Christmas Activities

After a long break here are some new blog shots. We have been having fun with the lead up to Christmas holidays. We started with a Health Region Kids' Christmas party through my work held at Zoolights. It was a bitterly cold night, but we bundled up in many layers to enjoy dinner, a visit and gift from Santa as well as a chance to walk around the Zoo and take in the light displays.

Emily was brave for her first Santa visit and was thrilled with her gift, a classic puppy pull toy.

Andrew wasn't too sure about the Santa visit, but held it together to get his present he kept eyeing in the distance.

Matthew was able to have a bit more of a chat with Santa before receiving his gift.

The boys always love playing with the "snowballs" they have out at the zoo.

Even though it was about minus 20, Matthew said he felt warm after rolling and racing around with the "snowballs".

Everyone has had a Christmas concert which allowed for some good photo opportunites. Here are Matthew and Emily before we all went to Matthew's school concert. He joined the Choir this year and they put on a nice concert last week.

Andrew's Winter Celebration was today. Bruce was out of town and Matthew at school, but Emily, Andrew and I went. The children sang some songs and then we enjoyed some delicious goodies.

Even Emily had a concert for her Music and Your Baby group. Here she is dressed up for the big event.

And here she is in her costume. They did " A hunting I will go", which Andrew had done a couple of years ago so we have photos of him in the same costume.

It's all about Emily

Well the littlest always gets the most photos taken, and that is no exception at our house. I guess that is because Emily is changing the most, and is always in another cute outfit! She has changed a lot in the last month. Here she is at Andrew's Winter Celebration eating her snack and you can see she now likes to use a fork.

She also loves to color as of late and is always looking for a pencil and paper.

She is quite the "cook". Here she somehow got her hands on our raspberries and a pot and was putting them in and out, eating a few here and there as she went along. It is hard to see in the photo but she was quite red from head to toe and needed a bath afterwards.

Emily loves soft things and puts on this scarf of mine every opportunity she gets. Here she is pushing her laundry basket. She is close to walking on her own, but still likes to push something, or walk holding onto one of our fingers.

She likes costumes as do her brothers. Our neighbors gave us some costumes and we couldn't resist seeing Emily dressed up as a leopard.

Putting thing in and out of containers is a frequent pasttime.

Emily loves wearing a hat, and really any container will do if she does not have her real hats around.

Fine Motor Finesse

I thought I'd better get some fine motor footage of Emily. Here she is at just over 12 months placing people pegs in her pop up toy. At first this toy really frustrated her, but in a few short days she was having success. She really sticks at it until she gets them in. If she puts one in upside down, she corrects it on her own. She also figured out how to press them down with one finger to pop them out. You can hear Matthew and Andrew in the background making a lot of noise doing who knows what in our family room.

Halloween

I hadn't even really started all our birthday thank yous, when the Halloween season was upon us. Halloween is no longer just one night of trick or treating, there are so many events, and all the more if you multiply by 3 children. Here we are before our trick or treating last night. Bruce stayed to give out our candy, while I took Matthew, Andrew and Emily around to the neighborhood houses. Emily didn't collect candy this year, but Andrew and Matthew were right into that part. They were most pleased with their large haul from very generous neighbors.

Earlier yesterday Matthew enjoyed his second day of school Halloween festivities, and dressed up as Harry Potter. Emily and I went with Andrew on his preschool pumpkin hunt. It was very cold and windy north of the city, so Emily had to bundle right up.

Andrew was successful in finding a nice pumpkin hidden by hay in the forest, which he decorated later.

Before the pumkin hunt we were at Emily's music class where everyone wore their costumes, including Fifi the pink poodle.

Last weekend we were lucky to be invited to a Halloween party at a friend's house. Here is Sir Matthew decorating his pumpkin.

Andrew the brave firefighter at the party.

Earlier that day we had our community Halloween party complete with a magician, treats and a costume parade. Here is our firefighter before the party.

Matthew has all the Knight moves and was happy to show them off before the community party.

Whew I am ready for some down time in November, before all the Christmas festivities get into full gear!

Matthew turns 7!

We have had a very fun, but busy, month with October birthday celebrations. After Emily's parties, we were on to Matthew's. Last weekend we had a party with some of his friends at a gymnastics club. After some gym fun, we enjoyed snacks and cake. He chose a "Hot Wheels" theme for his cake so we made a "7" race track road on his cake. He made "start" and "finish" signs for the cake, and put a few new Hot Wheels on the track. Yes one car has had a crash and is upside down!

The kids liked having time on the trampolines and jumping in the foam pits. Matthew wishes we could have a big foam pit at our house. I told him to ask Daddy about that request!

We had a family party for our 4 October birthdays, including Emily's and Matthew's, the weekend before. Here is lucky Matthew with one of his gifts, a cool dinosaur book, complete with a poster for his room.

Here is a good one of the boys in matching hockey jerseys before the party. The driveway looks a wee bit different today as we had our first snowfall last night, after a beautiful plus 25 day yesterday!

Emily Walking

I have been meaning to upload a clip of Emily walking. This is her preferred mode of travel as of late, though she still needs a chair or something else to hold onto. She likes to push something around on her chair and this can be a paper, a toy or as in this clip, a container from the recycling. She does laps and laps around the kitchen and then the whole upstairs. She is quite good at repositioning herself around the chair to change directions when necessary.

Mom, Mom, There is an Animal in Our Backyard!

