December 2012 Highlights | Photos

 A recap of the Court family highlights in December 2012:

 

Atlas & Mama out in the cold at the Santa Claus Parade.

 Otto "out cold" after the Santa Clause Parade! (Yes, he can sleep pretty much anywhere!)

 

Atlas having some fun at our gym day. (We took cars and bikes and the jumping tent over to the gym and a tonne of kids came to play)

 All the handmade Christmas presents this year. (there were a few more, but I didn't get pictures!) - An apron for my sister, various goodies and treats for students, neighbors, and friends, green bag for a friend, leg-warmers for a friend, and a clutch bag for a friend. I love hand-made Christmas!

 Otto and I visited "Christmas at the Hive" at a local honey farm. We were very excited to go on the hay ride, but when we got there, were disappointed to find that the horse was sick! There wasn't a lot to do, but we had fun just the two of us.

 Atlas just being adorable!

The bottom picture was taken at a friend's cookie decorating party. They boys had a blast. There were cookies and punch and balloons! What more could a little boy ask for?!

They had a great party where Great-Gramma lives. The boys loved the live music. They danced and had treats and were so happy!

 I made the boys Dino Tails, which are so much fun! Unfortunately, Atlas is the only one who will put it on (Otto still refuses! Maybe we should get a friend - or cousin - he thinks is really cool to wear one and then maybe he'll put one on!) Atlas and Gramma had fun wearing them on Christmas Day and chasing each other around.

 Family Christmas time just isn't the same without the games! Atlas and Otto even tried their hand! We played Tile Rummy, Bunko, lots of Quidler and Phase 10, and Monopoly Deal.

Whew! What a great December! This year, I really focused on our Christmas Activity Advent calendar, where we would try to do a Christmas activity each day. Some days it was just to watch a new movie or read a Christmas book, but it made our December so busy and so much fun! I even made a "December Daily" album where I documented the day-by-day of our December. 

And now it's Happy New Year to all of you, and may your 2013 be all you make it to be!

Merry Christmas | Christmas Nativity

 Merry Christmas! It's Christmas Eve afternoon, and half of us are visiting with family. The other half are napping or preparing for tomorrow. We've been having fun playing with some new Nativities. Here are the Nativity Blocks I made for Otto and Atlas to play with. They both love them, and I love them too, since I'm not worried about them getting wrecked! We've been doing a Christmas advent calendar, with Christmas activities each day. I set these up the night before, and in the morning when I told them there were Nativity Blocks to play with, they were so excited!

I used this set

  

(if you're interested in this set for this purpose, you will need to ask for the PNG files from the company because they only provide you with a PDF file, which is locked and comes in larger sizes than you really want for this project). I shrunk all the images in photoshop and printed them out at home, then mod podged them onto the blocks.

Merry Christmas to you all

 -

I hope you have time to reflect on the Nativity in your own ways, as we have had the chance to do all this month.

In the Christmas-Making mode

It's been busy around here, getting ready for Christmas. I like to hand-make or "home-made" many of my gifts - a tradition handed down to me from my parents. And because pretty much everything I've been making these days are Christmas presents for some who may read this blog, I can't post any pictures yet!

I do miss scrapbooking, and hope to get back to it after the Christmas rush. Looking forward to a scrapbook day with my SIL. Here's a LO I did before all my Christmas preparations began, but I just haven't posted it yet!

This year has been somewhat exciting, seeing the joy on the boys' face, and being able to do more with Otto. We do an "activity advent", where we do some sort of Christmas activity each day. This morning, we baked some plastic ornaments - a project you'd think Atlas would enjoy as well, and he did... for about a minute. Then the beads were unceremoniously dumped on the tray, and the crying commenced (he woke up WAY too early this morning and is currently down for his second nap of the day!) Now, I say "somewhat" exciting, mostly because I get all excited to do a simple craft with Otto, and sometimes it works out, but most of the time, he's either entirely uninterested or he is occupied for only a short while. I need to remind myself that he is 3 and actually doing pretty good considering. We have been to the Santa Claus Parade (out in the cold!) and Story Time with Santa. Otto and I went to "Christmas at the Hive" at a local honey farm. We've made a foam gingerbread house, several ornaments, watched several new movies, and read lots of Christmas books. Christmas is still wonderful, no matter what age.

