Mag and I were invited to dinner at Karine and Bob's place on friday. the fondue chinoise, the wines, the delicious birthday cake, the gracious hosts and good friends made for a very enjoyable evening.

before the dinner, John announced his engagement with Christine. i was very excited and surprised about the news and apparently my facial expression did nothing to hide the excitement, ie, I gave a goofy surprised look. I'm very happy for you two, congratulations!

saturday was grocery shopping day coz my parents, my brother and my cousin Regina were coming to my place for thanksgiving dinner. we selected a couple of new but risky recipes. because I trust my cooking ability so much, I bought some frozen entrees as backups. for one dish we did the preparation early coz it takes the most time: mag emptied out the pineapple halves, and I pre-cooked the rice.

dinner was set on sunday as a conglomerated celebration of (early) thanksgiving, (belated) birthday and my brother's new career opportunity in Mississauga. I started preparing the dinner after I dropped Mag off at work sunday morning. mom was in charge of the turkey so she (and dad) arrived around noon to allow enough time to prep the bird and roast it. soon after Edward had arrived, we started a game of mahjong. I'm going to miss the family time with them after my bro moves to toronto.

by 5pm I was back in the kitchen again. Maggy came back home from work around 6pm and made her smoked salmon appetizer, and then dinner was on. here's a quick look at the night's menu:luckily we didn't need to fall back to any of the backup dishes. I'm glad that dinner was a success, eventhough the kitchen looked as if hurricane Katrina had passed thru it twice. .e  23:52