The Good Ol Outdoor Rink!

No, Murray has not decided to repeat last year's heroic efforts to give the girls their own backyard rink.

don't be fooled by the smiles, these pictures provide a false impression of how much fun was really had!
Instead, we took them downtown to one that someone else has made. MUCH easier, especially since that's probably the only skating they'll do this year and it only lasted for about half an hour. They enjoyed it for awhile but it wasn't long before they were asking to go home.
Considering we spent at least an hour getting their stuff gathered up, dressing them apporpriately, doing a bathroom run, getting everyone in the car, driving 15-20 minutes to get there (plus the return trip), it hardly seems worth it does it?

They did pretty well considering they'd only been on the ice a couple times before and mostly just hanging on to a chair or one of us. They were gliding around a bit and had pretty good balance, as long as the skates stayed on. The straps weren't holding tight today and we spent a good portion of our time there rebuckling someone or other.
They liked seeing the bigger people skating around though so that gives them something to think about for next year. (Murray seriously doubts he'll want to try this again any time soon!) Next year we'll pick up some real skates and try again with ones that stay on the whole time. : ))



Things seem to be slowly coming together around here! I got a bit more wrapping done while Murray gave the kids their bath. Got the kitchen & bathroom cleaned up & Murray mopped for me (thanks hawney!) and got several loads of laundry done (now to get it all put away...). Oh! and I got my fudge made. Murray's been craving some chocolate sauce so I got a batch of that done too while he was sleeping in this morning. I thought it'd be tasty on top of our Belgian waffles with some strawberries on Christmas morning. I'm going to attempt to get one good meal into them before they raid all their Christmas candy.... if you consider chocolate for breakfast a healthy start (well I was thinking the waffles & strawberries would be nutritious at least!)

Church in the morning & company for supper tomorrow night, better get to bed at a semi decent hour so the morning's not too crazy!

Three more sleeps! (well, two if you're pysched up like me!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

Christmas Card Reject

Well it's official! All our cards are officially en route. I ended up with about 4 different designs and after a test print, managed to narrow it down to the one main one. I really wanted to use one of the girls in their fancy dresses but I also wanted to send a family picture. Murray & I debated it. He was for the "girls only" card as he said that everyone would be thinking " I just want to see those triplets!" but I enjoy seeing the group photos & heard the same thing from a couple friends so he got overruled. However, now that the cards are on their way, I can show you one that didn't make the cut! : ))) I sortof hated to scrap this one as I was pretty proud of reconstructing Sweetie's ornament. I'd cut the left half of it off in camera when shooting & didn't notice that it looked odd until after I downloaded. I spent quite a bit of time reconstructing the missing piece, getting it to line it up just so & get those stripes to match up & thought I'd done a pretty good job. But now I can still show it off. Gotta love the world wide web!

Merry Christmas to all our family & friends, near and far! I hope you have a wonderful holiday & that your 2007 was as rich in blessings as ours!

and the winner is....

ME!!!!!! The photographer who taught my photography course runs a "photo of the month" contest and past & present students can log in to vote for their favourite. The photos are anonymous until after the contest closes and you're not allowed to vote for your own photo. The closing date was yesterday and I got the most votes for Just Peachy. Very exciting stuff!

The contest is just for points each month but at the end of the year I think he gives a little gift certificate to whoever has the most points accumulated. I've only done it a few times this year but this is definitely incentive to try more next year!

It's a Winter Wonderland!

It seems like it snows every day lately! This is making for some nice high snowbanks already and everyone's enjoying the playtime outdoors. I try to get them out most days unless it's frostbite weather. The getting ready to go out part is tricky but the fresh air and change of scenery is totally worth it!

Yesterday we were heading out & Honey looked at me & said "Mummy! Where's your camera?!?!" I wasn't going to bother taking more snow shots so I told her I didn't think we needed any pictures that day. She said "Yes we DO!" Murray says that the concept of a day without having her picture taken is totally foreign to her : )

Today we didn't get out in the snow but we had a lot of fun anyways. It was the playgroup Christmas party and we danced to some festive music, decorated Christmas cookies, had treats, coloured Christmas pictures and played with the usual toys etc. It's the fastest 2 hours of the week.

