons binged (13 rewatches)
The breakdown:
– Hong Kong: 2
– Taiwan: 2
– Documentary: 3
– Korean + Korean Reality: 6
– Chinese Variety Shows: 8
– Mainland China: 14
– American Reality (consider English language): 15
– American/English-Language: 25

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Kim (@tranquildreams)

Top 10 Film Discoveries

1. Moonrise Kingdom (2012)
2. Hidden Blade (2023)
3. 10 Things I Hate About You (1999)
4. Perfect Blue (1997)
5. The Witch Part 1: The Subversion (2018)
6. Ride On (2023)
7. The Handmaiden (2016)
8. No One Will Save You (2023)
9. Nine to Five (1980)
10. White Ant (2016)

Top 10 TV Series Discoveries

1. Copycat Killer (2023)
2. Love Like the Galaxy (2022)
3. You Are Desire (2023)
4. Hidden Love (2023)
5. The Last of Us (Season 1, 2023)
6. The Glory (2023)
7. Light Chaser Rescue (2022)
8. The Fall of the House of Usher (2023)
9. Black Knight (Season 1, 2023)
10. National Treasure: Edge of History (Season 1, 2022)

Top 10 Video Game Discoveries

1. Jusant
2. Cocoon
3. Oxenfree II: Lost Signals
4. Far: Lone Sails
5. Coffee Talk Episode 2: Hibiscus & Butterfly
6. Chinatown Detective Agency
7. The Gunk
8. Alt-Frequencies
9. Venba
10. Agent A: A Puzzle in Disguise

While I should’ve put the video game discoveries over on Game Warp, I feel like it fits the general recap here as well so here we are. Overall, this year was pretty clear-cut for everything as there were a lot of really great films and movies but also a lot of pretty average ones which divided itself well. I’ve been gradually cutting a lot of things out so there are certain decreases and changes over the past year that caused a lot of the shifts. It all dials down to lesser time to do everything. I am slowly getting back to delegating time for reading, gaming, films and TV in the last month or so and that makes it feel promising for the coming year!

A quick look before we wrap up 2023 as I always set some goals at the beginning of the year in my Upcoming Plans post (2024’s is right around the corner):

1. Goodreads Reading Challenge: 30 books surpassed at 41 books which had a mix of children’s storybooks and novels as well as one or two normal novels. However, part of my goal wasn’t reached as I had wanted to read through Hercule Poirot novels and did not read even one.
2. Tranquil Dreams Podcast launch: Did not happen! (but…I’m all officially set)
3. Personal Goals: partially achieved as I did start doing more lengthy walks in the summer and recently did a little bit of bodyweight training. Its pretty sporadic so still work in progress. Streaming did not happen but I’m officially set up again to start that off once I can get some evenings without sporadic toddler wake-ups then it will be ready to go.

I missed New Year’s Eve launch for this post so Happy New Year everyone!
Remember to come back for the Upcoming Plans in a day or two! Have fun!

Upcoming Plans 2023!!

Happy New Year everyone!

2023 is here. Honestly 2022 went by way too fast even if its probably the year that I slept the least, got my first hospital operation ( since wisdom teeth extraction is also considered an operation), birthed a little baby boy Triple V and my life milestones are celebrating his developmental milestones. In the midst of that, I managed to cover a couple of film festivals and took a few review opportunities as well.

For a general overview of 2022, you can find it HERE!

As we look forward to 2023, we’re looking at mostly the same but perhaps a little more goal-oriented (or an attempt to be). Maybe it will help with my indecisiveness when there’s just too many choices!

Let’s get right to it!

BOOKS

Goodreads Reading Challenge 2023: 15 books

Setting a rather ambitious goal of 15 books this year but above is all the books I do want to get through this year. I still have a ton of unread books that I physically own but I’m going to start with that. It will also have some children’s books in the mix since I’m reading a lot to the little one. Not that he understands anything as I write this up but hoping to get him used to the sounds and such to hopefully help his development.

