It's almost a New Year!

This year we're hosting a game night with some friends so it has the potential of being either low-key or filled with tales for years to come...only time will tell.

I eased back into work today and had one of the dayhome kidlets for the day. Alex has been hounding me to play with his buddy throughout the holidays. He's been anxious to show off his Christmas loot! So, today was a great day.

I've almost decompressed after the holidays - well, just to get all wound up for tonight, haha. Christmas has left the building and gone back into storage for another year. I am not a Scrooge, really. I just like putting the holiday stuff away before the kiddies come back to the dayhome full time. And I have yet to find those missing stocking stuffers. Somewhere in my home are two dog toys, one catnip toy, one nutcracker ornament for Papa, and who knows what else?! Really though, where could they have gone? My house isn't that big and I don't have many hiding spots.

This Christmas we borrowed some traditions from other families which were a huge hit at our home. We had mimosa's and Cinnzeo Christmas morning. The mimosa's were from Phil and Cinnzeo from Jenn. And boy oh boy did we ever enjoy them. Alex is now obsessed with 'sticky buns'. He actually came up with that term on his own. I do realize that a lot of people use it but I'm just surprised that he tagged his cinnamon bun with it instead of something more true to Alex-lingo like 'the thing with the white stuff on it'.

I also found two new additions to my recipe box. Christine's Toffee Cornflake Cookies (which I'd like to rename into something more exciting) and Andrea's Holiday Cracker spread (which is what I'm calling her Philly block, with the red and green jalepeno sauce on top...mmm...my mouth is watering already. Thanks ladies!

Have a fun and safe New Year!

UFC Night w/o the guys

I can honestly say it's a bit sad. Aaron gets really excited to have the guys over to watch the fights and now he's home hibernating with his strep...shudder shudder...

So while Aaron's busy being sick I've been busy decorating. If I had to describe the downstairs in a word it would either be brown or neutral, haha. We bought a painting for the rec room too but I'll save that for another time.

Tomorrow Alex and I are driving halfway to Mom's to pick up Joey. Apparently Joey thinks he has 7 more sleeps at Nannie and Papa's - hope he's not too disappointed to come home.

Enjoying the quiet lull after the holidays

well we still have New Year's to party through but we're enjoying a nice break from the hullabaloo.
Hope everyone had a fab Christmas! Ours was wonderful, we mostly spent time with family playing games and visiting :o)
I can't believe it's been so long since I posted, whaddupwitdat?!?

Here are some holiday goodies from the Christmas Cookie Exchange - which was fabulous!

Here's Joey - he was so stoked to see the reindeer carrots and santa cookies were almost all gone.
Alex opened up two gifts, a tool belt with his name on it and these galactic heroes. We didn't see him for almost an hour after that. He was more than happy to play by himself with these no matter how much I prodded him to keep opening gifts.
This is the boys gift to Aaron. Joey was adamant that he wanted to buy Daddy a game for his Xbox for Christmas so I took the boys to the game store and let them have free reign and this is what they came up with. I didn't think Aaron would really like it but b/c it was from his boys he loved it.

I myself got a lot of wonderful gifts but there were two that definitely stick out in my head. My Auntie Anne sent me another Willowtree ornament which made me cry like a baby. It's a mommy with a toddler and little boy...sigh..now I'm starting to water again...sigh...and the second gift was from a group of my dayhome parents. They gave Aaron and I a gift certificate for Banff. There's enough deneros to cover our hotel room and dinner...even at the Banff Springs :o)

We've got a lot of plans for the next few months but hopefully end of March/April we'll be having some grownup time.

Joey is at Nannie and Papa's for an undisclosed amount of time. He said 10 sleeps and Mom and I were thinking more like 4 sleeps so we'll see. This is giving Alex and I some quality time together and you know what he wants to do?!? Teach me how to play Star Wars on gamecube. Honestly! I suggested going to buy a skating support frame thingy and skating, or Chuck E Cheese for some games, or going to see a movie and all he wants to do is teach me Star Wars. Priceless.

Hmmph I didn't win Super 7 last night

Guess I won't be taking extended Christmas holidays this year.

I'm almost all ready for Christmas. Gifts are wrapped and under the tree, food is figured out and bought, baking is done BUT I realized this morning that I don't have the Christmas tablecloth, or do I?

We hosted an early Christmas dinner with Aaron's family last night before they head to Oyen to visit Grandma Tarr for the holidays.

Joey got a Spiderman laptop and has not stopped playing with it yet - it's that cool!

And Alex has been busy playing with dinosaurs - rrrrargh!

Thursday Thirteen

13 Songs I Like to Sing Along To In My Mommy-Wagon - you know the one with the 'sporty' fin?!?

1. Lips of An Angel - Hinder
2. Big Girls Don't Cry - Fergie
3. Chasing Cars - Snow Patrol
4. No One - Alicia Keys
5. Because of You - Kelly Clarkson
6. What's Up - 4 Non Blondes
7. Money Honey - State of Shock
8. Ice Ice Baby - Vanilla Ice
9. Here By Me - Three Doors Down
10. My Immortal - Evannessence
11. Don't Phunk With My Heart - Black Eyed Peas
12. Don't Matter - Akon
13. The Sweet Escape - Gwen Stefani

Another concert crossed off the to-do list

Joey's concert was last night and it was soooo cute. They acted out The Mitten and sang songs. Joey has been practising and practising and did a great job :o) Last year he just sat there in the horseshoe of kids and observed, this year he sang along and even seemed to enjoy himself. That's him in the middle wearing his lovely H & M toque. And then there's Alex - who was having MAJOR ISSUES SITTING STILL FOR HIS BROTHER's PERFORMANCE. Although the best pic Aaron took of the night seems to be one of Alex?!? Once again, Mama Beaver was the videographer.