As if that wasn't enough excitement, Gran-Grad came & met us at the end & took us all out to lunch and then we helped him shop for Grammie for awhile. Lovey spotted him arrive at the church and ran over to tell him "I'm so glad you're here!". We enjoyed our lunch date & the girls were really well behaved at the mall.

I thought I'd gotten all my cards finished & sent out but when I double checked my list, I noticed I'd missed a couple. Even worse, I had cards left but no envelopes and had to make my own out of the girls' construction paper. Claaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaassy! Not pretty but they're definitely done & going out in the mail tomorrow. I've also got a good portion of my Christmas treats ready! Three batches of toffee crunch candy, Aunt Caroline's party mix and some brown sugar shortbread cookies. I just need to whip up some fudge and maybe some cream cheese sugar cookies and then we're all set I think! Murray finished up his shopping last night & got a couple things for the girls so they're pretty much taken care of and I just need a few odds & ends which I can hopefully accomplish in one outing on Friday when Murray starts my vacation.... err I mean HIS vacation hee hee! He works tomorrow & then he's off til Jan 7th or 8th (I can't remember which) Woohoo!! Even though it's a good long span, I find it goes soooooo fast with all the holiday stuff in there. I always expect there'll be lots of time to do this & that, all those things I've put off all year that are non essential but "would be nice to do" (cleaning off my scrapbooking desk so I can actually SEE it & maybe use it occasionally).
Lately I find the girls are playing much better together & sharing more (usually pretty good) and they tend to keep themselves busy and I can get some chores done during the day. Although to look around here, I'd be hard pressed to prove I'm accomplishing much!

We have another lunch date lined up for tomorrow at Old Nanny's so we're looking forward to that! Big week for us & we like outings : )))

Oh Christmas Tree, Oh Christmas Tree!

Not many sleeps left & each day seems to race by! I thought the weekend would be pretty productive but I ended up doing some family pictures for a friend and then it stormed on Sunday and well, here it is Monday. ONE WEEK left... nothing wrapped, only about half our cards have gone out in the mail, nothing is wrapped, there is still some shopping to do.
this was a little tricky! One of the girls did NOT want to do the photo thing, she was right in the middle of a serious puppet construction & we had the nerve to interrupt her. The final result is a combination of a couple of face swaps from other photos. I also found the electrical cords distracting so I removed those. I'm so excited to find new things that I can do with this software!

However, I do have most of my shopping done, 2 batches of my candy made, one batch of shortbread cookies in the freezer and the tree is up! So we're not out of the running yet!

Hey! where'd that chair go? Gotta love photoshop!

I got some pictures of the decorating we did on Sunday. Sweetie wasn't too interested in putting ornaments on the tree. Her main concern was putting chocolates in her mouth! She did take a break from the snack buffet and hung some of her things up. Lovey & Honey couldn't get enough of the ornaments & kept going back for more & more until they'd scrounged every last thing out of the box & jammed it onto the lower branches of the tree. From waist high & up, the decorations are pitifully sparse & are mainly comprised of the breakables that we're trying to keep out of reach!

Murray may have made a few trips to the snack bar too...

*sigh* Poor Dora. We had a little incident & luckily there was only one casualty. Unfortunately it had to be Honey's favourite ornament...

With the stormy weather, it made for a long afternoon indoors and Murray & I were both pretty tired by supper time! : )) Murray tried to de-stress and play a little guitar but I don't know if it really worked.

Post decorating, these two decided they'd both be Mary and go for donkey rides. This turned in to donkey races as they competed for first place in the Bethlehem 500. You'll notice Mary/Sweetie has a good grip on baby Jesus but Honey either hasn't had hers yet or has misplaced the babe... Earlier in the day, Sweetie had Jesus (aka White Bunny/Sarah/Almon) in a stroller and was zipping up and down the hall, going in and out of different rooms. I asked her what she was doing & she said she was Mary (in KKK dress???????) and she was taking baby Jesus to Bethlehem. She was really on the move so it was hard to keep up with her and she seemed to be having a hard time finding a suitable stable. Each "inn" she went to, she'd check it out, decide "nah! too BUGGY!" and race off to her next destination.

what I'm hating lately...

the fact that every day they wear the same thing outside! It makes for very boring pictures after awhile! Oh, look snowsuits again. and again. and again. totally unoriginal and boring... I'll have to get better at the indoor stuff so I can jazz it up a little now & then.