Also, I’ve been thinking about reading all the Hercule Poirot books by Agatha Christie so I’m planning on trying to get that kicked off. I’m going to read them in order of release.

MOVIES

Not too many changes to movies this year. Much like previous years you can expect Double Features and single reviews on new releases, mostly those that I am more enthused about. My main source of entertainment remains Netflix and Shudder and sometimes Amazon Prime so I’m working mostly off those avenues. Not too sure whether I will getting on for the bigger festival coverages but I’m going to guess it will be a year or two more before I get back into it (if I’m still doing this by then). Marathons should remain the same with February Romance, October Horror and December Holidays. These suffered quite a bit this year but I’m hoping to shorten the length but get some decent reviews out. Still working on getting some themed months but hopefully this year will be it.

Also, seeing as my co-host for Ultimate Decades Blogathon announced last year his hiatus or possible permanent departure from blogging, this will not be happening.

My main focus has shifted a lot on Movies and Tea Podcast. Its a great time to record and Elwood and I have a lot of fun as we move through more directors and have some pretty good ideas for upcoming seasons.

TV & Tranquil Dreams Podcast

If you were here last year (and amazingly have stayed after my hiatus and slow content), I already talked about this. Only difference is that I actually put a lot of set up work on this in the past 2 months so its almost ready to get going. I just need some small polish to get things ready to relaunch.

For those who weren’t here, TV binge will focus on everything other than Chinese Language Series. I’ve already started doing that in 2022 and even changed a little bit how I approached the TV binges in general. All the Chinese Language Series will be moved to the podcast when it launches. I’m actually working on some series from the past few years that I haven’t had a chance to write about but I really love. Chinese Language Series means anything from Hong Kong, Taiwan and Mainland China. Maybe the random Singapore ones if it catches my eye. The main focus will be on the bigger North American streaming platforms like what is acquired by Netflix but will also look at notable ones from Chinese International streaming apps.

Last year I did also talk about the Sunday Lists being moved to the podcast also. Its still in my plans but I’m going to get it relaunched first before going further with this. I love the segment a ton so I do hope that I get around to working it back into the blog one way or another.

Monthly Segments

Monthly Segments remain the same with Music Obsessions happening the first weekend of the month and Adventures & What’s Up as a month-end wrap-up.

Retiring Photography Segment, Housekeeping and Where It Goes

I mentioned on the Adventures post for December 2022 that I had retired all the photography posts on the blog. With that said, I do still want to get back to photography. I’m mostly using my phone lately but still, it should be fun. I’ve always wanted to do the 365 challenge so I’m going to attempt to do it this year over on Avenue of Daydreams which was constructed for all things creative so photography is moving over there and honestly just continuing since I did weekly photo posts before I took a hiatus.

PERSONAL GOALS

WORK OUT REGULARLY: I’ve given myself a good deal of time to recover from the operation and while taking care and amusing my 6 month old is a lot of exercise, I do want to start doing some actual working out. I’m looking at getting in some yoga, bodyweights and light weights just to see how it goes. It will be a slow progression but I’m rather heavy right now and I’m starting to worry that its not doing any favors for my knees. Plus, we plan to get back to hiking in the summer carrying the little one on our backs so I do want to start training a bit more endurance in preparation for it.

STREAMING: Last year I set this goal and did not do it at all. Its still on my mind to get this launched. I have a lot of games to play on back catalogue and why not try to build something in the process. This will probably happen after I get into a rhythm after the podcast launch.

FINAL NOTE

Last year I talked about slowing down and to be honest, its pretty clear that I’m not picking up blogging any time soon. My baby is taking a lot of my time during the day and in the evenings, between making sure the house isn’t a complete mess and trying to move up my sleeping schedule, its been really hard to focus on writing a lot. I basically write posts for the things that inspire me the most at the moment. Anything that lands in the average doesn’t get prioritized. You can always follow me on Letterboxd to see what I’ve watched and the ratings, if you like. I only use it for my diary to track the movies I’ve watched throughout the year.

