Le Grand Marché de Noël & Luminotherapie!

Downtown Montreal is bustling with Christmas right now. This past Friday, I went out with friends to Le Grand Marché de Noël (tranlsation: The Big Christmas Market) located in Place des Arts and also connected with Complexe Desjardins. It had a lot of fun stuff. There were stalls with gift ideas from local Quebec producers and artisans. There was food trucks  and lots of decorations. And if you haven’t heard yet, we got a huge Christmas tree (which everyone calls the ugliest Christmas tree ever). After that, we headed out to Quartier des Spectacles right next to Place des Arts for the annual Luminotherapie.

Christmas Village at Complexe Desjardins

Fontaine Boreale at Complexe Desjardins

Le Grand Marché de Noël at Place des Arts

Hey, look, snuck a picture of me in there. I know this is for kids but hey, kid at heart right here! This was just so adorable. I couldn’t resist!

Jerry Ferrer (Food Truck)

Christmas Poutine (with cranberry and truffle sauce)

Lobster Bisque

Grilled Cheese

Jerry Ferrer food truck is an extension of a chain of really awesome restaurants. The food truck was awesome because it had their usual great food but with a Christmas twist. While I didn’t eat it, my friends said that it was pretty good.

Luminotherapie at Quartier des Spectacles

I skipped last year’s luminotherapie and can’t really remember what it was but I usually go. You can see that I went to the Iceberg exhibit a few years back, then the field of dandelions imitations, and there was a few more after that. This year was these little contraptions where you move the metal lever in the centre between two people and it moves a wheel inside that depicts a story. We managed to get on two: the first was Little Red Riding Hood and the other one was the Frog Prince.

What Christmas events is going on where you are? Are you ready for Christmas?

Winter Events I’m Looking Forward To!

I’m a little behind on this seasonal segment.  I wanted to set them for the first day of every season but excuses aside, its been kind of busy but its even better now because all the events are set and I can choose whichever ones I want. I might not make it to all the events but these are the select ones that have caught my eye and I will make an effort to go.

For autumn events, I only made it the MTL a Table event.  To be fair, I ended up going to check out Sherbrooke Met La Table and some Halloween haunted houses. That’s just what happens, right? Sometimes we just discover other things and spontaneous decisions happen. This is what makes life so fun 😉

Now, we’re here! Some notable winter events was the Christmas Market that we had and although everyone wanted to go, we didn’t end up going.  It could just be that there was no snow and no one particularly felt like Christmas was here.

But, we now have a little bit of snow on the ground.  The below zeros are here so winter sure feels like its here also.  What events are around, right? I feel totally out of the loop. Let’s get the research going! 🙂

Luminotherapy, Quartier des Spectacles
(Until January 31, 2016)

I go to Luminotherapy almost every year.  The concept in what they are trying to portray is very unique.  Sometimes, it does work better than others.  I don’t think I’ve actually been more in love than the very first one I went to called ICEBERG and it was about the movement of the iceberg and glaciers.  It was to send a message about global warming and the transformation of whats going up.  After the Alaska cruise, my appreciation for it was even bigger.  If you do want to check that post, you can see it HERE!

However, think about this year’s! Its literally a winter wonderland.  We get to play on seesaws in the middle of the night in downtown.  I think that is a pretty special moment.  To take nice pictures, I’d have to go with a friend or two so maybe I’ll just take some street shots of people if I go alone. The exhibit is ending soon so I’d better schedule in that time ASAP.

Happening Gourmand 2016

We’ve been all about foodie events this past few months.  I really enjoy it and honestly, I’m absolutely into finding new restaurant to try and blog about.  Its a fun and eye-opening experience.  This restaurant line-up actually is pretty cool. My friends and I had gone to Verses Restaurant back in November for MTL a Table and I’ve been to Vieux-Port Steakhouse and Modavie before foodie adventures blogging phase.  If it was my choice, I’d want to try out Mechant Boeuf.  I’ve always wanted to try Suite 701 but they never have a menu that I can eat due to allergies. I’m not sure I’ll have time to do all this though.

