My December Adventures!

Its the last day of December. Isn’t that crazy? I’m doing this on the last day instead of tomorrow since we have 2020 business to take care of then so shifting things up a little. We’re going through the very busy December and all kinds of recap and seemingly a bunch of shopping and gifts and fairs and outings, etc.

Fingers crossed that all will go as planned as writing in December has been a bit all over the place… (it hasn’t because this is going up much later than expected)

CRHS Annual Craft Fair (December 1)

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The @officialcrhs annual #craftfair was today! There were a lot of stalls showcasing all kinds of unique things. In the end, this was my #shoppinghaul . #Teas from #NamasteKitTea ; #Snowflake #Ornament by kids (can't remember the store name..Little Fairies something); #Anthurium from #CactusofHope #cactusdelespoir (for a charitable cause); #Crochet #Wand as a gift from #2SistersCrochetandKnitting

A post shared by Kim (@tranquildreams) on Dec 1, 2019 at 12:55pm PST

DIY Christmas

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Its December already! And it means channelling the #crafty #diy side of me! I've made a few #wreaths but couldn't resist making a #branchwreath for the first time. Here's how it turned out! #plushie #snowman #cupcakes #sparkly #glitter #gingerbreadhouse #gingerbreadman #pinecones #berries #Diywreath #christmas #christmasdecor #decorations #xmas #holly #winterberries

A post shared by Kim (@tranquildreams) on Dec 2, 2019 at 7:00pm PST

You can see the post on it HERE.

Next up, I went along and tried out some Marbled Ornaments as well! Which was mostly a failed attempt in general but did decide that its a project to further pursue and figure out. Plus, its some nice way to use up old nail polish so that its not just thrown out without some form of recycling/repurposing. You can check my post on that HERE.

Marché Casse-Noisette & Mini-Comiccon

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Went to check out the #MarcheCasseNoisette and #MiniComiccon today both at @palais_montreal #palaisdescongresdemontreal ! Here's some fun little items I picked up (and a gift) – #catcollar gift from @surprisesdephoebe for my cat at @zoelulupetboutique – #scarf at @leoncemtl (for the husband) – #maplesyrup aged with #TennesseeWhisky from @virgin.mady Then some free #posters from Mini Comiccon for upcoming #films, #TheGrudge and #FantasyIsland as well as a little card for #selfpublished #comic by @erik_teren_mullins . #mtl #events #shopping #shoppinghaul #buyinglocal #quebecproducts #quebec

A post shared by Kim (@tranquildreams) on Dec 7, 2019 at 1:28pm PST

Marche Casse -Noisette took place from November 28 to December 8 at Palais des Congres which happened to overlap with Mini Montreal Comiccon held December 7 and 8 also at Palais des Congres just one was in the main hall and the other was upstairs. With that said, it made sense to go and check out both at the same time. While the haul wasn’t particularly a lot, it was a first time visit for both place for myself. Some nice discoveries to be found. I will definitely go check the Marché Casse-Noisette again but probably not the Mini Comiccon as its rather lackluster.

Salon des Metiers d’Art 2019

• Coach House Shortbread Company: Dark Chocolate & Salt; Almond & Rose; Ginger
• La Nougaterie: Salt Flower Caramel; Dark Chocolate; Christmas
• Nutra Fruit: Chocolate Covered Cranberry; Dark Chocolate- Cranberry Spread
• Cidrerie du Minot: Des Glaces
•  Choco Chocolat: Dark Chocolate; Dark Hazelnut

A lot of the SMAQ 2019 sales is about the same as previous years, the exception being that I bought the spread from Nutra Fruit and the chocolate from Choco Chocolat, which I believe is a new booth this year at the Salon. Most of this stuff is for festival party time and gifts and whatnot.

Ottawa Day Trip

We took a quick trip with a friend to go to Ottawa to do some quick errands. We had a nice lunch at Fatboys (post about our first time HERE) and then finally found time to go grab some donuts at Mavericks Donut, which they had 4 dairy-free flavors and the husband and the friend each chose 4 to get a dozen. After that, I finally brought home Pumbaa from Disney Store to join Timon at our place and then picks up some wine at LCBO and some food in preparation for NYE dinner plans at T&T Supermarket.

