Around our house...2009

Some of our favourite sounds at Christmas...

• "It's a Hi-5 Christmas" CD. Max would have listened to this CD 24-7 if I would have allowed it.
• Cuddling on the couch with a big stack of Christmas books and reading them out loud.
• Jets in the hot tub. Ahhhhhhh...Bliss!

• Hearing Max say on Christmas Eve: "Mom. I really need these carrots. To feed the reindeer. I need 9. One for each."

• Hearing Max on Christmas morning rush into our room at 7:50am excitedly saying "MOM! DAD! Santa was here! And he left me a big diamond. Or else it's his pack! That's all I can figure out. He left me a diamond or he left his pack!" The little stinker had snuck downstairs without waking us up first, to see what was under the tree. Here he is opening up the big "diamond/santa's pack".

• Hearing my little Maximus humming and singing Christmas songs. His versions are great. "Walking in the window by the fire..." (Walking in a Winter Wonderland) and his Deck the Halls version is pretty crazy....not sure where, how or why the Egyptians come into play...

"Deck the Hall with thou's of holly, fa la la la la la-la-la-la,

Twiz the season to be jolly, fa la la la la la-la-la-la,

don we now our gay appearal, fa la la la la la la-la-la,

Don't forget the Egyptians, fa la la la la la-la-la-la!"

 

 

 

Some sweet little sights around our house at Christmas...

• My "found" antique silver tea service. It's very special...my first birthday gift from Keith ever. We were just engaged. He knew I liked oldish things. He bought it at an antique market and surprised me with it...I think I turned 26 that year. When we moved out to BC, it somehow went missing. Buried in rubbermaid tubs in our various storage rooms. And at Christmas time when I would think of it...I didn't have the desire to start tearing apart an entire storage room. After our latest move, I came across it early in the fall and deliberately set it aside. So pleased that I could bring it out and polish it up. It's been about 6 years since we've laid eyes on it :-)

• Using our collection of Christmas mugs. Somehow they just make coffee and tea taste a bit more festive.

• Christmas Art Masterpieces exhibited in our gallery, complete with periodic visits from the artist in residence himself.

• Presents wrapped and ready to go. These are for the "Adults Only Penny Auction" at my parents on Christmas Eve. Not to worry, it's not x-rated or anything like that. I say adults only, because we make sure we put the kiddos to bed before we start. That way they get to bed at a half decent hour and the adults can also relax and enjoy the evening.  

• Decorations throughout the house. This year the theme was "anything goes". The last 3 Christmases have been each spent in a different house. The decorations in our Kelowna house were definitely more silver oriented. Which does not work in our current house at all....the tones of it all lean toward gold. And I didn't feel like starting over yet again. So I decided to go with a gold and silver theme and mix in the red stuff from our Vancouver house. I know it didn't particularly flow the best. Would never make it on the pages of a magazine. And that's quite ok. There are alot of memories tied up in these decorations and that's what counts!

• Matching sockies for my sissies...Little tradition where for more years then I can count, I have bought all my sisters coordinating PJ bottoms to be worn at Christmas. This year I left it too late. There was absolutely no coordinating to be had. They each got PJ bottoms, but barely. I found these darling little sock/slippers at Reitman's and added them to the PJ's. Cute, eh? They make me happy! They almost look like they were hand knit. Which has made me wish I could knit. I'm adding that thought to my New Years Resolutions. Can this old chick learn a new trick? We shall see. In the meantime, LeeAnne and I had fun wearing and admiring our new foot gear. :-)

•  Stockings hung with care... 

• Cookies and Milk too...

 

 

•  Out of the corner of my eye, seeing Max run to the cookie plate on Christmas morning to see if Santa had eaten the cookies and milk that he left out for him. There were a few crumbs and pieces left. Which made for a satisfied smile on his face. Next he was off to the patio door to check out the carrot situation. Santa's reindeers had gobbled them all up...except for a few tops. Seems they don't like their greens. Max didn't say much as he was inspecting it all, but his smiling face was priceless!

Some of the yummy tastes of Christmas...

• Grilled salmon, mashed potatoes and spinach salad for our little family dinner on the 23rd. There was alot of salmon to be eaten. Aunt LeeAnne gladly joined us and helped to make the fish disappear.

• I had big intentions of baking a "Happy Birthday cake for Jesus" but it didn't happen. Instead, we frosted some cupcakes added sprinkles and wrote Happy Birthday Jesus with icing and added a few candles. Max was thrilled and it worked out just as good as a cake would have. We're all about cupcakes around here :-)

• Coffee and Cinnabons enjoyed by the three of us on Christmas morning. YUMMMM!

Sugar overload anyone? Feel free to have a nibble or bite of Keith and Max's sugar-high chalet...

• Kids hot chocolate at Starbucks...

 

• In fact, you just can't go wrong with ANYTHING at Starbucks! :-)

 

One favourite little tradition at Christmas...

• Opening up one present on Christmas eve. It's never a toy. Always new pajama's. To be worn to bed that very night. This was a tradition when I was a kid. Sometimes, they were sewn by my mom with lots of love and care - embroidery, ruffles, you name it. Other times they were ordered straight from the Sears catalogue and we all marched around in a different colour of the same style PJ's. It varied from year to year, but each Christmas eve, there was a new pair for each of us kids. We've continued this tradition with Max. He was allowed to open his present before we went to church on Christmas eve.
   

Glow-in-the-dark hockey pajama's. AWESOME!

 

But wait...there's more. Just what he wanted. A matching bathrobe. I'm not kidding about him wanting that. He wanted it last year already. He had been on a sleepover at Jack's house. Jack had a bathrobe and Max throught this was the coolest thing ever. They were scarce last year and I wasn't able to find one in time for Christmas. This year I kept my eyes open early and it seems that they were a more popular item because I didn't have trouble finding one.

 

Check it out. Here he's busy admiring his reflection in the window. It says "The Champ" on the back of the robe.

 

Doesn't he look like the Lord of the Manor in this shot? ha!!

 

But without a doubt, the most precious thing for me at Christmas is...

 

...being with my little family. My two most sweet and handsome boys. No matter where in the world we are, as long as we're together, that's what's sweet to me! :-)