I had the brilliant idea of having Fondue for Christmas Eve with my mother. Well, that got postponed to New Year’s Eve, which seemed and even better celebratory occasion.

I had fondue about once before — two years back and was not involved in the cooking process in the least. My mother last had it about thirty years back.

So, I found an online recipe from Go Fondue for a classic Swiss cheese recipe.

I followed its recipe, put in two cups of wine, then started adding the cheese.

Stop. Stop right there. That’s where we went wrong.

As I mentioned before, we had no idea what we were doing. So, we added all of the two cups at once. You are supposed to add a little, heat it up, then add a little cheese, then more wine, more cheese, and so on.

We ended up pouring our entire pound of cheese into the pot, and it was still like liquid. I went out and bought another half pound of cheese. We added it to little avail, while it gained a bit of a thicker consistency it wasn’t much. The wine was also much too strong for both my mother’s, her friend’s and my taste.

We ate a little bit, but it was far too strong for me. All in all, it was a fun learning experience!

I’ll definitely be doing it again, I’ll probably report here. Hopefully it will be successful next time!

-Kerry

The first event, I didn’t have my Ninja costume, and so literally 30 minutes before closing time of a party store, I rushed over and bought some make up as I decided to become a vampire. A friend did my makeup, and voila! I scared people to the point people couldn’t look at me in the face! This was a week prior to Halloween.

The night before, I wore my Ninja outfit dancing. It was great, I looked like a real ninja, with a Bokken and rubber shurikan. Many people had trouble knowing who I was and had to peer into my eyes to see. I also grabbed a friend and ran off with her.

I was trying to decide what I would do for actual Halloween, whether I would just be Ninja again or be something else. I remember my friend went emo a few years back, and I thought, why not?

So, I started contacting friends and asking what information they had if I wanted to go for an emo/scene look. One of my friends said “oh, emo/scene/goth?” And so I started adding that in. Finally, one friend of mine told me she had a lot of information on goths. She gave me a whole bunch of information, and what I planned on being a really cheap costume turned out to be pretty expensive.

I borrowed many of my friend’s clothes, including pants, shoes, gloves and some makeup. The pants were a bit tight (which could be expected, being a girl’s) but they did fit. I bought several things from Hot Topic, borrowed my mother’s trench coat, and became what is my all-time favorite costume.

I had what looked like two piercings, black eyeliner, a slightly paler face, arm fishnets, boots, checkered gloves, it was absolutely amazing.

So, I went to a friend’s house for a party. Lots of drinks as well as a dance floor, and while I don’t drink it definitely provided some entertainment. I had friends not even recognize me as they walked by. Many of my old friends freaked out when they saw the pictures, and go sooo many compliments on the costume.

As for the actual Halloween party, it was mainly just our friends hanging out and chatting. Though, a friend of ours nearly got into a fight, which would not have been fun, but was a little exciting. We did dance for a bit, but it was right next to the fog machine and bally hot, so we decided to stop.

And that was Halloween!