More Snow?????? Seriously??????

Wow! I've heard that we're supposed to have one heck of a winter with colder temperatures & more snowfall than we've had in a long time. This week seems to be right in line with that prediction! It has snowed almost every day I think! The kids are loving it & every time they see more snow, they ask "NOW is it Christmas???" They seem to think that once there's a good blanket down, that's all we need to proceed with the festivities, the actual dates be damned! LOL

We actually went shopping today for a present for Uncle Dale. I got them advent calendars & they've had fun getting caught up on the days we've missed so far. Murray thinks the chocolate in there is pretty crappy but they don't seem put off by the low quality confectionary!

After lunch we geared up and went outside where they imagined up all sorts of stuff! Their scenarios, characters & dialogue is getting pretty complex these days. We were surrounded by hot lava (which is filled with "gooey" in case you didn't know). We also had to be very quiet when climbing the volcano because the lion was sleeping (what the heck's he doing taking a nap on an active volcano anyway? furthermore what are WE doing up here???????)

Yesterday they each got a Christmas card in the mail from Bonny (Early Intervention) and were pretty thrilled with having their own letter. Honey's been carrying hers around all day & even took it shopping with us. I made her leave it in the car because I'm terrified the thing is going to get lost! Today when I suggested going to the mailbox, it was like a stampeding herd, they were so anxious to get there & check it out. So thank you to all those sending Christmas cards, you're making 3 little girls very happy! (and a couple of other people here too!) I'm really enjoying getting news from friends & seeing some pictures. I've been working on our cards & hope to get them out soon.

I'd better sign off & get ready for bed, I have a photoshoot tomorrow. Gotta get rested up you know! LOL

HO HO HO

A little pre-Christmas excitement! Tonight was our fellowship dinner at the church & Santa made an appearance. Teena, her husband & Boo came with us too. I don't know that there was a whole lot of dinner.... We got 2 kids plates to split between 4 of them & still had ALOT of leftovers when they abandoned us for the train table in the corner. How can you not like turkey dinner with all the trimmings? I actually saw Sweetie SPIT OUT her turkey! Honey ate a bit of her meat & then filled up on cranberry sauce & rolls. Lovey seemed to enjoy the dressing but not much else. They didn't seem to care too much about the menu & were completely content to play with the other kids & come back for dessert. After dinner they joined the other kids at the front of the room & sang Christmas carols. Teena & I were amused & amazed to see Boo front & centre at the microphone! I guess it's a good sign that she felt comfortable & welcome! LOL

After the sing song, Santa arrived and every kid there got a present. I thought they were getting candy canes or something. Nope. Real actual gifts, wrapped and the whole works. We now have 3 brand new puzzles & Boo took home some card games. They also got candy canes that were nicely decorated. We had a great time and the kids were pretty excited to see Santa. Lovey had no problem going up for her present when her name was called but Honey & Sweetie were a little more hesitant. Boo was quite intrigued with the whole thing.

heavy traffic!

wow, just peeked at the counter! Between 10pm yesterday and 8:30 this morning, 7 people visited the blog! Don't you people sleep at night either???? ; ))) So who are the night owls??? I know Princess Pamela checks before bedtime, Little Carrie sometimes checks before work, M&D usually have a look first thing in the morning... was Rick already here too? that would be 4 or 5... I probably clocked one since it had been several hours since I was here. Very interesting!! I love the counter : ))))

a day with GI Kelly

Not sure what was wrong with me but it definitely related to the GI area and was very uncomfortable but has improved a bit today. Hopefully another good night's rest will do the trick. It's almost10pm now, not too much time left to still make an early night of it but I'll give it a shot... definitely going to bed on today's date though!