Holiday Festivities: Christmas Dinners & NYE Hotpot

Christmas Eve dinner was a ton of fun with a lot of people at the in-laws. It was a fun little event with some surprise gifts for ourselves which we didn’t expect to get anything in the first place. My mom wanted to have a turkey feast (as shown above) so she held a dinner and invited us and some of her own friends for dinner and here we have the overzealous food galore. Everything was delicious as usual. NYE is a hotpot meal and part of the Battle of Ingredients festivities so a separate post will be done for that.

Boxing Day Shopping Haul

Boxing Day this year has been a little less exciting. It has to do a lot with the fact that we’ve been trying to decrease expenses and its truly changed the spending habits into being very cautious with our expenses. Its not going to seem it since we’ve done a lot of shopping this past month…seemingly..but then its all useful things or food. Either way, without further ado (as this is the last part before this post ends)..the shopping haul from Boxing Day.

• Adidas outlet: Running Shoes
• Dynamite: Sweater and 3-pack scrunchies
• Steam Sale: Life is Strange 2: Complete Edition, Detention, Gris, The Infectious Madness of Doctor Dekker, Glass Masquerade
• Playstation Holiday Sale: Overcooked 2, Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey
• Amazon: Playstation 4 Controller Charging Dock
• Walmart: John Wick 2

Cute Kitty Pic

That’s it for this December Adventures!
How was your holidays? Had a lot of fun with family? Did you do some Boxing Day shopping?

Boxing Day Haul 2018!

Lets start off right away that we are trying hard to keep our spending in check so this might not be the most exciting segment. This year’s boxing day sales started earlier than boxing day which is a tad odd but then at the same time, the deals weren’t exactly spectacular either so a lot of these were made after some thought. I have a certain measure for say games and movies as to what price tag I am willing to pay and how worth it it is to pick up.

With that said, boxing day is kind of a pre-boxing day and boxing day haul to pad things out a little. 😉

Pre-boxing day sale

Playstation store

• Fe
• Unravel 2

Fanatical

• Sonic Mania

Adidas (50% off deal)

All my gaming stuff was bought pre-boxing day sale mostly because Playstation and Fanatical both have these weeks and deal days set before the holidays and I ended up landing on these three games. All of them are games that I’ve wanted to play and it is in a price range that I’m pretty happy with.

Other than that, I got a new bookshelf from IKEA, the LAVIA for $24.99CAD. I’ve been trying to reorganize my books since right now they are running out of space and all over the place. I can’t say my new system is any more organized but I kind of like how it looks. It rounds out the look of my den. I’ll talk about that more once its less than a mess as the book organizing is still in progress as this goes live.

Boxing Day

Amazon

• Always and Forever, Lara Jean (ebook)
• Instant Pot 6qt 9 in 1 (waiting for shipment)

I’m not sure if Always and Forever, Lara Jean was a huge discount but I’ve been looking forward to reading the third book in To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before series, especially since the Netflix sequel got confirmed, I’m even more excited to finish up these books.

Walmart

• Kong: Skull Island

Best Buy

• Pitch Perfect 3

I wasn’t planning on buying any movies but these two had pretty good deals, especially for Blu-Ray. Plus, I really liked Kong Skull Island so looking forward to watching that again, while I haven’t seen Pitch Perfect 3 but I have the other 2 so why not, right?

Michaels

• 4 Frames (Buy 1 Get 1 Free Deal)

I always look out for this deal at Michael’s, especially this year since we wanted to get all the artwork framed that we had bought earlier this year. I’ll do an update or something once we get that all figured out.

Finally, we wrapped up Boxing Day at IKEA which was surprisingly not so busy. At least in the evening when I went. I ended up picking up a lamp since the one in our den was broken a few months ago. Its a little dimmer than the other one we had but it still does the job. I mean, this was $10 so what more could I ask for, right?

That’s it for this pre- Boxing Day and Boxing Day haul.
Its turned out to be a good few things to recap but still, it didn’t break the piggy bank too much so I’m fairly happy with how it went.
I still maintain that this year’s deals both Boxing Day and Black Friday weren’t particularly impressive but maybe its because I’ve become pickier on pricing and what I buy, which isn’t a bad thing.