To be fair, I’m shifting more towards my co-host projects so while I’ve mentioned Movies and Tea Podcast. I am going to also put more effort into Game Warp to try to get more reviews out and gaming done. It will go hand in hand with the streaming plans.

2023 has some ambitious plans but I’m hoping to get through it!
Wishing you all a fantastic 2023!

Update & Announcement: Welcoming a Baby!

For those who have been reading my actual weekly adventures this year, I have been inadvertently dropping updates about preparing for a baby to arrive since the beginning of this year.

This past week, he has arrived! Boy, do I have a story to tell…. in time (probably the next Weekly Adventures). As I draft this quickly at 5am as we are in the first week with a newborn and the sleep schedule is still all over the place, my priority is not really on the blog. It does feel weird to not be writing but my brain can’t seem to process a ton of good analysis…yet.

Fret not, it is a hiatus and isn’t at the same time. I had a bunch of work in progress in preparation while I was waiting for it to happen. While I didn’t actually create the impressive backlog that I had intended to as a bunch of posts are unfinished, its still on my mind to do it when I have more time to sit in front of the PC.

For now, I don’t want to put myself through too much as unexpected situations arose and I also need some time to recover. I do want to still aim for a relaxing 1 post a week. If that doesn’t happen, the monthly segments will still be happening for sure.

Thanks to my amazing Movies and Tea Podcast co-host Elwood Jones, things over there will be running as usual with new episodes going up. Keep your eyes peeled as we continue through the Quentin Tarantino season. If you haven’t been following us, there’s tons of episodes in our archive from the past seasons and the show is available on most podcast platforms or you can listen to it via the player on the blog HERE.

We also managed to cover the non-E3 2022 gaming showcases and gathered a bunch of our selected highlights in a few separate posts over on Game Warp blog. You can check that out HERE if you don’t follow us yet.

That’s it for now! Things will gradually get back on track in time. I am fairly confident about it. In the meantime, hope you all are going to have a wonderful upcoming summer!

Reminder: Ultimate Decades Blogathon

A quick reminder that the 6th annual Ultimate Decades Blogathon hosted by me and Drew’s Movie Reviews entry deadline is around the corner on February 15th! Remember that this year’s Ultimate Decades Blogathon is not about a specific decade but the year ending in “1”.

If you haven’t sent us your post, you still have a week to do so. You can send it to myself or Drew at kim.tranquildreams@gmail.com and drewt510@gmail.com.

If you haven’t heard of the blogathon but want to join in and want more info, you can find it on the announcement post HERE. If anyone needs more time, let us know in advance and we can work it out.

If you know anyone that would be interested, let them know and see if they can join. Help us spread the word. The more the merrier!

Thanks again for joining and we look forward to your posts!

Announcement: Ultimate 2010s Blogathon! Sign Up Now!!

WELCOME TO THE 5TH ANNUAL ULTIMATE DECADES BLOGATHON HOSTED BY MYSELF AND DREW’S MOVIE REVIEWS!

This year, we’re taking up the hot topic of 2020 and that is of course, looking back at the decade that we just left behind of movies from 2010-2019.

The last decade saw a lot of changes whether its an higher emphasis on diverse cinema and technology advancements giving us more realistic movie experiences to of course, the continuation of Disney taking over the Star Wars franchise as well as Marvel wrapping up its Phase 1 and followed through with a few more phases of building the Marvel Cinematic Universe and of course, DC joining in to that party, albeit fashionably late.

It became a decade of some highly creative movies, a rise in independent cinema, a more accessible appreciation of foreign cinema, the more widely accepted queer cinema as well as a lot of remakes, reboots and sequels of movies that were long-awaited or not so necessary.

Aside from that, cinema saw a shift in its viewing outlet. While theatres still had some outstanding cinema that made a lot of movies accessible, streaming services took a leap forward in creating original content with Netflix taking the lead and with other services following behind with a mix quality of movies.

