Christmas Gifts Ideas

Hiya, fellas! It's 15 days till Christmas! How's your Christmas shopping so far? I am thinking of doing a little bit of online shopping for hubby's gifts at Amazon.com. We'll see what I can find for him because I got so distracted by their various selections of Christmas novels. The price for most of the used books is sold from $0.01. Cheap, VERY cheap, isn't it? Well, of course that is excluding the shipping rate, which is around $3.99/-.

Below are some of the books that I found interesting and I can't wait to enjoy my read with a cup of hot drinks.


I'll Be Home for Christmas
by Linda Lael Miller, Catherine Mulvany, Roxanne St. Claire, Julie Leto

LINDA LAEL MILLER delivers a holiday miracle in the bittersweet tale of a young woman who can't hide her broken heart -- or her past -- when she returns to her hometown. But a sexy widower may just help her discover the true meaning of home in "Christmas of the Red Chiefs."

CATHERINE MULVANY spins a fairy tale come true in "Once Upon a Christmas." They flirted as teenagers, but it takes time -- and some divine intervention -- to bring two star-crossed lovers together at last.

JULIE LETO pairs fire and ice in "Meltdown," the sensual tale of a Cuban-American PR whiz whose job description includes thawing out her CEO boss's frosty image. Will their sparks torch into flames of passion?

ROXANNE ST. CLAIRE unwraps the thrills of Christmas in New York, where a female bodyguard toys with a dangerous desire for a mysterious hunk while protecting his young daughter. It's a risky game with passion as the prize in "You Can Count on Me."

The Gift: Home For Christmas/All I Want For Christmas/Gabriel's Angel
by Nora Roberts

Home for Christmas
After years spent abroad, reporter Jason Law returned home determined to win back the girl he left behind. It would take all his skills—and then some—to win Faith back. But this time, nothing would stand in his way—it was time faith was rewarded.

All I Want for Christmas
Identical twin boys Zeke and Zach wanted only one gift from Santa this year: a new mom! But convincing their love-wary dad that their music teacher, Miss Davis, was his destiny and part of Santa's plan wasn't as easy as they'd hoped—.

Gabriel's Angel
All Gabriel Bradley wanted was solitude. But when Laura ended up at his remote cabin during a blizzard, desperate, alone and on the run, the modern-day Scrooge couldn't turn her away. For she brought him the gift of passion, life, hope—if he had the courage to reach for it.

Small Town Christmas: Return To Promise/Mail-Order Bride
by Debbie Macomber


PROMISE, TEXAS, is a good place to live with the person you love. When rancher Cal Patterson and his wife, Jane—better known as Dr. Texas—face a threat to their marriage, she leaves Promise, the town that's become her home as much as his. Will Jane be back by Christmas? Because, for both of them, the greatest gift of all would be her Return to Promise.

GOLD RIVER, ALASKA, isn't your average town. After being jilted by her fiancé, Caroline Myers ends up there—thanks to her matchmaking aunts, who send her on what appears to be an autumn vacation. Not surprisingly, they have something different in mind. Something that involves spending a snowy Christmas in handsome Paul Trevor's home—as his Mail-Order Bride.

Note: Images and synopsis of stories are copied from Amazon.com

Since I haven't purchased any books for a few months now, I'll be sure to grab this chance to order a couple of books with these incredible prices. What about you??


Click HERE for more books in my astore.

Metro Jaya at Suria Sabah

Yesterday, the new shopping mall in Kota Kinabalu, Suria Sabah Shopping Mall, was opened for public and one of the latest departmental stores available is Metro Jaya, which is the first in East Asia. The building is huge and I love the entrance because it's quite spacious. However, most of the shops were not in operations yet, so, hubby and I went to another mall for lunch.

We went there by foot and left the car at Suria since the parking fee was free for the first two hours, and it's much more convenience to walk because it's not far and only within walking distance. On the way to the other shopping mall, we bumped into our ex-boss and her boys, three of them. Wow, they're bigger and taller now. I left the company more than two years ago and the two boys were still small and shorter than me back then.

Anyways, upon arriving at the mall, we went to collect my bracelet and only after that we had lunch. Soon after we finished eating, we went into a gift shop and I've bought a couple of gifts for my younger sis and bro's gf. We walked back to Metro and bought another two gifts for my two older sis. I'm glad because this year I managed to get some gifts in the first week of December he he... That was an achievement, but there are 9 more gifts to go!

Oh, since the mall was not fully opened yet, I haven't taken any photos yet especially the Christmas decorations, but boy, there were so many Christmas trees inside Metro with lots of themes, and they were so bright and lovely! I do have some photos to share, though, but these were taken last Christmas at 1Borneo hyper mall that was launched last year. We went there with my parents. The hotel I worked before was just next door.






That day, hubby walked ahead of us, I was walking with mom and dad was behind us. As we walked along, I thought I passed by hubby who was standing, looking downstairs and facing backward. So, I just patted him quickly on the back and said something like 'c'mon' as we wanted to take some photos with the decorations, but mom and I didn’t stop walking. The funny thing was I suddenly saw hubby smiling from afar. He was standing next to the sleigh and waiting for us. I was a bit shocked, who the heck I tapped on the back just now???

Mom was laughing and she said she thought I knew that guy. I blamed hubby for walking so fast that day!!!

Same Old Christmas tree

You heard me right. The Christmas tree that is standing at the corner of the house right now is the same tree as last year and the year before. We are still using the red and gold round ornaments and also the white silvery Santa Claus and snowman for decorating the tree.


As mentioned in my previous post, we have put up the tree in mid November and I have decided to place it at the corner nearer to the plug as well as to avoid the cats from noticing it. However, it seems like one of them or maybe the two of them have been playing with it because it looks so messy now and the lights are supposed to be swirling from the top, but... See for yourself below...


Talking about the lights, they were once red, green, blue and yellow in color, but they are the same age as the tree, so, they do grow old, I guess ahahaa... and they have changed colors into white, green, orange and yellow!

Google Page Rank Checker

It is sad to see that my blog's Page Rank (PR) has the same fate as Humpty Dumpty. It just crashed and never again increased even a bit for many months now. Maybe it's my fault because my blog is not being constantly updated and the search engines just ignored the existence of Choc Mint Girl!

Some time ago, I have blogged about Google PR and the importance of number of back links and pages indexed. Hmmm... I have been using the PR Checker and it mentioned that the next update will be on January 2010. So, I've been thinking of doing something about it to improve my PR.

What about you, fellas? Do you care about your PR?? Do you think it's still important???

2012 End of the World

I went to watch 2012 with hubby last weekend, and the effect was extraordinary. I shed tears watching some of the moments, which have really touched my heart where it was too late for the dad to reconcile with his son and how families stick together and struggling to save their family members. What went wrong in this movie was the people have never being made aware about the event.

Even though the plot was predictable, but in my point of view, 2012 should be a great reminder for humankind to think like human even when the world has come to an end. We don't really know when exactly it will happen as we only based on predictions and Science, but it really got me thinking of what I shall do if I am in that situation. Everything was gone in just a blink of an eye!

Well, I don't want to spoil the movie as probably some of you haven't watched it yet.

Anyway, I suddenly feel like singing the song 'End of the World', one of my evergreen favorites. I have found a version by the late Lena Zavaroni when she was just a little girl and her rendition of this song was so beautiful and touching, it really wanna make me cry especially after I read about her tragic life.