Exhibit: Dinosaurs Unearthed 2, Montreal Science Centre
(Until March 20, 2016)

Ever since I was a little girl, I loved dinosaurs.  Its probably why I have an immense love for (almost) all The Land Before Time including the sequels.  I’ve been actually eyeing this exhibit since I saw a pamphlet for it a little while ago.  It ends right at the beginning of Spring so it works great for this segment.  It does give me a little time to go check it out! I’ve missed a few really great exhibits in the year or two so I really hope I can make it to this one!

Exhibit: Investigating Agatha Christie, Pointe a Calliere Museum
(Until April 17, 2016)

I have a long ways away before finishing all of Agatha Christie’s novels.  I’ve really only scratched the surface but I love her novels.  Hercule Poirot is a fantastic detective character for one.  I really would like to see the history and inspiration behind all of her work.  This looks like a pretty cool exhibit.  Plus, I work exceptionally close to this museum so maybe I’ll go check it out soon and report back 😉

Montreal en Lumiere & Nuit Blanche
(February 27, 2016)

I go to Montreal en Lumiere almost every other year.  It has a pretty significant meaning since it was on a Nuit Blanche outing that my husband and I started our relationship 8 years ago. Aside from that, this year the highlight city is Shenzhen. Nothing concrete has been released yet for Nuit Blanche but some of the highlight events for Montreal en Lumiere look pretty great.  I usually explore the art in the underground city and maybe they’ll have some foodie event that I can go check out 😉

Another intriguing event: Igloofest (for electronic music lovers to dance outside and enjoy the lovely winter)

Are there any fun events going around for the winter season (or summer depending where you are)?

Saturday & Montreal en Lumiere 2015!

If you haven’t noticed already, my weekly adventures have turned into individual posts.  I don’t necessary do a whole lot during the winter, especially when this year has been brutally in the freezing point.  The radio said last week or over the weekend that the coldness in February broke some records.  Just to give you an idea..

On Saturday morning, I did a little morning surprise for our 7th anniversary. I posted a little fun recording session last night with my boyfriend in celebration for it if you missed it, its here .  You might have because I forgot to put on a title and realized it afterwards, then changed the link, so maybe it might end up having the “page not found” come up.  I don’t know how these things work.  Anyways, I debated a little about posting this again but seeing as not everyone is going to check out the video, I’m going to post some of the pics here and talk a little bit more elaborately on Saturday and the Montreal en Lumiere festival since we explored the downtown area, which is new to us.

 Saturday morning surprise

This is only a portion.  But right from walking through the door I had a trail of post-it notes listing “Why I Love You”.  There was pretty much very little prep work except for getting earlier than my boyfriend arriving home from work.  I also hid away in one of the rooms that he wouldn’t cross by, but when he stepped through the door, I put on a song that we love.

Montreal en Lumiere 2015: Downtown @ Quartier des Spectacles/Place des Arts area

Complexe Guy Favreau: art

This second one is really cool.  There’s this projector up top and it has this very video game-esque sequence when we walked by imitating a helicopter and some dudes running around.  It looked a bit like an escape video game.  That was pretty fun.

Complexe Desjardins: Salon du Livre Gourmand

These two books was our anniversary gifts to us.  I know I know, its just another excuse to spend.  I’m telling you though, these two are quite good investments, I can already feel it.  Maybe its going to be my next project idea: Quebec cuisine.  What do you think?

I’m not much of a cook but I certainly want to be a better cook at least a less frustrated one that enjoys the art of cooking.  Talking about that, once I get myself settled into my new place (hopefully this coming weekend) and get the kitchen organized, we’re starting the Baking Through Disney project.

Quartier des Spectacles/Place des Arts (outdoors area)

Urban slides

Ferris Wheel and Heat shelters

Urban zipline

That blurry flash is the person ziplining.  I had my phone so I couldn’t get really great shots.  I’m telling you though, if the line-up wasn’t so intense, I would’ve done it.  There’s something so amazing about ziplining over thousands of people in a city. Can you imagine how it would feel? Just wow! Whoever thought that up, please bring this back next year.

