Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas to all my blog readers. Here is hoping that Santa was good to everyone.

Christmas Eve - Afternoon

As my family relaxes this afternoon by the tree. I think of those who only have a couple hours of shopping left. I can only think how crowded the shopping places must be. Only a couple more hours till our get together with the Hanna family. Their son and D are good friends. Finger foods, games and wonderful company. Sounds like a lovely way to spend Christmas Eve. So now here is the photo for the afternoon post.

You may know that Edmonton is host to some of the IIHF World Junior games. Our city has put up this huge mural for our Canada team , on one of the buildings downtown. It is pretty impressive.

Christmas Eve AM

Well there will be 3 blog postings today. An AM posting, afternoon posting and a Christmas Eve posting. (That is- if I haven't had too much wine at the gathering tonight.) So many fun things happening today! Last night we went to view a couple of big Christmas events in town. First off is Candy Cane Lane. A community decorates their houses and you walk down the blocks and look at their displays. It was fun. Then in another subdivision is this home. This house really takes the cake. It is called Masie's Christmas Magical House. Of course their is a story behind it, but you can google that if your interested in it. The house is decorate in holiday lights and ornaments. I mean really decorated!


The christmas countdown is on.


When you look inside the windows of this house, they are filled with the neatest displays. It is amazing.


Final thought for you. It cost approximately $1000-$1500 per month for the electricity bill to light up this house.

Christmas Bells Are Ringing!

Well today I attended a sweet little event. Grade 6 hand bells concert.(Or as the Grade 6 boys call it - hand balls concert.) Sorry for the poor photos. I wasn't using my flash, as I was the only one taking photos and I didn't want to embarrass D. I was sitting practically in front of him to take photos. Anyways, he did a fantastic job and I was so proud of him. He has been participating in this for 2 years now.

Fun Christmas Event

2011 Oil Kings Teddy Bear Toss. Always a fun event to attend. Here is D with Louie the Oil Kings Mascot. Notice the special Christmas Jersey's the team and Louie will wear for tonights event. Some of the players and Louie's jersey's are then auctioned off after the game for charity. I think they are sharp!

Look who came to help with this great event! Santa helped pile 6, 600 teddy bears into trucks for kids in need this Christmas.
In the pile of Teddy Bears, Louie jumps in! Can you spot Louie?

At the hockey game, there are fun events always going on. This is called throw the perogie (similar to throw the beach ball into the crowd.) Look who is beginning the game! My own little perogie thrower.
Last- D is posing with Keegan Lowe, he is drafted by the Carolina Hurricanes.

Winter Fest

Remember the good ol'Christmas Concert at your child's school? Well times are changing. Our school begun it's first winter fest. An evening of hands on activities for children and their families to par take in. I wasn't thrilled with the new change. I very much enjoyed the play or short song my son performed with his class or school buddies. However, what a fun evening we had. Brent, D, and I enjoyed playing holiday bingo, christmas jeopardy (this was a blast) and D, enjoyed HO HO Hockey in the gym. We topped off the evening with parents and classmates enjoying a cup of hot chocolate! What a fun night.


HO HO Hockey

Holiday Bingo

Yummy cookie decorating!

HUGO - Movie Review

Go and see this movie. What a fantastic movie. All 3 of us went to see it today and all of us agree-- best movie we have seen in a while. Worth every penny. You can look up the plot but I do not want to give it away. I am really not a movie person but this film captured us. The cinamtrogaphy was outstanding. Ahh, now for a good night of baking cookies, and finishing my novel.

The house is decorated for the Holidays

Last year we didn't have a chance to make a gingerbread house and D really missed it. So this year we made sure we got the gingerbread house done early. This year D decorated the house by himself, Mom, was only allowed to apply the frosting and the wreath on the door! D had fun decorating his house and I had fun putting the wreath on the door, even if I did put it upside down on the door. Oppps. Next year I will try again and make sure it is correct. Let the Festive Season begin. Happy December.

Monopoly Anyone?

My boy is officially a crossing guard/patroller this year. He helps kids cross the street to get to school. He loves this job. Another bonus for Grade 6's.

Monopoly anyone? Here is D's halloween costume - a monopoly board. All 3 of us worked hard making this costume and it turned out awesome. He got so many compliments on it. (I think he even got some extra candy at some houses that liked his costume!)

Grade 6

Well this year D is in Grade 6. The top grade of our school. (Next year - junior high. I'm gasping on this end. ) I remember when I walked him to Kindergarten, we walked hand in hand. Not this year! Here he is taking all his school supplies on the first day. He is enjoying his first month of Grade 6. No fighting going to school this year.

Being in the top grade of the school gives the kids exciting opportunities and challenges to show their maturity. Below you will find D selling popcorn at the Meet the Teacher BBQ. They are trying to raise money for the Grade 6 final party. He was a great salesman. His team of 3 raised the most money. (Popcorn is always a hit at our school and for $.25 what a bargain.)
Come back and look for more leadership opportunities D is involved in.

Road Trip!