Happy and Holidays

{Otto, so happy on Christmas Eve}
While I love the holidays and everything that goes along with that - the family, the food, the games - I am somewhat glad it is all over and we are all getting back to normal.

That said, we had a really great holiday. Games were played, Wii was experienced, food was eaten{oh yes it was}, Otto was loved by all, and we saw everyone in the family but Niki's family, whom we all missed terribly, especially since she had her baby girl on December 10th. We can't wait to see her in February! Welcome, welcome, little Cedar Rose!


{Otto and cousin Paisley hangin' out all cute-like on Christmas morning}













{Otto saw his first Santa Claus Parade. He was mesmerized with the lights and sounds. As you can see here, he was still trying to look out into the street.}



















{Otto, so happy in his new Christmas hat - thanks Metcalfe family!}

Christmas Come and Gone

Wow. What a busy holiday! I hope you all had a great Christmas! I did, for the most part. The very day I started my Christmas break, I began a 6-day fever/headache/strep throat. It didn't help any that the E.R. doc took one look at me and said that I was fine, I was just running a slight fever. But he "humored" me and took a swab of my throat. Sure enough, two days later (through the weekend and getting worse and worse by the day), I phoned up my own Dr. and they said, yep, it's strep. So they got me on antibiotics and I was actually feeling better on Christmas day. After that, I was pretty good.

But, Christmas was a time to be happy and have fun visiting with family! Everyone was home this year in both our families, so that was a real treat. Andy and I got to spend time with family we see the least because of distance, so we were really happy to get to do that.

Highlights of this Christmas:

~The nativity play my nieces and nephew put on. Notice how baby Jesus is a rolled up towel under Kaiomhe's dress... and then out it popped! She was so proud!





















~The white elephant exchange with Andy's family. Andy, Daryl, and Adin kept stealing each other's presents because everyone wanted what they had: mint Oreo's, Wagon Wheels, and chocolates. Andy ended up with a spatula. Also fun was how excited John was with his motorcycle. Good thinking, Juanita!
















~Andy's excitement with his gifts: the One Piece t-shirt I made for him, and the Carcassonne game I got him. We played it every few days with whoever would play it with us!


~The little house I made for Andy's Mom. (picture at the top)I think it turned out pretty cute! I hope she liked it!












Well, I hope your Christmas was wonderful! Happy New Year to you all!

Candy Cane Popcorn!

Here it is! I broke my back trying to get popcorn and nuts 'n bolts done in the same night and now I'm paying for it - sick, sick, sick.
But doesn't it look yummy?
Pop about 18-20 cups of popcorn
Pour about 3 two-handed handfuls of white chocolate (melted of course) over.
Crush at least 5-6 candy canes in food processor. Pour over chocolate.
Mix all together until completely covered.
Lay out on counter to cool.
Pour into Glad 2L freezer bags. Decorate with ribbon.
Enjoy!

First of the Christmas Baking! (Finally)

I am so glad I finally have some energy to get stuff done around here!

Last Saturday I made shortbread and gingerbread cookies, then started to put up Christmas decorations (and this was after the funeral for an old family friend - I had the privilege of playing the piano for him). There should be a picture of the aftermath of decorations, but I'm too embarrassed because doing all this wiped me right out and the house is still in shambles! Sunday we had church and choir practice, braved the cold to visit with some friends and then some family and when we came home, we went straight to bed! What a busy weekend! Monday it didn't stop because I spent all the time between preschool in the morning, till my students came in the afternoon decorating the gingerbread cookies and using the leftover chocolate to dip an entire bag of pretzels! These pretzels are the BEST for dipping! (I got the last bag at Extra Foods in High River!) And if you have kids, what an easy and fun activity!




So now that I have all these things done, I still have to make a tonne of candy cane popcorn (don't worry Megan, it's coming!) and a huge batch of nuts and bolts.