Our 12 Days of Christmas {2014 Edition}

I have been wanting to share our Christmas festivities but I must have been too busy enjoying them to do so.

Now here I am, December 31st mere hours to midnight, feeling the need to squeeze all this in before the New Year hits.

1. Ballet.  

The Christmas recital for Alberta Ballet Edmonton Studios included our BFF Charlie this year.

Fiona was also more than ready to attend Alberta Ballet's Nutcracker and loved every minute of it.

 2. Gingerbread house making at Gram and Grandpa's.

 3. Festival of Lights at the Edmonton Valley Zoo.

 4. The Legislature grounds.

Cedric was focused less on the lights and more on eating snow.

Fiona was focused less on lights and more on climbing snow.

 5. Candy Cane Lane.

We always love the lights but were especially taken by the sweet people who decided to give their time to play Santa (on the left in case you weren't sure) handing out candy canes and 3 friends who bought toys to hand out to the kids walking on the lane.

We were blown away by this generosity.

 6. Visiting Santa.

 Love that guy.

 7. JCI Holiday Hamper.

This was our first year participating and it was our partner Chloe who organized it.

It was a humbling and heart warming day and an organization we would support again.

8. Christmas Eve was at our house this year.

I loved having ample time to set out our cookies and carrots.

9. A month worth of early mornings and late nights with background Christmas lights.

10. A beautiful, magical and lazy Christmas morning.

11. A beautiful, magical and exhausting multi location Christmas day.

We enjoyed 2 turkey dinners and lots of love.

Small traditions like the angel carousel below gave the day extra magic.

12. Christmas aftermath.

On boxing day we headed to the lake for some much needed decompressing.

Just like last year we shovelled a rink on the lake and broke out the skates.

The kids were significantly more confident and begged us to get out again.

I brought the tripod out and attempted a family picture.

One small hitch, 10 seconds is not long to walk over snow from the camera to the shot when you're wearing hockey skates.

The result is a shot where I'm holding my 4 year old for support and, you know, I love it.

BONUS

13. A Christmas miracle.

My sweet boy decided on Dec 22nd that he was done with diapers.

Not just wants-to-wear-underwear done but meltdown-when-we-tried-to-give-him-a-nightime-diaper done.

So we obliged {and frantically re-read the "3 Day Potty Training" manual} and never looked back.

By Christmas Eve he went the day with only one accident and on Christmas morning he woke up dry.

No you didn't hear wrong, dry!

I'm not counting my chickens just yet, this isn't my first kick at the can you know.

We could just as easily go backward but I am so proud of my guy.

He made this decision completely on his own and with a little help {thanks Gram and Grandma} rocked it.

I hope you had a great Christmas and are having a beautiful New Year celebration.

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like...

...Christmas!

I have a weekend trip to Toronto to share but that task seems a little daunting for a Sunday night.

Instead I am posting some pictures of the weekend.

We started it off right with a Friday night swim with our youngest friend Olivia.

Saturday began with Fiona's ballet dress rehearsal.

Her third dance recital is taking place next week and they are cute cute cute.

 In the afternoon we took in the Festival of Frozen Trees with our besties.

{There may have been a few Elsa, Anna and Olafs.}

 The new story corner was a welcome addition.

 And of course cookie decorating is a must.

 Cedric needed a little decorating help but had no problem completing the eating portion solo.

 We took in what we could of the decorations while running between children events.

 This was our first year sending Fiona in to the "secret kids only shopping".

In the whirlwind of figuring out how much money she needed and accidentally letting Cedric slip in behind her we failed to explain that this was her chance to buy Christmas gifts for others.

That's ok I thought, there are elf helpers in there, they'll explain it to her.

When she came out with that cheeky smile on her face, however, I just knew she had found some treasures for her own collection.

I know her so well.

In that moment I felt a mixture of emotions.

She was so happy and excited so I wanted to share that with her.

At the same time I felt like I had failed her.

I hadn't equipped her properly, not only for that shopping spree but for life.

Had I created a materialistic, selfish child?

Hadn't we discussed at length what the true spirit of Christmas was?

I expressed this to Jeff on our way to dinner.  He didn't disagree but kept fairly quiet.

After a lovely dinner my sweet child, who had behaved so well in the restaurant, said out of the blue "Mommy, I just love you."

I wanted to cry that I had doubted for even a split second the character of this wonderful little person.

I had forgotten that she is 4. 

{Four and a HALF she would say.}

I leaned to Jeff and said that I thought I had been too harsh in my initial reaction.

He said "no, not at all" of course {smart guy} but chuckled a little and I knew that he knew that I knew he had known that all along {smart guy}.

 This is one of the best shots I could get of Charlie all night.

The kid just does not stay still!

