Happy New Year, everyone! Yes, it’s been a while since I updated, almost 2 months in fact, but it’s been a busy 2 months! Let’s start with Halloween…
Oren (3rd from left) posing with her ghoulish cousins before trick-or-treating.
Most of you know that every year, I create a custom costume for Oren (with a lot of help from the mom-in-law). In previous years, she’s been a Chinese gymnast, Supergirl, and Princess Leia. Much like Sylvester Stallone in Demolition Man, it allows me to unleash my inner-seamstress. And because she was too young to complain, she’d wear anything we put on her. 
This time around, we decided she was old enough to choose her own costume. Her first choice was Tinkerbell, but Target didn’t have one in her size. Her surprise second choice was the witch costume, which happened to be Katrina’s staple costume when she was growing up. Of course, Trina’s version was a white-faced, bloody ghoul witch, so we grabbed a pack of makeup as well.
Mommy creating spookiness.
Since I didn’t have to do any sewing this year, I focused my efforts on the jack-0-lantern. I thought I’d go with a scary cat to go along with the witch theme:
Meow!
If you want to see a step-by-step slideshow of the carving process, check out my page on Whrrl.
The Thanksgiving holiday was a special one this year. First off, we hosted both our families. Trina made a turkey with all the fixings, while I carved (with the help of this video on YouTube). I think the spread looked pretty good (tasted good too):
Hope you're hungry.
It was also special because we all had the day off afterwards to recover (and check out the malls on Black Friday). Trina and Oren always had off, but in my case, it was a result of the HGEA agreement with the state to give certain UH employees paid leave during the holidays (with a paycut). This includes 2 weeks during the Christmas and New Year’s holidays as well as Spring Break. So I guess I use the word “special” half-heartedly; while it’s great to have time off during the holidays with my family, a 5% paycut (coupled with my wife’s previous paycut) means living much leaner (first thing to go was cable and our Blockbuster Online account). Of course, that’s hard to do during the holidays, but we tried our best. 
It’s hard for me to remember what happened during those 2 weeks off; it’s just one big blur of lazy days, movies, shopping malls, soda (lots of it), food, family and friends. All I know, is that Oren had tons of fun. Evidence:
Christmaaaaaaaaas!
Oren loved it all. The shopping, the tree, the lights, the gift-wrapping, the gold antlers and santa hats, and the carols (she sings them year round, actually). Speaking of carols, I was able to attend her Christmas program this year. Her class, the Peeking Pueos sang “The Chipmunk Christmas Song”.
She was supposed to be Simon but she refused to wear the glasses. Primadonna.
But Oren wasn’t as joyful during our family’s Christmas Eve party in Kailua. When it was her turn to sing the same song in the talent show, she went all Michigan J. Frog on everyone; you know, the Loony Toons character who only sings and dances for his owner. We were a little bummed that she didn’t perform, but she eventually warmed up… 2 days later at the in-laws. She even threw in a “Single Ladies” dance routine afterwards!
Unlike previous Christmases, everyone knew what to get Oren this year; PRINCESS STUFF. We were up to our eyebrows this year with Princess outfits, art supplies, video games (we gave her a Leapster), toys, and more. Here’s her favorite piece of Princess schwag, courtesy of Aunty Kristie:
Miss Aiea!
Yep. A tiara and high heels, too. The good part about this Princess obsession is that it might justify a trip to Disneyland sooner rather than later.
New Year’s Eve was spent at the familiar joints. First, my half-sister’s place in Kalihi then to Kat’s family’s party in Liliha. Was it me or was it a lot louder this year? I’ve never heard that many bombs go off in my life (and they’re still going off in Aiea!). The Valdez’s usually bring the most ammo to the NYE parties, but we cut back on the fireworks budget this year. Luckily, my uncle came through. It’s amazing how loud the paperless strings sound when you braid them together! Oren got a little more brave this year with the fireworks. Not only was she twirling sparklers and throwing pops, she held her first punk and lit her first fountain!
Do you feel lucky, punk?
On the business side, 2009 was a great year for Valdezign, due in part to my wife, who’s my inspiration, but also because of all the great people I’ve met on Twitter. Without your support and encouragement, I wouldn’t be where I am today. I worked on quite a few side projects, one of which was putting up my Valdezign Store! After being featured in the Entrepreneur section in MidWeek in September for my personalized Twitter shirts, I wanted to make sure there was an easy way for people to buy them, as well as showcase some of my new designs. My latest shirt is a fundraiser for Hawaii Public Libraries. Like the Twitter shirts, they can be personalized, but this time with your favorite library branch:
With the HSPLS facing budget cuts and furlough days, I wanted to do something to help. All proceeds from the shirt sales will go to Friends of the Library Hawaii.
And that’s the way it was for 2009. Thanks for bearing with me on the long post. I’ll try to update more frequently to avoid this in the future.
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