Overall, a lot of breakthroughs, a lot of highs and with that, a lot of lows as well. Making it a decade well worth looking at, wouldn’t you say? Suffice to say, there are a ton of choices available for everyone to choose from. What 2010s film is one that you can watch over and over again? Which made an impression on you? Which ones remain memorable?

The details of the blogathon:

• Any movie released from 2010 to 2019 is a valid choice.
• You can choose to do more than one review (just give us a heads up in advance)
• We are posting up the reviews on our blogs so it has to be submitted to us (notify us if you want to post on your blog also and we will work out the release date)
• Submission Deadline: Entries sent in to us by February 9th (if you need more time, don’t be afraid to email us)
• Blogathon kicks off on February 17th!
• Email me at kim.tranquildreams@gmail.com and/or Drew at drewt510@gmail.com to notify us of your participation and your selection(s). (We’d like to keep your choice a surprise.)
• You can tag us and help us promote using #Ultimate2010s via Twitter.

Welcome all to join in! We’re looking forward to your choice and submissions. Feel free to use the banner above to show off on your sites. Also, if you know anyone that you think would be interested in joining into the blogathon, please do spread the word. The more the merrier!

2020 Upcoming Plans!

2020 is already among us!

For new readers, welcome to Tranquil Dreams. I’m a blog that doesn’t quite follow the successful route of blogging (meaning to focus on one topic), instead I’m a fan of doing what I like and just using this as an outlet of doing the things I love. They primarily make up 4 categories: Movies, TV, Books and Food. There are weekly and monthly segments and a whole bunch of random spontaneous things going on. Now that the introduction is done for anyone new here!

Let’s check out plans for 2020! Note that a few little changes but not too many. I’ve indicated where the main changes are. 🙂

READING

2020 Goodreads Reading Challenge: 25 books

Last year, I set a bunch of books that I wanted to read and then didn’t get around to reading 90% of them, I’d say. Its probably because I forgot about it at one point being busy with everything else. This year, I already have about 5 books set for the first 3 months which is a great start as it all goes towards blog tours and such. I’m not going to say which one and will leave it as a surprise. The goal is to participate in blog tours and then work through a ton of TBR books on my bookshelves and Kindle. I won’t change the 25 books this year and if I exceed, then so be it. In general, its been a struggle to find reading time especially in the second half of the year.

MOVIES

Movies are staying relatively the same. I’m hoping that I will still be able to get the media accreditation for film festivals like in 2019 as that is always a lot of fun and brings in some really nice film discoveries. It might not be everyone’s cup of tea but it always brings in a nice refreshing change to the normal fare on Netflix.  Fingers crossed on that, right? 😉

As for movies, we will be keeping the double feature usually around 1-2 per week, depending on time. Full single reviews are for theatre viewings and festival screenings. The normal themed months still apply:

• February: Valentine’s Romance
• October: Halloween Horror
• December: Holiday Films

This year, I’m thinking of doing some themed months randomly so that I can catch up on various genre of films. Its still in the air whether I’ll do it as A-Z or simply as random screenings.

As for any other things, I’ve neglected my Sunday Lists in general and will hopefully be aiming to get one a month. I’ll set a Sunday per month for that.

TV

TV has really turned into a Chinese drama series deal since middle of 2018 and that will continue this year. I’m hoping to get a few of the TV binges that I didn’t do last year done this year as I didn’t do any for my Top 5 shows last year and that seems sad as they were all very accessible on Youtube and/or Netflix.

Aside from that, Netflix series are the other focus and perhaps Shudder depending how long I keep the subscription. A short little no change section at all: TV binge for Chinese dramas will keep the normal format I have and may actually use a part of that format for any other series I watch as well.

OTHER RANDOMNESS

After getting through the top 3 categories of focus here, its time to take a look at the random other segments at weekly or monthly frequency.