On Sunday we headed to our favourite tree lot at the U of A to visit those trusty Forest Society students.

We browsed the trees and I thought of picking a pine with those nice long needles or a sparse Charlie-Brown-looking douglas fir but we just kept coming back to our tried and true Balsam.

And the students approved, saying that it gives off the best smell and lasts the longest.

They're the experts you know.

Cedric was a big help carrying the tree.

 Fiona helped by cheesing up the lot.

 But the real smiles came when the candy canes were busted out.

I'm telling you, we just love those forestry students.

 They sawed the bottom and even offered to load it on the car.

 We declined since we were all prepared-like with bungee cords this year.

Fancy, I know.

  I forgot to get the shot of the tree loaded up at the lot which gave me the perfect excuse to get our lights in the background.

Christmas is officially in full swing over here.

Summer Recap 5: Festival City

Two months!

It took me two months to get this post done.

I'm not sorry though since going through these pictures again took me right back to these spectacular summer days.

The last time we went to Folk Fest, Fiona was 4 months old.

We went for one evening, Ben Harper was headlining and was incredible.

Fiona was also incredible but we felt alright ducking out a little early knowing that we'd see him again at the Gorge when he opened for Dave Matthews Band.

{Yes, Fiona attended two Ben Harper gigs and as many DMB gigs by the tender age of 5 months.}

Anyways, Ben was back at The Edmonton Folk Music Festival so it felt right to return.

On Thursday we had only a single ticket so Fiona and I made it a date.

{If you're under 12 you're free, is that amazing or what?}

Fiona requested that we please match for our concert date.

This girl loves matching so I did the best I could with the limited purple in my wardrobe.

 We were so happy to spend the weekend with these sweeties.

 They danced like no one was watching.

 They also begged for some candles.

After Fiona stared at hers for a few seconds, having just heard the "be careful" spiel, she turned to me and said "Mommy I don't think I can handle this."

I had to backtrack and edit my warnings so as to give her a little more confidence.

She could indeed handle it.

Nothing beats the view at EFMF.

I popped down on my own Friday night to take in James Vincent McMorrow.
Him and Gregory Alan Isakov were two of my favourite artists of the weekend.
I also was happy to catch a little Vance Joy, Ben Howard, Holly Williams and discover a local band called 100 Mile House.
There were, of course, many more great acts, too many to mention them all.

Saturday was a long day but the kids did well.

Cedric passed out in the backpack after a popsicle meltdown, don't ask.

We were able to break up the days with fun at the park, face painting and bouncy castles.

The kids enjoyed the music but in short installments only.

It was by far my best experience at EFMF and I hope it only gets better as the kids get older.

Next up in August was the Fringe Festival.

We didn't make it to any shows this year but spent an evening taking in street performers and a little street food.

And what would a visit to the Fringe be without a trip across the highlevel on the street car.

We met our festival partners in crime for this one.

Any type of train is always a hit with this little man.

And these three little gals giggled like teenagers the whole way.

I love Edmonton at all times of the year and am digging all the winter celebrations lately.

But, if I'm being honest, August kicks butt in the festival department.

Proud of you Edmonton

I love Edmonton.

This is where I would usually insert all of the "despites" but not today.

I'm done apologizing for all that others don't like about this city.

It is a damn great city.

I feel that way more than ever having just participated in the Pride Parade.

As I biked through our beautiful river valley across the amazing high level bridge and rounded the corner towards the rainbow filled streets to line up for the parade I couldn't have felt happier.

I have always felt lucky to be surrounded with people who celebrate diversity and inclusion but it still warms my heart to see just how many do so.

Then I get to hang with these beautiful people as we get ready to spin our little hearts out for 8 city blocks.

To top it off we saw our mayor bike by with his wife and kids.

Not to mention that he was surrounded by many city councillors and joined by a number of local politicians from all branches of government.

We've come such a long way. 

So proud.

Photo courtesy of MasterMaq, used with permission.

 This was our first year participating in the parade and it was a blast.

The crowd was beautiful.

So colourful, loud, energetic and diverse.

 We outfitted a truck with flags, ribbons and the large speakers we use to fill a gymnasium with sound at our yearly competition.

Even so it all seemed to fade in the background compared with the amount of colour and sound the other entries had going.

Next year bigger speakers and more colour is in order.

We had some wonderful volunteers cheering us on, working our sound, keeping us hydrated, driving the truck and taking photos.  Thanks Darren, Niki, Scotty and Steve.

Thanks also to Stacey for taking Ced to the parade while Daddy was finishing off my volunteer duties at Fiona's dress rehearsal.

It was too bad they had to miss the festivities but if you can't be at the parade why not celebrate pride with some ballet looking fierce as a zebra, am I right?

 Pride Week is still in full swing and it's not too late to take in the family and some not-so-family events.