Did I mention my tree?

I've hated our tree for the last couple of years.
I took all my "special" ornaments and all my show ones and put them on the pink tree that I display in the stairwell. Partially because the pink tree is too cute not to have special ornaments and partly because I'm scared of the kids breaking some of them.

The problem this has caused is our big tree is now kind of bare looking, all the ornaments being nothing really special.

Until this year.

I went out to Canadian tire one day and feel in love with all these bejeweled beauties.

 It all kind of started when I fell for this little "jester guy" and the jewel encrusted crown. The star is such a perfect replacement for our big white angel that was getting a little ragged looking.

The whole tree is themed in such rich greens, purples, reds and Oranges. And I love the fact I can add things like a feathered purple bird (50% off on boxing day)

 All the jewels, sparkles, and rich colors just make me so happy

Can you tell I'm thrilled? to finally have a put together tree again, makes everything so much better.

Stairwell Christmas

My Shoe Tree

The upper part of the display with the "Dear Santa, Let Me Explain..." Shirt.

 The shiny trees and Presents under the Christmas tree

The Whole space! It was a real Pink and Red Theme there this year and I kind of like it. I still look having the Stairwell as the one place to put my pretty girly things that the little ones can't get to. Especially now that Greg is getting into EVERYTHING!!!

2010

L to R
Cheering for the Olympics, New Chicks, Mutton Busting, Tent Picnics
Garth Brooks in Vegas, New Goats, Baby toes, Leprachaun Gold Hunt
West Edmonton Sea Cavern, Hanging with Penguins, First Day of School, Santa
1st Birthday, Staying at Gramma and Grandpas, Maggie & Jasper, Meow Meow and Maxxie

Christmas B-day Boy

With Christmas this year we had to start another new tradition

BIRTHDAY CAKE!!!!

I can't really believe it's already been a year since I got the best Christmas gift ever!

Mid afternoon, we stopped playing with new toys long enough to have a cake and sing Happy Birthday.

Awe. The one year old cake smash. What could be cuter?

My 2 Favorite pictures of the season

Quick Christmas re-cap

I must apologize to Everyone! My kids got so spoiled this year, I think Santa must have emptied his entire sleigh here. So if Santa Forgot you, I apologize, I'm sure it was our fault!!!

Really the kids got spoiled rotten.

There was everything from a bike to a rocket ship in our living room on Christmas morning. Plus about nine million action figures.

My in-laws were here, we had such fabulous meals both days, and the kids were in heaven getting Grandpa Charlie to figure out there toys (all I have to say about that- "when are the toy manufactures going to stop making it a half an hour process to get toys out of their packages?!!!?)
Grandpa and Gramma learned names of characters they'd never heard of.

See? S-P-O-I-L-I-E-D!!!! let's just hope it doesn't turn them rotten!

Do you remember back in November when I wrote about the radio station being on location in town and how we'd enter for a trip to Vegas? Well, we didn't win the trip to Vegas but Chris won tickets to a Charlie Pride concert in May. And really no offense to Mr. Pride. I mean I know his Kiss an Angel Good morning song, but that's about it. Dude is like 72. I wasn't sure his concert was going to be our cup of tea. So we kind of re-gifted the tickets.
We gave them to my in-laws for Christmas.
They were the surprise hit of the year.
My father-in-law was totally excited.
I mean the tickets are wicked, they are like 3rd row on the floor. -and yes I know I'm totally cheap, giving away free concert tickets as a Christmas present, but he was so excited. I thought it was awesome!

Another magical childhood tradition

When I was a kid one of my favorite parts of December was the night we got to sleep under the Christmas tree. We did it every year I can remember, until I was "too cool" to participate anymore.
There would be eggnog and Christmas stories and then my whole family would curl up in their sleeping bags and sleep on the living room floor for the night under the twinkling Christmas tree lights.

This year I decided Nathan was old enough we could start the same sort of tradition here.

Since Grandpa Zoom wasn't coming for Christmas this year he came up the weekend before.

 Nathan and Grandpa ate snowman cookies, and drank little mugs of eggnog while watching the Grinch.

Then they settled in under the tree for the night.
Nathan L-O-V-E-D this new tradition. And I think Grandpa Zoom loved reliving some Christmas memories while making new ones with a new generation.

* I still have at least one more Childhood tradition I hope to revive before the seasons out- stay tuned*

In the running for Mother of the year?