• [change] Wine Recap will wrap up with its final one with December 2019 and it will be over. I’m no wine connoisseur and the whole 2 year experiment of doing it has really helped me appreciate wine better but its becoming more of a chore to write it up. I’ll share some of it on Instagram instead so feel free to follow me over HERE.
• My Adventures: I’ve already changed it to a monthly segment in the middle of 2019 and it will remain that way. I’m finally happy with the structure so we’re keeping this as the fun and more personal post.
• What’s Up 2020: will remain a weekly segment set on every Wednesday to recap the previous week.
• [change] Baking Through Disney: has been a neglected segment over here that I’ve tucked away but never forgot about. As I aim to get back into baking, its the project that will hopefully be revived on a monthly basis. One baking day a month seems fairly reasonable.
• [change] Goodfood recaps: have been no more since the middle of 2019. It was due to a few bad experiences that Goodfood has finally fixed on their end. I didn’t talk about it at the time and won’t go deeper into it. As I’m not paid to do this and I have to pay for the experience, its becoming a convenience choice for our life so its become less frequent as well. I’ll share some of the meals on Instagram whenever we do order.
• Battle of Ingredients: has changed its structure since its beginning. We’ve been talking about how to get things back on track to fit its name but we are also enjoying taking the time to highlight some recipe trials as well as using local Quebec products in our cooking. This one is really supposed to be monthly but we have random hiatus due to our busy schedules.
• Ultimate Decades Blogathon is coming back in 2020. We are currently in production phase of getting things together. If you are interested, remember to check back here. We should be announcing it soon.
• Music Obsessions: almost got cut but this segment was saved by a recent comment. I enjoy the segment but its the one that does the least well out of everything here BUT at least its a fairly fun and easy post to put together. So its staying without any change, on a monthly basis on the first weekend of the month.

I know we cover a ton of stuff here including Restaurant recaps and other event coverage including shopping hauls and such. It shouldn’t change much on that front. I’m hoping to get some more DIY going on and other things, if possible. However, time is scarce so I’ll do what I can.

I think that generally covers everything for 2020 plans!
Its not a ton of changes but I will work on being more organized this year!
Happy 2020 and all the best to all of you lovely people!

Announcement: Halloween Marathon 2018 Officially Begins!

The 2018 Halloween Marathon is upon us. It definitely came by quickly enough.

Halloween Marathon has been always an exciting month in the year over here. This year’s horror movies have been quite limited so its going to be an adventure to work on getting rid of some of the movies in My List on Netflix as well as some movies on our shelves that we’ve bought but never seen. We are in the phase of decluttering and trading in our films is one of the phases we are working on. I do have a lot of horror movies to catch up on and with the Netflix October movie releases and other bits here and there with books and hopefully some cooking as well, its going to be a ton of stuff happening and with a decent variety if things go as planned.

Reviews currently being scheduled and writing in progress:

• The Babysitter (2017)
• Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (2017)
• Shadowhunters: The Mortal Instruments (Season 1 & 2)

Some of my top picks:

MOVIES

• Annihilation
• The Babadook (because it seems like I’m the only person in the universe that hasn’t seen it yet)
• Bone Tomahawk
• Green Room
• Gantz: 0
• The Visit
• What We Do in the Shadows
• Sharknado: The 4th Awakens
• Sharknado 5: Global Swarming

TV SERIES (These picks are priority because I want to wrap up the show as they are already done)

• Scream Queens (Season 2)
• Hemlock Grove (Season 3)
• Ash vs Evil Dead (Season 2)

The Maybe List (if I’m in a mood and none of the top picks fit my liking or I want to watch a dumb horror):

• The Forest
• It Comes at Night
• Anaconda
• Mother!
• Mama
• The Open House
• Winchester

Obviously, the list above is all subject to change and its on what I decide to pick. However, I’m open to any suggestions! If there’s any movie that you want me to review on this list, just leave it in the comments or tweet or email or whatnot and I’ll make sure to bump up the priority. 

Also, as I mentioned before, books will be included in there. I’ve currently started one already so we will be having 2 or 3 hopefully pop up over the month.