I was still feeling pretty tired this morning & not up for anything too complicated or requiring much energy. Since it was freezing cold outside, I immediately ditched any thought of getting them dressed to go out. They wanted to play school today so we did that for quite awhile. I'd tell them to sit at their "desk" (aka kitchen table) and work on their "spelling" (aka drawing random figures that are supposed to be letters of their name). Every once in awhile I slipped away to gather laundry or put something away. Every time, my apt little Honey pupil would track me down and say 'why are you're not at the school teacher?" Dang. busted by a 3½ year old! So we did "art" and "math" and reading. They must have been at it for over an hour. Good thing there are lots of subjects in school!

After lunch I thought it would be a good idea to make Christmas cookies and decorate them. Somehow I strayed from my "KISS" plan (keep it simple stupid). They were keen to get their aprons on. When I told them they'd need their little rolling pins, they almost tripped over each other to get those from the closet. I gave them each a little ball of dough & tried to show them how to roll it out into a flat circle so we could use the cookie cutters. They were avid rollers and I don't think there's ever been a thinner sheet of cookie dough. It was so hard to keep up with each of them & restrain them before they beat the dough into a slimy pulp and got it wrapped around the rolling pin 17t imes. I'd add icing sugar to one to keep it from sticking, clean off the rolling pin and get them started, only to find the other two right back in the same predicament. I stopped Honey from pulverizing her pile further & took the rolling pin to clean it off and she started to cry and said "You're not being very nice to me, I'm going somewhere else!" and ran off sobbing. I felt bad since this was supposed to be a fun activity but I hadn't yelled or beaten her with the pin or anything! I talked her into coming back and finally put away their rolling pins so we could actually cut out some cookies. This didn't go much more smoothly than the rolling out. They kept stamping the cutter into the same spot over and over, making it impossible to actually get a cookie out.... after one sheet went into the oven, I'd had it. No more of that type of cookie for a looooooooooooong time! I remember making them with Pat-rick when he was a toddler and it wasn't anywhere near this nerve wracking or frustrating. I was younger then though and only had to keep track of one set of hands! Nancy, let me tell you right now, I think you're crazier than a bag of hammers to be looking forward to this activity with the girls over Christmas!!!!!!! Let me know when you're going to do it, I'm getting out of there, I don't even want to watch!!!!! ; )))

So, what I thought would be a fun little activity, turned into an all day project. I forgot that the dough is supposed to chill overnight so I put it in the fridge while I gave the girls their bath. I brought my Christmas card stuff in with me & started working on addressing the envelopes and got most of those done. The postage I ordered online arrived today so I can hopefully get my pictures printed & start getting the cards out in the mail sometime soon!

After the bath we went back to the kitchen & the dough was chilled, it just didn't stay that way with all their manhandling. By the time I lost patience with the whole plan, it was almost supper time, not even half the cookies were baked & I had to turn the oven off to cook the meal. Between all the craziness, I ended up overcooking two of the batches (still edible just browner on the edges than I'd like) and had none of them frosted. I'd thought we'd get icing on them & maybe add sprinkles etc. I quickly dropped the sprinkles idea & settled for just some icing. After supper, Murrray helped clean up so we could decorate. (oh yes, I let them get into the icing an hour before bedtime........BAD BAD BAD idea). We had to let them bounce off the walls for about 45 minutes after we were done decorating the cookies. The good news is that there is so much icing on them that lifting the cookie to your mouth a few times is enough of a workout to cancel all the calories of the treat itself. : )

Murray read them several stories to try and wind them down but as soon as the books were put away, they went right back into hyper overdrive. At 7:30 we decided to just proceed with bedtime preparations anyway, hoping the routine would soothe & settle them... they didn't immediately become docile & quiet but they did get ready & go to bed without a fuss. They just insisted on travelling in style!

Somewhere in the midst of getting changed & washed up, Sweetie had an accident on the floor.

Murray: Sweetie, what's this on the floor? Pee?

Sweetie: of course!

Murray: did you do that?

Sweetie: of course! you can pick it up.

Murray: no YOU can pick it up.

and she did. Do you suppose she learned her lesson???????