My friend has an excellent saying
"...And then, I accepted my Mother of the Year Award"
(insert sarcasm font between quotation marks)
For all those times you say or do something to your child that makes you feel like maybe they should require people to get a parenting license before having kids.

I had one of those moments last night...
It's been a fight with Nathan for the past 3 bedtimes, whether he should be required to wear pajamas. The first couple of nights he has gone to been in the pajamas but also in tears.
The fight started again last night, trying to avoid a temper tantrum I changed the tactic.

This was the conversation...
"Mom, I not wear pajamas"
"If your going to bed you wear pajamas"
"NNNNOOOOO, I want to wear my clothes!!!!"
This is the point where the whine started and the eyes are brimming with tears.
"Nathan, if you want to sleep in your bed you wear pajamas. If you want to sleep in clothes I guess you need to go out and sleep in the goat barn."
There is a looooonnnnnngggg pause, as he absorbs this information. Then tries to decide if I'm serious.
"MOM, Don't be silly"
"Nathan, you don't be silly. Put on your pajamas or you'll have to sleep with the goats"
At this point he decided to go find some pajamas, rather than see if Mom was serious.
And me?
I went off to accept my Mother of the Year Award.
I'm sure threatening to make your child sleep in a barn in the dead of winter would at least get you into the finals, for such an award.

Teddy Bears' Picnic vs Toy Story. My Magical Childhood

Do you know the Teddy Bear Picnic song?
After watching Toy Story 3 for about the 9 millionth time, I had to share.
Toy Story makes me feel guilty about where all my childhood "friend" are now.
When I was a kid, We used to have a record of the Teddy Bear Picnic Song.
My parents convinced me that it was true. That Teddy Bears came to life at night, or when you weren't around and played and had picnics (Much like all of Andy's Toys in Toy Story, but long before the movie ever existed)
One afternoon, I came into to my room and "CAUGHT" them.
My parents had set out a blanket, places all of my stuffed toys out, as well as my tea set.
It was so convincing there was even cookie crumbs on the plates.
I was utterly convinced that my toys came to life.
Which is probably why, even after Toy Story has been put on repeat for days. It's one of the movies I still don't mind.
I believe that toys can have a secret life.
I have proof that mine did.
I asked my Dad if there was a picture in any of the albums of the Teddy Bear tea party. I so wanted to show you, why my childhood was magical. But alas. It happened in the days before toy story, and the days before digital camera. So there isn't picture proof of every little event. The Teddy Bear Tea party only still exists in my memories.

Girly stairs

For the last few months my Stairwell display has stayed the same. Either because I'm too lazy to change it, Or because I Love having all my Girly pieces somewhere on display that little hands can't get too. One or the other I'm not sure which.

But, I hoping to get some Christmas decorating finally done this weekend. So it's about to change, and I realized I hadn't posted any pics of how it's looking now.

Sharks and penguins and sting rays, oh my

 West Edmonton Mall, had a customer appreciation day at their sea cavern this week. = free admission.

 I took both boys, and we were there in time to see the shark feeding

Greg is getting so big, and trying so hard to do and see everything  Nathan is interested in.

WE got to stick our hands in the tide pools, where we could touch starfish. Nathan wasn't a fan, since they are both slimy and kind of rough feeling at the same time.

  We also got to pet sting rays in another pool, although Nate couldn't get them to swim close enough and couldn't reach to the bottom. I did however actually touch one, which apparently amazed a few people when I told them : )

By far, the highlight for Nathan was the penguins.

I think he would have watched them for hours, if I'd let him.

It was a fun afternoon. But even better when you don't have to pay admission to show the boys something new.

Cold days, fun afternoons

Our "new" schedule means that Greg is in babysitting on Tuesdays and Wednesdays. Nathan goes to school Tuesday and Thursday mornings and joins Greg at babysitting on Wednesdays. This gives me a day and a half to complete all my work and half a day alone with each of the boys.

Today (Tuesday, Nov. 23) was brutal temperatures, record setting temperatures actually a lot of Alberta was some of the coldest places on earth today. I know our thermometer was reading -33 at one point this morning and it doesn't factor windchill.
The highways were so bad first thing this morning that Daddy couldn't make it to work. So he worked online part of the day, and came to town with Nate and I in the afternoon. After I finished what was left of my work assignments, and we got some water, the 3 of us had a great time doing some Christmas shopping. Checking out all of the holiday decorations, and ornaments. Trying on silly hats.Drink Christmas cokes And getting Nathan to pick out a gift for his brother, specifically for him.