Ice sculpture: Harp

Garden of Lights/ Food kiosk area

Pianist on Ice Piano

The Pool, interactive “game”

Scene RBC

Break Dance performance

La Maison de la Suisse

Its been a while since I’ve felt this hype for Montreal en Lumiere.  Last year, we went to the outside area of the main festival and saw penguins in the show and the Planetarium and Biodome.  This year, it felt amazing.  I’ve never actually stayed the whole night for this Nuit Blanche/all nighter event.  But with tons of free stuff from 6pm-6am, this festival is absolutely worth the time and even pushing through the crowd didn’t feel too bad either.

We also made a little stop at Hydro Quebec building to see the painting inside which was an abstract art by Mousseau with a series of lights panel running behind it which changed to emphasis different aspects of the painting itself.  It was pretty interesting.

However, the reason we had ventured downtown was for my friend’s belated birthday dinner so we made our way up to Ace Grill & Bar. I had Filet Mignon Brochette which was actually better than I expected. 🙂

Filet Mignon brochette

It may have been a late dinner but its been a while that I’ve seen my friends around so it was really nice to kind of catch up with everyone and share some laughs.

Saturday was pretty awesome and the weekend itself was efficient.  I just always wish it was longer.

Thoughts on Montreal en Lumiere?

All in A Week(end)’s Work (plus some blogging help please)!

I have no idea how to title these things anymore.

My highlights of the week are so similar that they really don’t have any titles.  Maybe I’ll just give it a segment name, once I figure out something witty and fun 🙂

Moving right into  this past week..it was a short work week because of Labor Day weekend and the weekend came incredibly fast with a few little fun things!

1) Completing Nike Training Club program on Saturday night

Its been hard to get back on this whole working out routine.  The first was the hardest of the program where I felt my body didn’t belong to me.  I could barely do push-ups anymore and every move was a mega chore.  By this last week, I was able to pull off a good bit of burpees, push-ups, even figured out the whole plank row deal once and for all.  I’ve sweated buckets and buckets of sweat over the last few weeks and although I did the Getting Lean (Intermediate without running) program and I’m not sure I got that lean but it sure did make me feel absolutely fantastic 🙂

Now its back to one or two weeks of self-disciplined workouts.  If I can keep it up for a month thats great, if not, I’m jumping back into Nike Training Club for the Getting Toned program.

2) ARROW Season 1

Montreal Comiccon is this coming weekend and for that, I went on the mission to binge-watch Arrow Season 1. Arrow is amazing.  I love the main character but everyone else is fantastic.  Its absolutely fun to watch and I’m pretty sure I’ll be done in a night or two at the pace I’m going 🙂 I’m going to admit that I love watch Stephen Amell as Oliver Queen doing those crazy workouts (shirtless of course), I also love the rest of the cast. Everyone is just so awesome! 🙂

I think the CW dishes out the most series that I like. Its pretty amazing!

3) After Work Adventures: RedBall Project

“ Through the RedBall Project I utilize my opportunity as an artist to be a catalyst for new encounters within the everyday. Through the magnetic, playful, and charismatic nature of the RedBall the work is able to access the imagination embedded in all of us. On the surface, the experience seems to be about the ball itself as an object, but the true power of the project is what it can create for those who experience it. It opens a doorway to imagine what if?…That invitation to engage, to collectively imagine, is the true essence of the RedBall Project. The larger arc of the project is how each city responds to that invitation and, over time, what the developing story reveals about our individual and cultural imagination.”– Kurt Perschke 

RedBall Project is travelling the world to spark imagination.  Has it landed in your city yet? You can check it out: HERE

4) After Work Adventures: Fountain House

Fountain House is a temporary exhibit on the streets on Montreal.  Its built on the concept of water flowing throughout and the idea to celebrate drinking water.

The Fountain House is first and foremost a space open to the public, like a park. Inside, at the centre, there is a basin with water flowing in it. Why did we choose to celebrate drinking water, a public good that might seem rather mundane? Precisely because we take it for granted, and we tend to forget the previous generations that built the infrastructure that now allows us to benefit from this resource.- Quartier des Spectacles

Its open to the public till October 26th.  It has water flowing down the center, the plants on the side grow (I presume), and they have stairs to go up where you can look out into downtown around us.  I love water so this was a pretty sweet concept.

