every new day seems so new

my mom drove me back to edmonton on december 30th. she slept over because she wasn't sure if the roads were good, and alyssa's bed was free because alyssa was in cuba for a vacation. while she was here, my mom cleaned my whole kitchen, and now i am trying really hard to keep it clean and do my dishes every day instead of letting them pile up. i have been pretty good at doing so, but alyssa isn't. inspired by my mom, i decided to clean up more of my house. i borrowed emily's carpet cleaner and good vacuum, and set to work cleaning, vacuuming, and sorting out/purging all my piles of papers and junk. i spent the rest of my christmas holidays doing that and crafting, but if you came and visited i doubt you'd even be able to tell that i cleaned much. but i did! i am really trying to do all that cleaning because alyssa is moving out in april, and i am either stuck with having to pay the entire amount of rent myself, or find a roommate. there's a possibility that jessica might move in with me in the spring, but i think that kind of depends on where she is working at that time. she often goes up north to work at a camp, so i'm not sure if she'll be around. i hope we do eventually get to live together, though, and i hope it goes well. i know i can be pretty hard to live with.

anyway. the rest of my christmas holidays went like this:

i spent new year's eve at what used to be the velvet underground, watching illfit outfit play. jenni, jessica, jonathan, and landon were all there, and it was really nice to see all of them. however, i hate bars and i hate new year's and i hate being out after dark, so jessica, jon, landon and i left as soon as illfit was done at 11:15. they dropped me off at home, where i spent the next few hours working on a sweater i had started knitting for myself. it is my first knitted sweater, and i will post pictures when it is done.

on new year's day, i spent the morning working on my sweater some more. in the afternoon, i took the LRT and then the #5 (i think) to government house (just south of the royal alberta museum) for the lieutenant governor's new year's levee. i've never been before, and i'm glad i went. i mostly just stood in line for a long time, but i got to see the inside of government house (which was built in 1913 for the first lieutenant governor, but hasn't been used as a residence since the 1930s or so), signed the LG's guestbook, shook hands with the LG and his wife, and (this is the best part) had some really incredible little cakes and roast beef sandwiches. a historical tour and some great free food? this year is off to a good start.

the next day, i met my cree student at rutherford library for a tutoring session. later that evening, i bid on this on ebay. i have been wanting to re-line my blue winter jacket ever since i bought it, and this year it is dirty and ripped enough for me to actually get started on that. my mom is going to give me her mom's old brown mink coat to cut up and line my coat with, but i want some white or grey fur to line the hood and bottom and sleeves. don't think i'm a terrible person, okay? these coats are all second-hand, and fur is warm and edmonton is freezing. also, it turned out that someone outbid me at the last second, so i am still looking for old white fur coats to cut up for it. rabbit is easy to find, but it is not very good to wear because the hairs fall out really easily. are you appalled by me yet?

on saturday, the mom of the boy i tutor came over to drop off my pay for december, and then drove me to the farmers' market. i got potatoes, carrots, fudge, onion, garlic, and raspberry jam. i bussed home and worked on my sweater some more.

on sunday, i went for a late lunch with my friend erica. we rowed together at the u of a last year, and then i stayed at her place in halifax when she moved there this summer. we went to dadeo, and had a perfect perfect hangout. it was just long enough to catch up and have a really great conversation. she is so creative, and i love hearing what she has been up to (she is taking jewelry design craft at NSCAD in halifax). i spent the evening printing out hundreds of pages of notes for my northwest coast archaeology class, which was kind of a pain in the ass but nice that we didn't have to buy a textbook. our professor actually scanned every page that we will need, and made them available through e-class. impressive.