Friday 30 December 2016

Christmas Holidays

We have been celebrating.

Food. Friends. Family. Food. Food.

So much food.

This is one of my all time favourite pictures of the kids. 


I took it 7 years ago.

I asked them to recreate it on Christmas Eve before we headed off to Mass.


It wasn't easy.  I think I took about 20 photos and this was actually the last one I took!

It's been a week of card games and visits and playing outside...and food....and watching the Dukes and Heartland and 'Family Matters'....they can all impersonate Steve Urkle perfectly!

Today we did the annual making of the gingerbread houses...



The girls were all gung hoe ready to go.  But the boys not so much.

Jack happened to come in from the barn and quickly made one....just so he would have one to eat later.  And he managed to eat a fair amount of candy while he made it.


It's all about the candy.  Even if it was 10am.  That didn't matter.



Sophie's had a horse and buggy in the yard...


Lydia made a skating rink with those minty round things...



Johanna's was very very detailed...



Grady said no and went back out to the barn.

Brenda



Thursday 22 December 2016

Wednesday 21 December 2016

A Snowmobile and Christmas Baking

I casually asked Lydia's teacher if there was something I could do to help out with the Christmas pageant during parent teacher interviews about a month ago.

She said that she really needed a snowmobile.

As a prop.  Made of cardboard.

I said....ya. No problem.  Leave it to me. I'm on it.

Even though I was in the middle of last minute renos and painting and trying to move into another house.

I became in the middle of snowmobile making.


The only safe to put it for painting was on the stepdancing board...you can see Johanna's shoes that I put off to the side....





It took me hours but I enjoyed the challenge.  And everyone thought it was pretty amazing.

The porcupine was suppose to be driving it but because I made it so incredibly massive there was room for the beaver and the otter to ride on it too!





What a hoot!...or maybe that's a woot...for those of you who really know me!

Anyways....the concert was amazing.

Lydia was the otter and her best friend was the beaver....how cute are they?


In other news...I'm up to my eyeballs in Christmas baking!

A pull apart cupcake cake....Grinch style!


And squares and decorated cookies....


Brenda

Thursday 15 December 2016

We moved. and the bus came!

WE MOVED!

It wasn't a typical move where you move everything and the house is empty. 

We moved down the road. 

So we moved but we didn't move it all. 

But we moved quite a bit.

I went back to the house about once a day for the last several days and I would end up bringing home a whole entire car load of stuff back with me.  But the last time I went I just needed a couple of things.

There are a lot of things that I actually just want to leave there.  You can accumulate a ridiculous amount of 'stuff' in 20 years.

I thought I would be really emotional with this whole thing but I honestly wasn't.  That house was the house that we moved into when we were first married.  The house that I brought all my babies home from the hospital to.  So many good memories in that house.

But that house was freezing cold and very old and we worked to try and fix it up but it just never worked.  It had lathe and plaster walls and the dust was unbelievable.

This house is so much warmer.  and better.

Lydia had a hard time falling asleep the other night.  She came back down the stairs several times complaining about how hot she was....I told her to take off those socks and change into a nightie...those warm winter pjs are just too warm!

It's lovely.

AND the bus....it comes and picks up the kids at the end of the laneway like it does with everyone else!

It's lovely.

Before I had to drive them to meet the bus in the morning and pick them up in the afternoon. 

Now they walk!

I went out to watch the bus on the first morning that it came.




And I thought that our dog Ruby got on the bus too!



But she didn't!...thank heavens!



She had never seen a bus before!  She is loving her new home too!

Brenda

Wednesday 30 November 2016

A Cupcake Cake in the Shape of a Cupcake!

I made my first pull-apart cupcake cake on the weekend.  It was SO easy!

And it was in the shape of a cupcake.


See it?  Can you see it?

So it was a cupcake cake in the shape of a cupcake.


As I was putting it together, every time someone walk into the kitchen they would ask what I was making...

a cupcake cake in the shape of a cupcake.


And they would say a WHAT?

And I would need to repeat it and explain it.

And then the next person would come walking thru the kitchen....and ask...

So blessed to live with 6 people!


A cupcake cake in the shape of a cupcake.

Easiest cake to make only slight mental break down having to explain it again and again.

The cupboards have arrived!

I love my white kitchen but I was convinced to go with wood....so I picked maple....


The kids had a snow day yesterday because of freezing rain.  I was trying to tile a backsplash and luckily my Aunt dropped off a couple early Christmas presents on the weekend!  They are crazy about this colouring kit.



They coloured and read books and watched a movie and I nearly got the backsplash all tiled.


Nearly. 

The tile cutter busted.


Tomorrow.  It will get finished tomorrow.

Brenda