5) Getting out right in time

On Friday evening, the sky went dark shortly I left work.  Taking my time, I’m walking to the bus terminus, hoping that it doesn’t rain.  And then it does.  I feel the first drop and then the drops come a lot faster right when I spot where I am and dash up the stairs to the OACI building, which is part of the underground passages in Montreal.  As I went in, I got out of the rain right in time.  Another 10 seconds and I would’ve been completely soaked.  Yay to perfect timing or should I say, being at the right place at the right time 🙂

6) Saturday: Friend’s Birthday Brunch and Shopping Ventures

Saturday was one of my very good friend’s birthday.  He’s almost like my brother and we hang out quite a bit.  For his birthday, I usually offer to take him out for a meal, this year it was at this brunch place in Old Montreal that he’s been talking about forever called Le Cartet

Pastries to start!

Green Jasmine Tea

Cappuccino

Brunch des Cantons

That was possibly the best brunch I’ve had ever.  For one, the coming in the cast iron pan made it so delicious and a very unique experience.  Plus, everything was cooked in duck fat which just melts in your mouth.  Except it also means, I probably won’t eat this all the time, for my health’s sake.

After that, he wanted to go shopping so we went on a little venture around town and ended up in Mountain Equipment Coop out across town since that one is gigantic.  I managed to get my boyfriend and I a new hiking backpack and got myself a yoga brick because I’m not flexible and to avoid injuries. One of the few purchases that day, along with a few movies: The Shining, Moon, Weird Science.

A very fantastic day with good company and nice chats! Hanging out with friends is really quite awesome! 🙂

7) Sunday Gardening 1: Fern 

Everything deserves a chance.  With that in mind, I decided to give my fern a second chance.  It was looking monstrously huge and just totally out of control.  I gave it a little trimming and pruning.  Took some branches out (dead and alive), shrunk its size and gave it some structure and voila! I think its looking pretty nice! 🙂

8) Sunday Gardening: Autumn Flowers

I haven’t quite finished with fixing up the side area in the front yard but I pulled out the frustrating vine plant and now the area is completely clean after I cut a part of the tall stems that are done blooming.  Things are starting to look good.  This week, Rona had a fantastic sale on Autumn Chrysanthemums so I thought it’d look nice in that spot. After a lot of pulling and cutting and shovelling, these two got planted and ready.  The one on the right is coral and the left is orange chrysanthemums 🙂

I can’t wait to see them bloom!

Now to end this off, there are a few highlights which I’m going to give an update for some coming blogging stuff!

• I have drafted a general list of movies that I’d like to watch for Halloween marathon but I’d also like to give you all a chance to choose what you’d like to see so I’ll be putting together a small poll soon.
• The original plan to do recommendations month in September is not happening as I want to continue to put extra focus on books so BRING ON MORE INDEPENDENT WRITERS! 
• Pinterest Therapy session coming up!
• I owed you all a review showing my new movie crush. That did not happen last week unfortunately since I’m shifting my schedule a little, but it will go up in the next few days 🙂
• Following that, I’ve been thinking of making a new segment either for Crush of the Week (or something along those lines), highlighting an actor (or sometimes actresses). Maybe it’ll be a monthly basis.  It really depends how impressed I am with what I’m watching. Is that a yes or no for you?

To recap, a few questions this week:

Do you know where to find online yoga routines?  Have you seen Arrow? Have you started fall gardening yet and what are your favorite autumn flowers?

What do you think about a new segment for sexy actors or beautiful actresses? 

Thats all for today! Happy Monday! 🙂

Exhibit: ICEBERG

As I promised from yesterday’s Weekly Photo Challenge: Illumination (click HERE to see the post), here is the full exhibit.

First, I do have to give thanks to another fellow blogger, David @ Lead.Learn.Live who reminded me of these fantastic arts exhibits in the Quartier des Spectacles around my area with showing another display that had taken place there. That exhibit was called 21 Swings.  Check out his post about that HERE.

As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, this is Luminotherapy’s 3rd annual event.  This is just one part of the complete lights display.

The concept behind ICEBERG is to see the lifespan and change of an iceberg as it shifts from the north to the south and nears land.  If you were to walk the whole interactive experience, you need to start on the most north (for ones familiar, Maisonneuve street).  And walk through the multiple series of metallic frames replica of icebergs which emit sounds to reflect the stage as you walk through.  To get the full experience, you need to stop under a beam to wait for the full sound effects.