On top of the normal programming from movies definitely making it in and others in consideration above, Elwood and I are kicking off Movies & Tea Podcast’s season 2 with our look at Guillermo Del Toro’s directorial effort. With that said, there is a lot of horror movies coming out from there. I’d say that we might get through a movie or two in October if things go as it did in the first season of the show.

Before I wrap this announcements and start the Halloween Marathon out of the gates here, I do want to say that I have a last minute decision of attending the Festival du Nouveau Cinema in Montreal so I’ll be covering up to 10 films there. However, none of those films will be horror, or at least from what I think. So, there will be other things going on here. If the marathon takes a little slide in the background, the second half of October will be in full force. You just need to be patient with me as I work through real life, festival coverage and Halloween marathon.

That’s it for this morning’s announcement! 
We officially start tomorrow morning with a movie review! 🙂

Are you doing anything special for Halloween on or off the blog? Leave a comment and a link to your blog so others can go check it out!

Calling Out for Guillermo Del Toro Fans!

Hey everyone!

A little announcement and invite to everyone today!

Movies and Tea Podcast is about to head into our second season. After a great first season focused on Paul W.S. Anderson and a 3 episode After Hours session (and even had a little break to catch up on all the written material), we are ready to move onto the next director. If you are unfamiliar with Movies and Tea. Its a movie podcast hosted by myself and Elwood Jones where we choose one director every season to look at their directorial work. It acts at both a re-evaluation of their works as well as filling in those empty spots of films that we haven’t seen from director’s that intrigue us.

If you want to check out the episodes from Season 1, you can head over to the blog linked above or to Podomatic, iTunes, Spotify…we’re in a lot of places.

This season, we are talking about Guillermo Del Toro’s films. The change from last season, we want to open up invites to see who would be interested in joining us on some of the episodes and specifically which film you want to talk about. Suffice to say that Guillermo Del Toro is definitely more loved than our first season but his work and progression of style and film material has its diversity. For myself, I haven’t seen any of his earlier works so its going to be a journey to discover how his debut material is.

The list of films we are looking at this season are in the banner above:

• Cronos
• Mimic
• Devil’s Backbone
• Blade 2 & Hellboy
• Pan’s Labyrinth
• Pacific Rim
• Crimson Peak
• The Shape of Water

That is really all I have to say. To keep things a little more secretive, you can drop me an email if you are interested and which film you would like to talk about and/or leave me a comment to tell me that you sent me an email at kim.tranquildreams@gmail.com so that I know to keep an eye out for it. In the email, you can leave me the film you want to talk about, and recording availability. If you don’t know yet, we can work it out and see if our time zones can all jive.

We were super happy with how the first season went so incredibly excited to talk about Guillermo Del Toro’s works.
We’re looking forward to sharing this podcast experience with all of you!
One last thing: If you know anyone that is interested, please pass on the message!

My Weekly Adventures: A Little Bit of Everything…

Welcome to the next Adventures post!

First of all, if you do drop by here frequently, I’m sorry for the sparseness of the posts, I’ll have a general explanation of what went down and kind of took over my life. I feel like I’ve said that a lot in 2018. While there were a lot of things that have been fairly cool in 2018, overall on a personal sense, 8 months in and I’m sure my husband and I are quite over it and ready for something incredibly great to balance things out. Anyways, we gotta stay positive to hopefully attract some more positive things..at least thats the concept in my mind.

Let’s see how the second half of August went!

The next Battle of Ingredients

We skipped a month of Battle of Ingredients in July because well, its busy in July for myself. However, we got things set for mid-August and had it all ready to go for our Take 2 of BBQ. This time, we each made some nice twists and there were a lot of success. Some recipes are ideas for other cooking methods in later challenges for non-BBQ and others, we learned from its not so perfect execution. Overall, it was a fun little time together to hang out and catch up and explore some new recipes. Its hard to imagine we just did the 9th Battle of Ingredients and the next is the 10th!

