nativity set

I was reading back to last year's posts from around this time of year, and just love reading the 'journal' of how things went! Something I haven't posted this year is about Alexa and my trip down South again for Black Friday weekend! She took some pictures, so I should get them from her!
We had a blast and shopped even longer this time around!

One thing I picked up from Toys R Us, was this PlayMobil Nativity Set for the kids. I have always wanted one that they can play with safely and usually had my eye on the Little People Set - but when we spotted this one for $20, I got it once and for all.
I gave it to the kids on Monday evening - I thought I would work it into a daily "advent" countdown thing, but I didn't get to it --- and the countdown begins (or continues I guess) - only 8 days until Christmas!

cookie decorating

On Monday I had Rachel and Sara and non-school kids over for a cookie decorating lunch-date! (Sorry to those who weren't able to make it!)

It turned out really well - we had a nice quiet lunch with just the small ones around (Isabella, Marty, Jaxon, Sammy and Gabi). My kids LOVED having them all here -I never have people over, so this was such a treat for them! They were soaking it all in!
Then we got out some gingerbread stars and let the kids ice, sprinkle and smartie them! Yum!

A King is Coming to Town

This year our volunteer Mom stepped up the plate again to lead our kids in a Christmas Musical - Jodie! Since doubling the production from last year's 20minutes to this year's 40minutes, practices already began before Halloween! Just on Sunday's before Church started for 45minutes. We actually really loved that because then for that 45minutes, we'd run down to Timmy's and have great fellowship with other Moms and Dads!
They did a great job - and had a lot of fun!
Here is Sammy's group, age 3 and 4's, singing one song first:and then this seems to be the only picture I got of Elijah and the actual Musical:

Family Reunion - of sorts!

On the weekend Toby Mac was in Town with Reliant K for a concert in their "Winter Wonderslam" Tour - Jason went (his 6th concert this year I think we counted) with Kurt. Anyway, that's not my point! Because of this concert, it brought into Town Laurel-Anne & Family and Colin & Family. Both Siblings of Rachel! So Rachel opened up her home for an Open House type thing to come and visit both of these Families... of course, we went! Jason pretty well lived at their house in his High School years, hey?
It was great to meet all the newest kids added to these Families and see how big the others have gotten - AND of course, visit with Colin, Kelly and Laurel-Anne! (and yes, you too Rachel!) Laurel-Anne has an Elijah too - so that was weird for my Elijah to hear his name said when not in reference to him - we actually don't know any other Elijah's!
Here are two pictures I got...
Rachel's boys and my boys: Marty, Elijah, Max and Sammyand here are two of Laurel's kids (out of 5 so far): Cara and Clay and of course, my two.It was so nice to visit! Thanks for opening up your home, Rach!

o tannenbaum

We went on the 7th to get our tree - put full snowsuits on kids due to the very cold wind we had been having...

annual "friends" Christmas Party

Year after year we have had a Christmas Party and Jason and I have hosted quite a few of them over the years. I never end up taking pictures, but this year I was sure to!
We always do a potluck dinner, usually appetizers galore, but this year I decided upon a Mexican Themed Dinner. I made two chicken enchilada dishes and rice... and others brought a Taco Salad, Bean-Avacado Dish, Mexican Spirals and Green Salad. It was a wonderful dinner! There was talk of having another theme next year and having 'best dressed couple' to go with the theme. I did have that in the invitation this year, that people could come dressed in their Mexico-best, and Aaron did! He was great with mustache painted on and heavy, authentic, large hat on his head! Thanks for your enthusiasm!
For dessert we pulled out a Chocolate Fondue Fountain that Jason's Cousins gave us (Georges and Micheline) - it worked out well with the assortment of dippers we had (cherries, pineapple, bananas, pretzels, cookies, cream puffs and more)
Here is Dana - and Jason, Steve and his new Bride, Jen (there were 3 Jen's here that night!) and then our tradition is to bring a 'white elephant' gift (something used, gag or re-gift) - we got some good stealing going on this year! Makes it more fun!
Here is Aaron with is painted on facial hair:and Sara picking a giftand Kurt opening a little teapot and teacup setand Jen opening this crazy fish that can actually swimNathan stole that as fast as he could!It was another wonderful evening of visiting!

