And we've hit Christmas!

We just decorated the tree last weekend, and it's starting to feel very Christmas-y around here, despite the lack of snow. Don't worry all you Vancouverites, it is still Ridiculous Cold. But with no snow, so not even worth it. But still - I am feeling very joyous and festive. True story.

Onwards... The Tree!!

Complete with single branches laden with 3 birds, a Tim's coffeepot and a pig. Our kids have an amazing way of taking "eclectic" to "extraordinary".

We also decorated a gingerbread house, which I honestly love far more than if we'd made it exactly like it showed on the box. (Yes, this is from a boxed kit. So much better, trust me.)

Each kid beside their side of the house - different personalities do you think??



Merry Christmas!!! See you in the New Year!

Birthday Bowling

Graye and Tegan's cousins had a birthday in November, so we all went glow bowling. We had a great time, especially the kids who had never been bowling before.


Graye even managed to beat Ryan's score! This could have been why...

Actually, we had a list of Top 10 Awkward Ways to Bowl (this may or may not have been the name I gave it.) ;) Bowling through the legs of your teammates was on the list. It is actually quite terrifying being the one standing there while someone else hurls a very heavy ball right beside your ankles. However, I don't think the face Jeanette was making while I took my turn was quite necessary.

Strike??!!


The boys and kids also made a snowman family that weekend. We actually had more snow then than we do now!

Wow. It's been ages...

It seems it's been almost a couple of months since I updated this blog! Sorry, all! We've been busy with school and work - Ryan is still teaching, they haven't kicked him out for unprofessional behaviour just yet (though taking a school day to play multi-hookup X-Box on the projection screen with the students seemed risky!) ;) I have started a new job, though still in the same department with the University. Instead of working with Undergraduate students, I'll now be working with the Postgraduate residents in Family Medicine. It's a big change, you can just trust me. :D

The kids are both doing great in school, coming home saying new things in French all the time. It's not going to be too long before we can't understand them at all. They have amazing teachers and birthday invites coming home every week, it seems.

I guess I'd better start the update with Halloween photos. I missed getting my kids costume pics onto Facebook with the hundreds of others I saw, hehe!

I should make it all the way to Christmas by the time I'm done these updates! Though you've probably already seen those since they will be posted above this one.... ah well.

Halloween:

Tegan had decided she wanted to be a cat (which was no easy task - keeping her on track and away from the princess costumes once this had been decided was hard work! Though the sparkly ears helped.) I was very excited about the princess-less Halloween this year!


Graye's face shows exactly how he feels about scooping out pumpkin guts.


My excitement about the princesslessness (I'm sure that's a word) didn't last long though, as I let the kids pick which pumpkin they liked from the image gallery on Google...

At least I convinced Tegan not to go with Sleeping Beauty - "Sorry honey, that's a little too much hair for mommy to carve into a pumpkin!!"

Aaaaand after we forgot to dress Tegan in her costume for daycare (yes, we were THOSE parents....) there was no convincing her to leave the princess fairy costume that the daycare lent her there, and change back into her cat costume for trick or treating.


I made Graye a "Scary Spider" costume, upon request. I was pretty proud of myself! Even added some extra eyes for extra creepiness. :)


Every parents nightma.... I mean dream - seeing their children's eyes light up (glaze over) as they stare at the mountain of candy that they worked so hard to collect:


Hope you had a happy Halloween! We are still working our way through that candy. (Though the good stuff's all long gone...)

Mountain Vacation 2011

We went on a tour of Alberta a few weeks ago - thought it was about time the kids saw the mountains! It was an amazing time to go, all the leaves were turning colours, and while it wasn't a "hot" vacation, it was still warm enough (for the most part... there is one photo of us in a blizzard!)

As with all of Saskatchewan residents' westward vacations, we had to stop in Vegreville to see the giant egg.

Ryan's artistic portrayal of "A Giant Egg":


Autumn Kids:


We stopped in Edmonton for a night to see some family, and play with the cousins.


Just outside of Edmonton, there is a place called the Jurassic Forest. It was incredible! Especially for a place I had never heard of before! Ryan's Aunt and Uncle told us about it when we were leaving Edmonton, and I'm really glad they did - I think it was the best "dinosaur" thing we saw on the trip. (And there was a lot...)

These animatronic dinosaurs were all along this nature walk, and they moved and made noise when you walked past motion sensors in the bushes.

They had a great big sandbox with bones hidden in the sand. There were brushes laying around that the kids could use to brush the sand away and find the bones.


We stopped for a visit with friends from BC, who are now living in Whitecourt, but I missed resizing photos from that one! Sorry Spivak's, but thanks sooooo much for the fun and hospitality!!

First mountain sighting (too bad Graye was fast asleep...)


We stopped again in Jasper for a couple nights and the first thing we saw there was Maligne Canyon. We took the kids on a big hike around and over it - I can't get over how deep it is! Scary.



Tegan being Tegan:

"Look! I'm camouflaged!"


"I'm a reindeer!!"


Supermodel?


One yellow tree in the middle of a thousand Evergreens.



We also managed to get a free ride up the tram to the top of The Whistlers.


Tegan and Graye both wanted popsicles as a snack from the restaurant at the top...

...despite it being like this outside:

Because of that weather, we ended up being stuck at the top of the mountain for about 3 hours. It was too windy to run the tram back down. They opened up the restaurant for everyone up there though, and we all got free soup, sandwiches, hotdogs, smokies and drinks. Very hospitable! I guess it pays to keep everyone happy when you're all stuck on the top of a mountain, with a very steep dropoff a few steps away, haha!

Ryan contemplating life, the world and everything.


We had an amazing loft hotel room in Jasper, with a fireplace perfect for roasting marshmallows!

This was the view we had in the morning. I think there were four elk out there:


We then went to Athabasca Falls - it is incredible how much water pours over those falls! It's hard to wrap my head around it.




On our way to Banff! And the Columbia Icefields on the way...


With another short stop at Lake Louise:



We went geocaching at Bow Falls in Banff:


And after a couple of days in Banff we went to Calgary to visit Ryan's sister, Kristen, and her husband Chris.

First stop there was the zoo! (And more dinosaur sightseeing!)

Biggest bat I've ever seen:

Joeys!


Bet you can all guess where our last stop before home was...

Yep. Couldn't leave without seeing Drumheller!


And there you have it! 300 photos condensed into this blog post. Haha! The kids traveled really well, there were only a couple of times that I was going to leave a kid on the side of the road. Not too bad! Next year, maybe we'll make it all the way back to BC.