Boxing Day Haul 2017!

Boxing Week is probably the correct term to use nowadays. However for myself, Boxing Day is really the day we do most of the purchases and get it behind us so that we can recuperate from expenses and zero back in to the coming New Year. This year,I do have to say that I had already had some pretty solid idea of what I wanted to get for Boxing Day so its more home and useful stuff, except for some gaming stuff and impulse movie buys that I thought was decently priced.

To be fair, the deals (for things I would get) was not really that great. I think its because Black Friday had pretty great discounts this year. However, we did end up hitting 7 stores (not all yielded purchases) within 4 hours and found some really fantastic deals.

Let’s take you shopping with me in this recap!

Walmart

Not a great way to start but the Boxing Day always starts at Walmart because my friend is into getting movies but the movies he was looking for wasn’t discounted. For myself, I wasn’t intending on picking up movies but then I saw Alien Covenant on sale and it would complete our Alien franchise at home. I do have a Alien franchise list post coming up so its nice to have it to revisit if I need. See how it holds up in repeat viewing. Second one was The Legend of Tarzan which funnily enough, I had taken out of my Amazon cart the night before but decided to pick it up again here. Record time to get in and out of Walmart for us: 10 minutes.

Best Buy

The main goal of my Boxing Day was at Best Buy because of the external hard drive. We desperately need to extended storage for the Playstation 4 because with my husband and his AAA games in progress, it takes up a chunk of the system leaving me with very  little space to add games in to play on the side. With 5TB, its going to be great on all fronts. This drive was $150 which was pretty decent. If you are looking for an external like myself, the max is at 8TB which also happens to be on sale and actually averages to be a slightly better per TB rate however, I didn’t want to drop the extra money due to other needs. Second was NieR: Automata which is a game I’ve wanted play since we checked out the demo in early 2017. Its $30 now.

Adidas Outlet Store

I’m determined to get back to running next summer and that required a new pair of running shoes. The current pair I had has already been used for light hiking and a lot of walking around during the past year. I probably still have a few miles on it but I wanted a new pair for backup in case there wasn’t another sale. I ended up with these that could double for work if I wanted something comfortable and casual but matched with office attire when needed. Plus, they were 50% off so it came to $35 for the pair. My husband’s shoes didn’t have a good discount so I ended up getting him 2 shirts at $10 each.

 

IKEA

IKEA always has specials on oddly colored models. For Boxing Day, the Raskag rolling tray was $16 instead of $50. I’ve bought a lime green drawers set before. There was no way I was going to miss out on a reddish-orange-brown Raskag. We got one of these (and you can see it in the background) and it is so great because it fits so much stuff and is great for organizing stuff in it. I’ve seen it used as an alcohol trolley or for crafts. I use it for office supplies and secondary book shelf. This one is probably going to be for video games and our new humidifier (coming up next).

Canadian Tire

Its moments like this on my blog that I start to realize how much I’ve changed with the blog. This haul is so grown-up. So, I picked up two humidifiers which we desperately need. So the small one will be move between the office and the bedroom as its for smaller spaces. It was $35 and cool mist. The second one is warm mist and will be for countering the dryness from the fireplace and works for a medium sized room which will do the job here and at a decent price of $40. But we really needed it especially with this incredibly cold winter we’ve been having so far and the fireplace running more than past years. Finally, we’ve been looking at the 3 outlet power post by Noma and this had a 40% discount (came to $18) so I was pretty happy about it although my husband seemed even more excited than I was about it.

Michaels

The last stop was to pick up 6 picture frames at Michaels. Montreal Comiccon ended up with quite a few art pieces that needed to be framed and Michaels had a sale for buy one and get the second one free which honestly is pretty awesome. We have everything framed now and just trying to figure out which goes where. I’ll give you all an update in an upcoming Weekly Adventures.

Amazon

• Playstation 4 Controller
• Assassin’s Creed Origins

As this post goes up, I haven’t gotten the physical items yet since its out to be delivered today. Playstation 4 Controller is really because one of our controllers dropped and broke apart. It still works but the super glue holding it together isn’t very fun to use. In case, it decides to break, at least there’s a backup. And hey, if we ever get a chance to play local co-op, we can play 3 players. Assassin’s Creed Origins was kind of a make up present for my husband since I talked him out of buying the PS VR (as its pretty pricey and not a great deal) and he was a little saddened by it. Can’t say it didn’t work out for him though. He ended up getting a game for not spending money. Not sure how the logic works there…haha!