I didn't get pictures of everyone! Sorry!
And we missed you out, Brian & Korinne, Paul & Rachel, Paul & Lisa! Next year!

Spirit of Christmas

On Friday December 4th, we dropped off Elijah at my Parent's so they could take him to basketball so that we could take Sam and Gabi to this event at TWU. We had a great time - facepaintingpetting zoomusical entertainmentoutside drama
And as crazy as we are, we picked up Elijah, stopped at home for snowpants (for warmth, not for snow) and headed to the Candlelight Parade in Mssn. It was a late night for the kids, but so fun!

The illustrations in this book are fantastic, using soft sculptures - not what you typically see that's for sure!

great story

I pulled out our Christmas decoration totes and inside were most of our books that are Christmas-themed. I thought I might share some of them on here -Merry Christmas!

Pay It Forward

Back in April I signed up on Lucy's Life blog for a Pay It Forward challenge she was doing! Here is my post about it.

Anyway, well to my suprise two weeks ago, I received a package in the mail!! From Lucy!! She so kindly and generously sent me these two books which are supported by Women of Faith - A Time to Dance by the all-famous Karen Kingsbury and The Note by Angela Hunt.

Thank You Lucy!!

trick or treat

Our Halloween Day started out by saying Goodbye to Lily and Kelly - off they went back to China to their Moms and Dads! Too bad they missed out on the day's activities!

From dropping them off at the Bus - I took the kids to Michael's to do a free Make/Take and get a free bucket with goodies and balloon! It was a good start.

We then went home and got our costumes on and headed to the Mall for some trick or treating around Noon. It was busy in there!Elijah was a lion; Sammy wanted to be his Bee costume again though it was a bit small for him; and Gabi is a poodle NOT a sheep as more than one called her!We came back for a quiet afternoon - in which Gabi got into the Halloween makeup and made herself all silly!We headed out in our Neighbourhood for some trick or treating for an hour (it was a wonderful mild night and not even too cold!) and then to my Parent's for a quick visit and around their block for trick or treating - with lack of options for Church Harvest Parties to attend, we just skipped the one or two we did know about and enjoyed the walking outside!our little Neighbour friend, Nate, was dressed as a lion too! Big Lion meet Little Lion!We convinced Uncle Matt to join us around the block and glad he did because it was just way too cute to see Gabi getting Uncle Matt to hold her and cuddle into him as she was scared from some decor one house had - adorable!

carving our patch of pumpkins

On Sunday afternoon we got out 6 of the pumpkins and carved them up!

marble game

Mom, make me a marble game please, I want a marble game... Sammy said this a few times on Monday morning - so the best I could do for him was give him a bowl and show him how to make it spin around! It worked for a little bit!I then thought Alexa might have the Marble-Works toy from Discovery Toys, so I made a phone call and picked up this toy for us to borrow!it would be nice to get the actual marble one (this one shown is for balls moreso, also from Discovery Toys) - shall we write that down on our Christmas Wish List?!

lining up to meet...

Spiderman!A Best Buy opened up this weekend in town, so to attract Families in to the store, on Saturday they had "meet Dora" and Sunday was "meet Spiderman" - for a long line up, it went real smooth and quick and the rest of the crew spent a bit of that time in the Playstation semi-truck playing some games while I got us a spot. No fuss - and it's not like we really know anything about Spiderman besides his name, but it was fun none-the-less!
Gabi wanted nothing to do with him so she didn't make the shot.

makenna turns one

On Saturday we went to Makenna's first birthday party! Sweet little thing is already one! Wow! She had a Halloween-type theme for her party - Dana did an amazing job of creating a great atmosphere and activities for the kids!
We were asked to wear Halloween colours - so my kids were all in orange and black and even some Halloween shirts!

Spread out around the house were stations for facepainting, decorating a Halloween House (gingerbread house), Halloween video and Halloween necklace making, shown here, Gabi and Aunt Katrina:And here's Makenna:

Mmmmm - cupcakes:Jessie:I even had this shirt that Lily could wear!Wish I got a picture of all 5 kids together. Elijah's shirt says "no questions, just put the candy in the bag"! We got it for super cheap after Halloween one year at Target. He usually wears it as PJs.
and yummy - a buffet of candy!