One of the radio stations was broadcasting from a local store so we stopped in to enter our names for a trip to Vegas ( wouldn't that be heaven to go anywhere warm right now!!!!) They were also having a crack the vault contest, where you can enter 7 numbers into their  "vault machine" and if you crack it the prize is a million dollars. How Sweet would that be???? Needless to say, we  didn't manage to crack the vault. But Nathan was thrilled with the hot chocolate, getting a sticker and a rice crispy square.
Wouldn't it be nice to be 4 and have those things be cooler than a million bucks?.

Overall we had a great afternoon out. Of course that ended pretty quick when we came home and discovered a goat half dead with hypothermia. I don't write much about the acreage here any more. Mostly because  I maintain another blog devoted to the comings and goings of animals and the work were doing on a separate blog Acreage Dreams. You can see the post about our poor goat buddy here if your interested.

adorable background idea.

How cute  is this idea?
I sent my MIL an e-mail with the picture of Nathan's Santa letter
She wants to use it as the background for her annual Christmas letter.
Instead of buying a holiday letterhead. She plans on taking the picture and she said fading. I assume reduce the opacity. Having it printed and then color photocopying 20 or so copies to print her letter on top of.
If it works out I think it will be such a cute background for a letter. I almost wish I'd thought of it first.
But I suppose as the parent it would be kind of tacky to send out your kids wish list to everyone you know?!?!?

Today was a day of kindness

I have an insanely busy week in front of me. ( well, coming from my old life of having no routines and no defined schedules. This work/school/babysitting thing is hard to adjust too)

Anyways, in order to fit everything in since I have about twice the amount of work I was expecting this week, I went and did my in store studies for most of today.

Since I have no winter boots that I'd wear to town I wore a pair of old high heeled boots. Now My arches and back are killing me. Again, I will point out I used to live in high heels, heck once I moved in them. But now-a-days I'm all about flip flops, sneakers, or rubber boots. So heels was a pretty bad choice.


having said all this...I HAD A SUPER AWESOME DAY!!!!
It was one of those days you count your blessing. People seemed to be going out of their way to try and make my day.

* The Lady at the 7-11 gave me my coffee free
* Another lady stopped me in the store
"Excuse me,"
"Yes?"
"I just have to tell you that you have gorgeous hair"
"Ummm...well, thank you. I'm a little surprised it's not even done today"
"Well, it's so pretty, I just had to tell you"
"Thank-you"
(and it's true, I thought my hair looked horrible today I had it up in a loose bun/knot on the back of my head. People usually only tell me how nice my hair is when it's down and curled under control)
* I got home and my kids were thrilled to see me.
* Greg, although he was suppose to be in bed, spent 1/2 an hour doing a dance and talking to me from his crib. He had quite a story to tell me and I just smiled and thought, these are the moments I wish would last forever.

I don't know, all in all it just felt like a very good day. Where you have to stop and count your blessing. See how people really truly, can be good and nice and make your day in such small simple ways.

Things that made me laugh while driving

There were several instances over the summer, and the last few months where I came across someones car, and just started laughing. These are the few a actually caught up to and got a picture of.

Seriously thinking of repainting my minivan to have a snazzy paint job like this.

(Although Chris says its actually suppose to be the Scooby Do van)

Here Lizard, Lizard. I think its hilarious some one turned their car into a lizard- dragon- reptile mobile.

On a Smart car. A Licence plate that reads "NOTDUMB" -Brilliant if you ask me!

And really this sign speaks for itself.

The only picture I missed that I'm still kicking myself over,

I saw an older Hurst driving down the road. Someone had obviously bought it second hand and pimped it right out.

the back window read

" A Tisket a Tasket, No Body in the Casket."

and then it had one of those gory, bloody Halloween arms dragging out the backdoor.

I just died laughing. But at 80km/h it was impossible to get a picture : (

A MOM letter

Do You ever read an article and sit there the whole time nodding your head in agreement?

That's what I did when I read this posted on a friends facebook page.

I just couldn't help thinking. "she put words to exactly what I can't explain to some friends and family"

I know I drive a few of my friends nuts that I can't have lengthy phone conversations anymore. During the day I'm too busy keeping little feet from climbing counters when they know Mom's distracted on the phone. And at Night I just need some silence. No more questions. Please. No more explaining anything for awhile.

But anyone without kids doesn't seem to get how much...

well the article expresses it better than I can.