This exhibit is separated into 4 stages. Its to help you understand the lifespan and how global warming is effecting it.  The guide told me that an iceberg’s lifespan as it moves down south should be about 5-8 years before its completely melted but now its average before it disappears is at around 3 years.

The first one is the Iceberg origin when it first leaves the North.  Here is whats on the plaque for this section:

“Between 10,000 and 40,000 icebergs appear in Canadian waters every year, 90% of them originating from glaciers on the west coast of Greenland.  Glaciers frequently break apart in this region of Greenland.  That is because this unusual island is below sea level, but covered by a dome of ice that sits above the water.  The weight of this ice dome, combined with the effects of the Arctic summer melt water and erosion by waves, causes crevasses to form in the ice.  This in turn leads to calving, a term used to describe glaciers breaking off to form icebergs.”

As you walk under each of the tall and big metallic beams, you hear the cracking of ice.  When you pause under a beam and hear the crack, this builds up…

When you get through this iceberg and it has broken off from the glacier we head into the next phase called Quiet Strength.

“As soon as they enter the Arctic waters, the icebergs begin slowly melting.  Seawater eats away at their submerged sections, while the sun, wind and movement of the waves erode the ice above water.  These various natural phenomena affects an iceberg’s equilibrium, gradually shifting its centre of gravity.  Enormous pressure is therefore created between the downward force of the iceberg’s immense weight and the upward force of flotation.  

Like a compressed spring, the iceberg can release their energy at any moment.  When the pressure becomes too great, the fragile equilibrium is broken, releasing a considerable amount of energy. This causes the ice mammoth to flip over, creating an impressive shock wave. As the icebergs continue their slow melt, this spectacular and unpredictable phenomenon occurs ever more frequently, so much so that at the end of their life, icebergs can roll over every three or four days.”

This part I needed to wait for everyone to get out and tried this video multiple times because you need it to be extremely quiet to catch the water sounds that slowly build up.  The beams here are shorter than the previous ones and start decreasing in size as you walk through them.  Every step you take, you hear water dripping sounds and same as before, when you stand under a beam that just has the water dripping sound, it also grows and we hear exactly what happens in the description above.  Something like this…

When you exit this series of Quiet Strength, we head into the last series of sound accompanied iceberg phase called Ice Song.

“Centuries old and shaped by time and the elements, these monuments of ice make a distinctive sounds.  As water gets inside their cracks and crevasses, they resonate like giant pipe organs, the tones modulating and evolving as the icebergs slowly melt.  This “glacial” symphony reaches a crescendo as the icebergs approach the Arctic Circle.  Navigating through ice-covered waters, they come in contact with chunks of sea ice, some of them a metre thick.  The impact leads to exquisite vibrations in the seawater-filled crevasses deep inside the icebergs.”

This third part is the one that’s closest to a road so it was hard to wait for complete quiet although the sounds are quite sharp.  Also, this iceberg gets shorter and shorter as you approach the exit to the point where my 5’3″ height had to bend and crouch down to get out of the exit.  Every time you step under a beam, this one rings our a little sharp music note.  When you stand under the beam for a while, here is the song that we get to enjoy…

The fourth and last part is located right on the Place des Arts entrance.  There are no sounds because it signifies the end of the iceberg’s life.  I didn’t take a picture of that plaque (missed it) so no information on that section.  The guide did say that it shows the disappearance of iceberg as it is now just little chunks of ice floating around in the sea til it fully melts.

This is both an educational and beautiful exhibit.  If you are from Montreal or you happen to be close enough to visit, this is definitely worth your while.  My videos are to give you an idea of what the actual experience is.  I probably will go again and just stand under and enjoy the sounds of the iceberg because the experience matched with the lights and the sounds was just so awesome! It reminds us so much more that we need to take care of our planet and start caring of what is happening with our environment.

Next up: I’ll be heading out to see the other part of the Luminotherapy called Le Jour de 8 Soleils.  The translation is The Day of 8 Suns, which is a story projected on 8 different buildings.  Sounds fun, right? I’ll be back hopefully by next weekend with some more on that.