My Blog (for now): Christmas 2009 Come and Gone

We have had a true white Christmas this year. It started with a blizzard in the second week of December and it hasn't ended.

We had real blizzard, Reuben's hockey and Ryan's basketball games were cancelled in Kanai and Medicine Hat and to top it off church was cancelled. The day was December 13, 2009. I have never in my life had church cancelled. We had lots of fun. Since Raymond is small we had our friends over for soup and scones on Saturday and then our neighbours invited a bunch of families over on Sunday. So we had lots of fun.

There hasn't been much of a chinook yet so we still have lots of snow. It has also been really cold, we have had lots of -30 days. Even though it is pain to bundle everyone up I still love it. I just don't go anywhere.

We spent Christmas at the Steed's this year. The usual fun, skating, food, games etc. There some really cold days so we went swimming and played inside a bit. But between Christmas and New Year's we had lots of fun tubing, tobaganing and skating. Christmas Eve was the traditional steak dinner, with four lobsters for Uncle Richard (he begged for them). Aunt Jenny-Lynn has been bugging us for months to prepare a number for the Christmas Eve program. All of her nagging paid off I think it was our best yet. My family performed Mary's Boy Child, I think it was because Ava sang it really cute so we all learned it. I played a cello Ennio Marcionni song (one of Grandpa Barrie's favorites). Everyone did something so it was great. Two things that helped the evening was: Feed the babies candy while the nativity was on, feed the other kids popcorn while the program was on and feed the kids first then turn on a movie while the adults eat. It went very well. Aunt Becky wrote a script for the nativity so it went much smoother. The kids were really into it and took their parts seriously.

We love Grandpa's hockey rink. We wish we could use it more. Ava got really good a skating this year. She loved it.

Reuben received a hockey jersey for Christmas. His father (an oiler's fan) hasn't had much influence on his choice of team. The brainwashing from the Uncles is really working. Although the other day he told his Dad that he should go to an oiler's game with Evan and Henry in Edmonton. We asked him if he would go and he said yes, we asked who he would cheer for and he said maybe both of them. Reuben loved skating on Grandpa's rink.

Ava really started to get the hang of it this year. She used a skater helper and loved it. She spent lots of time on the ice.

Caroline and her new doll Emily. She dressed her in her winter clothes and took her out for a skate. We got the music out so that she could dance. Just like the good old days, we spent hours doing that.

We all made Christmas nightgowns for the girls. It does seem like a big waste of time, but I just have such a good memory of my Mom doing every year and it just seems like something I should and I do enjoy doing. (it does help me learn to sew and Aunt Kathy says everyone needs to be able to do that for hard times)

The little girls had purple snowflake nightgowns, they looked so cute. Caroline chose her own fabric and she wanted pajamas and Reuben got hockey pj pants. (sort of ran out of time for his top)

Caroline and her new American doll Emily. She complained that she received no toys this year only crafts, but I think she likes her doll. Notice Otis in the background his and Henry's pjs were probably one of the cutest things I have ever seen.

At first Reuben wasn't so sure about Christmas morning but after a while and the help of Uncle Richard(he had to make sure Reuben got a cowboy hat, for some reason Reuben is his only hope of being a farm/hunter/cowboy kid) Reuben realized that he did have a great Christmas.

Ava was most excited about the treats in her stocking and she did like her toy guitar. Ava is really into music right now. She loves to sing and we spent all of December looking through the Reader's Digest music book and singing the songs. I think that is how we came upon Mary's Boy Child. She would get the music stand out, put the big book on, stand on a chair and sing.

This year some of us went to the lodge in Magrath and performed a little concert. I think it was a highlight for all of us. It was like the good old days, Mom taking us to the old folk homes to perform. We probably had more fun getting ready for it. The boys sang with us (Ryan, Robert, Richard, Dad, David) and it was so fun we got them to sing most of our songs. We gave them the melody and they did great. After we had a big Mexican feast at my house. Aunt Joy arrived with enough food to feed an army. We love having a house just for the reason that we can have people over.

Caroline performed Jingle Bells and Good King Wencesles on the cello. It was her first public performance. Her mother forgot to tune the cello and lets just say the piano must have never been tuned before. Caroline has quite a good ear so she couldn't figure out what was wrong with her cello, she tried to move her fingers up to get it in tune. We quickly stopped and I tuned it and then she started again. She did great.

Granny C was tickled.

Gladys Sheer (Granny C's best friend) offered to hold Rose. We had quite a few kids there (Hannah, the McCue's, Jones', and Baldry's). Rose sat on her lap happily the whole time. Gladys was so excited she couldn't stop talking about how lucky she was that she sat there.

I hope I will be like my Mom and do things like this with my kids.

Oh here is picture of the adorable pjs (and kid) Tina really outdid herself.

Christmas morning

After Calgary we came back to Raymond, went to sugar bowl, had all the Hicken cousins over, stayed up way to late playing games every night. The Baldry's were really into Werewolf. Debated whether to go to Utah with Roger and Kari, to see the Hunters. Roads looked bad, and we were exhausted so we went back to Calgary for New Years instead. I'd say we had a successful holiday season. We put up a real tree from Home Depot (I was so mad, it was beautiful but died in about a week). Had lots of parties and stayed up really late. A success.

Here are some family pictures (Christmas dresses are from Kalispell, they were each not more than $16, you can't afford to make them) Of course I didn't send out a Christmas card, I still might send a New Years one, but probably not because I can't ever get my act together.