Steam Winter Sale

To wrap this all up would be the Steam Winter Sale. I try to stock up on games with really great deals (even if they are old) during the sales and limit spending during the rest of the year when there aren’t some fantastic deal. Hence why there are always a few titles. I actually have played a fair amount of the Black Friday games and working on the reviews on those. I actually have to do some housekeeping for both Game Warp and here over the next few days. If necessary, I might take a day off in the new year to get everything in order and caught up. We do have some great stuff coming up in the new year. We’ve hit somewhat of a holiday and technical snag but things will get back on track very soon.

Phew…done! This haul is wrapped up!
Now for a few months of calm and no shopping (save the basic needs). 😉
I’m pretty happy that a lot of the stuff here was useful things for the house. 

Boxing Day & Steam Winter Sale Haul!

It feels like forever since I last wrote an actual post (although that isn’t true). Mostly, its probably because the last few days were so busy and tiring that its just kind of a blur. Regardless, I opted for a calm and easy post today! I have to admit that this year’s Boxing Day sales weren’t really impressive. I didn’t really end up buying a whole lot and other than weather causing a lot of traffic to get from one place to the next, the actual shopping time wasn’t a whole lot.

Aside from what I bought on Boxing Day here, I ended up getting paper towels, Oreos and surge protector power bar. Weird enough, as I get older, it seems to be a lot of picking up these household and food items. At the same time, around December 23rd or 24th (I think), the Steam Winter Sale started. Seeing as gaming is being a huge part of my life now and I’m having tons of fun, I took the liberty to pick up a few games. I won’t go into too much detail but I’ll list it under so you all can tell me your thoughts and whether you’ve played it!

Let’s go!

Movies

• Creed
• Kung Fu Panda 3
• Jurassic World
• In the Heart of the Sea
• The Age of Adaline

The wild card addition was The Age of Adaline that I’ve been wanting to watch but never remember to keep an eye out for it. Luckily, it was a good price so I added it to the pile. Compared to previous years, this is a very small movie haul. But then, I’ve been focusing on Netflix a lot and trying to minimize too many physical movies to be more space efficient.

Gloves

I wasn’t intending to get these gloves. Actually, the line-up at Adidas outlet store was so long (almost the length of the store) that I had time to browse the center display blocked by the two lines to see these gloves, which are actually a good alternative on mild winter days instead of my cute mittens.

Books

• Nocturnal Animals by Austin Wright
• iT by Stephen King
• The Couple Next Door by Shari Lapena
• The Fate of Ten by Pittacus Lore

Some of you might know (because I mentioned once or twice this year) that in the goal to save money, I promised myself to not by any books for the entire year as of last Boxing Day (which was my last book purchase). I did pretty well because I didn’t buy any physical books and only bought on super cheap one to wrap up a book that I had started but was recently condensed from a trilogy to just one book and in the heart of wrapping up the book (and the review will go up soon), I ended up buying it. Physical book shopping at a physical store is about the most amazing feeling ever especially after a year of not doing it and having to give up books that I wanted to get and only window shopping. Regardless, the next year might have a similar goal because I still have a lot of unread books, both physical and ebook. Still, The Fate of Ten was my award to myself which wasn’t on sale but I really want to continue the Lorien Legacy series. And who knew that iT was so freakin’ huge.

Steam Winter Sale

• Contrast
• The Stanley Parable
• Duck Tales Remastered
• Amnesia: Memories
• The Room
• World of Goo
• Bundle: Deponia/Edna & Harvey:Harvey’s New Eyes/The Night of the Rabbit/Memoria/The Whispered World:Special Edition
• Braid
• Bundle: The Longest Journey/Dreamfall:The Longest Journey

This is a lot more games than I anticipated but to be fair, the bundles were significantly cheaper so while I wanted The Whispered World, the bundle did also have Edna & Harvey that I’ve had my eye on as well. Same goes for something that I was browsing for The Longest Journey so figured I’d pick up the sequel also. Duck Tales Remastered was more of an impulsive buy because I didn’t know it was remastered and that whole all-new cast singing the theme song really has me hyped up. The Room, Braid, Contrast, Stanley Parable and World of Goo was all intentional buys.