You can check out the full post HERE.

Lachine Half Marathon – Spectator

No pictures for this event. I’ve grown so accustom to doing half marathon support for my friend that I just kind of chill out a lot. It was a super hot day and I got a mini sunburn. Honestly, my bad for choosing to sit on a bench under the blazing sun catching up on reading. It was a super nice and honestly, I kind of miss it because the weather’s slightly cooled down and after that race and going home for a pool session, our pool motor is dying but as its the end of the season, we are only replacing everything next year and closing the pool early for the year. However, in terms of the Lachine Marathon, it was a tough one because the heat came in fairly quick. My friend did finish it within the time he wanted but so close. This season has been a tough one for him. A few more races to go for the season and with the heat ramping down a little, I’m hoping that its gets a positive turn for him. However if you haven’t been to the Lachine Half, its set in a pretty cool pier/park area with some stuff set up to look at and nice little sitting areas and all that fun stuff.

The 15 Hour ER Adventure

Life takes us for some crazy time. Don’t freak out! I didn’t go to the ER personally however, my husband did have some pain that he was enduring and we had chalked up to maybe indigestion or stomach flu until he had pains on his side which because just very unbearable by the time we hit the end of the work week. For those who don’t know about Canada’s free healthcare, it just means that there is an incredible wait time more so because in Quebec, medical professionals and the whole system is fairly messed up so we ended up doing a 12 hour wait time in the ER then got sent to the room to wait for the doctor another hour before he saw him, took tests and proceeded to round out another 2 hours or more waiting for test analysis, results and diagnosis. It turns out it was something of the beginning of a stomach ulcer and its time for meds to stop it before it gets more serious and well, the pain still showed up every once in a while so further test is in the horizon at the moment. Quite the stressful time and honestly, after my 5:30am arrival to home after the ER adventure and staying awake to make sure the husband was okay and being over 30, the all nighter and sleeping 2.5 hours just kind of murdered my entire week that followed and with it, any energy or motivation to process thoughts on movies and reviews. I spent most of the time after work sitting in my chair just resting and relaxing this week.

Either way, with that little scare…we are officially enforcing…

A Transition to Change in Eating Habits and having more Balanced Meals

Not sure why that’s a section in itself! But I’m totally grasping for straws for something to talk about. Anyways, I’ve been getting back to working out as you can see. As I’m typing this up, we just literally finished binging Ultimate Beastmaster Season 3 and boy, am I excited to talk about it in the next TV Binge! Yes, its moved forward in priority because I’m so hyped by it. However, that is good because Ultimate Beastmaster usually gets us super motivated to train again. We are already working on the eating healthier thing and for that reason, I’m decreasing Goodfood boxes to help get into a groove of making food from scratch on our own and not always relying on boxes because the reality is that the boxes were meant to help support the crazy weeks and not so that we could get lazy and that is what we’ve been doing a lot, which results to some bad eating habits whenever we don’t get boxes. Either way, transition going on already and I’m probably not going to share that except perhaps on Instagram or if I try out any cool new recipes.

We did make this recipe today as a little throwback: Basil Avocado Bacon Pasta. The post is HERE. We found this recipe 5 years ago and we still make it a few times a year. Its actually the first time we made it this year so like I said, we’re off our game a little.

If you have any healthy and tasty recipes, do share it in the comments below. We’re always down for suggestions!

New Dairy-Free Food Discovery

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Kim (@tranquildreams)

Upcoming:

• TV Binges
• Book Reviews & Blog Tour
• Restaurant Review/Recap

Kitty Cute Pic

If you are following me on Avenue of Daydreams, you already saw this pic!
A silly kitty cat moment as she pulls down our towels that was hanging to dry on the railing to the ground to improvise a bed.

Thats it for this Weekly Adventures!
Its a little short but its just what happens when life gets taken over by more serious things!
On a side note, I am more avid on Instagram when I’m not posting or adding random posts on Facebook, so be sure to follow me there.

What adventures have you been up to?