Andrew can be kind of dramatic and often will tell me about an animal in the house even if it is just a little flea or piece of fluff. Today he came and said "Mom, Mom, there is an animal in our back yard", and of course I was expecting a squirrel, but look who we found! This has been quite a year for wildlife in the neighborhood as we've had bear sightings and one even managed to get into the hospital nearby.

Edmonton to Calgary through Matthew's Eyes

On the trip back to Calgaryfrom Edmonton Matthew took charge of the camera. I am always interested to see what catches his eye and he deems photo worthy. Here are a few of the shots. I left out the one of the bag of chips he bought with his allowance. This one of Emily at the rest stop was cute.

Here are some of the bunnies which have taken over the rest stop at the Heritage Ranche in Red Deer.

He took quite a few farming shots.

Andrew loved posing for the camera while we were driving.

Emily's Birthday

We went to Edmonton for a whirlwind Thanksgiving visit. We were able to get in some nice visiting and playing, though we are never able to catch everyone we want to, in one visit. Of course Emily is our Thanksgiving baby so here she is on her birthday. I am not sure if she is waving Hi, or trying to fend herself from the camera.

Emily was a good sport to go with the boys and friends to Chuck E. Cheese's on her birthday. This is an Edmonton tradition for Matthew.

There are three spots on the Carousel there, and we now fully get our token's worth as Matthew, Andrew and Emily can go on together.

Here is Emily riding her pony.

We had a pumpkin icecream cake for her after Thanksgiving dinner. We had to keep putting the cake further and further away so she wouldn't get the lit candle. She did manage to grab some of the pie and sample it first. She seemed to quite enjoy it. As you generally get to pick your favorite foods for your birthday we are really hoping her favorite is turkey dinner and pumpkin pie or we may have to alter our traditional Thanksgiving fare.

Emily has gotten quite good at opening her own gifts. She got the ribbon off this one before I could even get a photo, and you can see how carefully she is working at getting the wrapping paper off.

On other notes Emily loves doing laps around our kitchen pushing a chair. She has a new word, "uh-oh", and there are plenty of occasions to use it with her around! She went for her one year check today and she is still off the charts for height at 80cms. She weighs just over 23 pounds which puts her in the 75th-90th percentile for weight.

Emily is Turning 1!

Emily is turning 1 this upcoming Sunday. The past year has flown by! She will have a number of festivities, but we kicked it off last weekend with a kids' party on "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" theme. I uploaded the photos in reverse order. Here she is enjoying a birthday cupcake.

Here she is with Daddy enjoying a bit of birthday lunch.

Emily was hanging out before her party having some raspberries. These are a favorite, but we often have to do a quick change of clothes afterwards as they are messy for her to eat.

The boys loved looking at her cake. We made a caterpillar out of cupcakes with a beautiful butterfly in the middle. The boys enjoyed playing some friends at the party, and breaking open a butterfly pinata with them to get at a bunch of candies and toys.

Emily the Musician

Other people may have the dancing babies like you see on Youtube and the like, but we have the musical baby!

Emily in the Drawers

Emily has taken right over as you can see. She doesn't just play in the drawers, or even just sit in them...she gets fully in them and starts throwing everything out. She is doing more cruising when standing. She is making more sounds and says Ma or Mama for mom and Uh for up.

Little Monkey

Emily is a bit of a little monkey as she has started climbing things and this is where I found her today. Evidently the highchair is for babies and she is choosing her own seat now! On other notes Bruce said she got up to stand doing a deep knee bend from the middle of the room not holding onto anything. When standing if she is playing with a toy she can forget to hold on and stand on her own for about five seconds. Her favorite new game is rolling a ball back and forth with someone.

Here is Matthew with one of his latest creations. I thought I had better get a photo of someone other than Emily! School is going well. He is working on new reading words. He finished a sticker chart for good classroom behavior yesterday and was able to pick a prize. He was delighted with his glow in the dark lizard, and is anxious to start his new chart so he is closer to getting his next prize.

Here is C-Bear on his last morning with us eating his breakfast. Matthew kindly ate the portion that C-Bear left behind. I do not have any photos of Andrew, but he is doing very well at preschool. He loves the activites and snack time. He is crazy about his trike and is out riding several times daily. He can ride to and from our little community playground. He was even out riding in the snow today. Yes you read that correctly we did have snow this early in September. Thankfully it was just a bit and melted as it hit the ground!

Emily's Cruising

Emily is officially a "cruiser". She can take a few steps around furniture and venture from one piece of furniture to another. Here she is enjoying a friend's bowling and swimming birthday. She monitored the ball return while the older children enjoyed turns bowling.

Here is Emily apres swimming in the locker room. She loved cuddling up in her super cozy robe

You never know quite where you will find Emily now. This time she got herself right into a drawer and was ripping out all the papers!

Matthew's classroom has a teddy bear who reminds me a bit of Paddington, though "C-Bear" does not originate from Deepest Darkest Peru. The children take turns bringing C-Bear complete with his backpack filled with a toothbrush, hairbrush, journal and bedtime stories, home on weekends. Matthew had the first turn to bring him home this past weekend. He and Andrew took very good care of him around here, and they fixed up my old doll crib for him to sleep in at night. We took C-Bear on a bike ride around the Reservoir, on the Ferris Wheel at Heritage Park and to the birthday party. Then this evening Matthew drew a picture for his journal and wrote a short composition about their adventures to share with the class. It will be fun to get him back for Matthew's next turn later in the year and see all the other things C-Bear has been up to!