This wraps up the haul!
Did you go out to Boxing Day? Any good deals that you picked up?

Christmas, Boxing Day and Family Times!

I finally forced myself to sit down and write an actual post that can go up on the weekend on normal times.  As you already have noticed, Tranquil Dreams has been a bit off schedule.  Holidays tend to do that and I take the advantage to really rest up and recharge a bit, although work has suddenly become not so much of that as I’ll be the only one without the week off due to responsibilities.  Still, life is life and I can’t lose my job.

Aside from that, Netflix decided a week or so ago that January 1st would be the expiry day of BBC series Robin Hood so I’ve been working hard (and sleeping less) to try to finish all 3 seasons.

Of course, work or TV series doesn’t stop me from still enjoying the holidays and spending time with family. If you missed my Christmas Eve celebrations, you can find it right HERE!

Christmas was special this year because my mom invited two of her very good friends and I didn’t only get to invite my boyfriend but also his parents.  I love them to bits and they are awesome so spending Christmas with them makes me so much happier also!

Full of food!

So, what do we have here? Fruit salad, Vegetable Salad, Lamb, Shepherd’s Pie, Steamed Salmon, Spaghetti Squash (recipe HERE) and veggie stir-fry. Mega delicious, my friends!

Our dessert!

And then for dessert, my mom made her walnut cake and her friends brought homemade peanut-filled glutinous rice balls.  So yummy! 🙂

How about some of my decorations?

Ribbons and my Grade 1 Christmas decoration

 

Christmas Cactus in full bloom

My little Christmas tree and some real Christmas cards (other our from previous years)

Yeah, my mom likes to use decoy.  We used to have fake boxes to pose as presents when we had a huge Christmas tree.  Now we can’t do that so we just put Christmas cards.

Christmas group picture! 🙂

Lovely picture, I’d say! 🙂

So what happens after Christmas? Thats right! 1pm, December 26th is my date with Boxing Day! I went by myself to Walmart and some clothes shops and then my friend managed to get off work early so he joined me and we did our Future Shop, Best Buy, Adidas and Puma outlet! I did some other shopping but I’ll reveal that later on 😉 It has a bit to do with my 2014 announcements which I’ve been not telling anyone.  I did Target and Michaels the day after.  Lets check out a part of what I got! 🙂

Puma and Adidas shoes!

My casual walking shoes broke and leak when it rains so it was a matter time before I got a new pair and at 50% off for Adidas (on the right) and 60% off for Puma (on the left), these two pairs cost me $60 or something.  I also got a workout tank top at Puma and a sweater for my boyfriend that I don’t have here.

Movies!

And then, these are my movie finds! I think I need a bigger shelf but looking at this, I’m rather happy with myself because now I can catch up with 2013 movies! This is the End was a hesitating one but then Dave at ccpopculture put it on his Top 20 HERE! My review will be coming up soon! I wanted to get Side Effects but it was sold out EVERYWHERE!

Aside from shoes and movies, I managed to get some dress pants and sweaters and a new perfume called DREAMS! 😉 They just needed to add Tranquil in front..haha! And that would probably smell like nothing and be called water.

And I finally cracked open my Limited Edition Oreos in the flavor of Gingerbread!

Gingerbread Oreos

I officially declare these my FAVORITE oreos! I’m sorry Golden Oreos, you need to scoot aside because I think I’ll stock up another 2 packs and eat them “slowly”.

While I binge TV and eat oreos (and fruits), my cat was being her princess…

My cat sleeping on me and holding down one of my arms

Can you see her sleeping?

Oh yeah, I caught this at 4am the other night when I woke up because my cat somehow got between the covers and stuck her paw in my face.  The use of my nightlight at 4am when I needed to catch a picture with my phone.  LOL!

How was your Christmas? Any Boxing Day shopping? Did you go out and battle some people for amazing deals? Have you binge watched any TV series? Whats some more 2013 must-see movies?