Summertime road trips, sounds exciting eh? Wait till you see what D and I ventured out to discover. This summer we had some of the best peperoni sausage we've ever tasted. So off we went to view the "big sausage monument", where the sausage is made. Lucky for us, 45 minutes down the highway you will come to a nice little town of Mundare. The home of the famous Stawnichy's Sausage Factory.
AND HERE IT IS! We laughed and laughed and laughed and then got out of the car to take some photos. It is the most disgusting tourist attraction I've ever taken a photo of. D and I agree ---sausage isn't the first thing you think of when you see it. Whatever you do, do not stand in the middle and look up- it is not very appealing that is for sure.
The things your mom makes you do when your young. I made D stand by the monument for these photos. He looked around to make sure no one he knew was around before walking up to it. And let it be known that we weren't the only tourists taking photos. After we took our photos and got some peperoni sausage we got in the car and headed home.

Summer Fun

What did we do this summer besides play ball? We did lots. We went and saw a few games of Oilers hockey try outs. D is really a Calgary Flames fan . The big draw of the day, was the fact that Ryan Nugent Hopkins was going to be there. We got his autograph and a photo too. So D was happy. (Unfortunately we do not know who this guy was signing autographs. ) I cannot post the photo of Nugent Hopkins, as I am making a Christmas Gift with it. Sorry.Well I am unsure the West had a real summer this year? It was cold most of July. However when your a kid and a large body of water is in front of you-- it is hard to resist the urge to at least test out the water temp. On a hot day it is called "taking a refreshing dip" on a cold day it is called"polar bear swim". As you can see by D being the only one in the fountain here, it is a polar bear dip he his experiencing!

Storms. Man did we experience 2 wild/wicked storms in Red Deer,AB. We even saw tornadoes forming in the sky. Brent and I so love storms. Below is D holding up some of the hail that covered the ground. Notice he is wearing his fall coat. The temperature went from being 22C to about 7/8C within minutes when the storm blew in. It was cold.

Rep Baseball

Well you probably know that D made the top rep baseball team. Here are some shots of him playing ball. The first photo D is at first base. The coach is behind first base, lets clarify this- it is not Brent! Brent was assistant coach number 44. D was number 19.

Here you can see Number 44&19. Dad & son. Our team finished as silver medal finalists for Alberta, Mosquito level. It was a long season but it was worth it.

By looking at the following photo you may have thought that Dawson got the chicken pocks this summer.

Wrong! It was a terrible year for mosquitoes. Being on the ball field 4X's a week, didn't help. The boys couldn't keep enough bug dope on. I felt so sorry for my boy. We had to use antihistamines to keep him from scratching. One night after ball he had 23 mosquito bites on his face & neck. He was at practice for 1.5 hours. I hope I never see mosquitoes again.

The Return

Hello! I am back after a long hiatus. I have so many photos of the last 6 months but will only post a couple each day this week. (Yes, each day this week.) Lets begin with Brent's Birthday. September 19 is Brent's special day. We celebrated it a day early. We had a nice steak dinner,oven roasted carrots and oven roasted potatoes. YUM! Of course you see Brent here with his birthday cake to finish the lovely meal off.

And of course we gave him some presents.

After opening presents, Dawson tell us he would like to have a birthday everyday, so he can get gifts everyday. That sounds good like a good life eh? Then Dawson realizes by the end of the year, he would be a ripe age of 365!!!! He decide with his mouth full of cake- that a birthday once a year is the way to go.

So many Requests!

Just a quick update. I have been soooooo busy the last month- yes, just like everyone else in this world. I am slowly and I mean slowly learning about my new mac and how to use it. So now I will have to go to mac school and learn how to post photos. I have some great photos to upload and video also. It's coming. I will try to step up the "how to classes" and get back here soon. Take care everyone.

Photos on Hold

Well our family is the proud owner of a new computer. That being said, I haven't uploaded the photo software to go with it, so that means no photos on this post. And you are not going to believe what I have to say this week, without photos. I have been busy in the kitchen cooking! Yes, me, cooking. I pulled out the slow cooker and made a fab stew. Oh it was yummy! I have also made some other meals that were equally as tasty. I am on a roll. So look for some photos hopefully next week, as I continue to be busy in the kitchen.

Enough

Enough snow! Enough cold! ENOUGH! In the last week & a half, we have had close to 65Cm of snow and temp ranging around -25 to -35C.

Here is one of the snow drifts hanging off the roof. Did I mention the wind here has been active in its own way too.

Huge icicles!

The snow fort was really big. Now it is filled with snow.

To think in 6 months I will probably be complaining it is way to hot. (It is predicted that we will have a hot & dry summer here.)

Canadian Snow Storm

Our weekend storm has brought us 30cm of the white stuff. We just shoveled and shoveled and shoveled all weekend. It was nice to get some fresh snow but this is a little much in one weekend.
Here is my little boy cleaning out the tires; so I can back up out of my parking spot to clean the snow off my car. What a great helper.

This is our yard. One good thing for Dawson; he has a huge snow fort now! (You cannot see it in this photo though. )

I want to go back to Florida!

Take care all - Jen.