Thing Two's First Pageant

Well it wasn't exactly a pageant. More of a sing-song. The kids sang four songs. Twinkle Twinkle, Santa's Reindeer, I'm A Little Christmas Tree and for their grand finale they broke out some instruments and sang Ring Ring the Bell.

It was priceless. Short but priceless.

(photo courtesy of Christina - I was the videographer)

As Christmas gets closer the chaos ensues

It was a typical whirlwind weekend at the Beck household.

Friday night was Bunco/Cookie exchange. You wouldn't believe the delicasies :o) Aaron and I have almost polished off Christine's Caramel Cornflake cookies. Not so good for the waistline which coincides with the Weight Watcher's chat Friday night. A few of us are thinking about banding together and supporting each other. After the holidays of course. Although Christine and I are going to the Robbie Burns dinner/dance mid-Jan and it would be nice to not have a roll in the middle of my dress. Hmm..well there's some food for thought later.

Saturday Alex woke up with the most disgusting painful big toe ever so we rushed over to the clinic and were thoroughly disapppointed by our service. After 3 hours of waiting we got to see a doctor and apparently in our waiting time this pus ball exploded all inside his sock so we got a lame diagnosis of just a slight infection (huh, wha, slight?!? are you kidding me?) and instructions to soak his foot in warm water twice a day. Well, there went our Saturday.

Saturday night I had a few cocktails with a couple other dayhome providers and quite a few good laughs.

Sunday was mostly a cleaning day and getting ready for Christmas.

I'm still not feeling the Christmas spirit yet - what's wrong with me?

Happy Day Jonathan!

Happy Birthday Jonathan :o)

I'm behind a day but here's my TT

13 Things I Did Today

1. Took Alex to the doctor - he has a viral infection which has sprouted with some dots around his mouth. Not hand/foot/mouth and not impetigo. Phew!
2. Went to Bolero's with Kathryn and Jeff and enjoyed a fab FREE meal, we had to buy our drinks but that's a whole different story. It truly pays to be friendly and chat with the staff - you never know when the bartender you once chatted up is really management.
3. Finished my Christmas baking
4. Attempted a Shrinky Dink craft with the dayhome kiddies but couldn't find permanent enough markers/crayons/pencil crayons so when everything baked it faded and just looked like Chiclets. We'll have to go to Plan B.
5. Stopped at Best Buy to pick up Barnyard for Joey's stocking. His catch phrase these days is "ha ha, it's called cow-tipping", cute isn't it?
6. Did lots of laundry
7. Cleaned house for Cookie Exchange/Bunco night
8. Stopped at Future Shop & Best Buy to find out about Wii's. Even though Aaron was there at the crack of dawn this morning about 60 other people beat him in line...that's what we get for being last minute about this whole wii thing
9. Drank a lot of Buckley's for my mucho sore throat
10. Drank a lot of spiced rum and coke's
11. Stocked the almost complete bathroom in the basement. Aaron picks up the mirror today and it should be finito this weekend :o)
12. Made my Name that Tune list for Friday night - oh it's a good one
13. Ripped my belt loop on my dress pants on the door jam thingy right before going out so I switched to my good cords. Coincidentally they're a bit stretchy and a better choice for all you can eat Brazillian food!

Please will someone just push me over the holiday hump?

I'm just not that excited about the holidays yet. Maybe it's because I've spent most of my free time buying, wrapping and of course waiting in line.

I think I've got my shopping done :o), well except for a trip to the liquor store. And I think most of the wrapping is done too.

Cookie exchange is Friday night and I have yet to do my baking. That's tonight's plan. Aaron rented Bourne Ultimatum which is great BUT usually I'd be baking while watching TV and now that the rec room is complete we 'll be downstairs watching our movie. Guess I either need to set a timer downstairs or just wait until after movie time.

NOW onto some parenting issues...

Joey has made the connection that if he pukes Daddy will come get him from school so apparently he's been trying this all week at school. So we talked about it and I thought he understood how it's bad for your body to make yourself throw up until this afternoon when he gagged himself after lunch. And then tonight when he tried to make his little brother puke at bathtime.

How do you reckon we nip this in the bud?

Although, given a choice, I'd opt for puke over poop any day!

I'll be indulging in some holiday eggnog for sure tonight.

Phew, I survived Monday!

Today was a great day, just super busy even though I never left my house. (well I did walk to the mailbox and take the kiddies outside - the weather was gorg and we had fresh snow to play in).

So, Christmas cards are finito, done, vamoose, arivaderci! Yahoo buckaroo! I always feel like a weight's been lifted when they're out of my possession and enroute....sigh...

And then I jumped in with both feet to my next project of baby boy cards. It seems that the next babe enroute is my aunt and uncles' in the Maritimes, whom I've dubbed baby Mac. A boy called Molly just seems wrong. (haha, all their girls have "M" names) And although there's only one boy on the way I was inspired and made 8 cards.

The highlight of my day was having my new purse delivered from Laura :o) Picture this purse but in brown...tres cool!

This is my new fave song, anyone else lovin' it? Not sure if it's ringtone material though.

No One
By Alicia Keys
CodesAndLyrics.com

Another snow day

Looks like it snowed all night, the roads are white and the radio is announcing tons of accidents and delays already and it's not even 7 o'clock. So, here's my dilemna: Do I send Joey to school or let him stay home? The last time we had road conditions like this he left our house at 7:20 (which is typical) and arrived at 9:30. School is dismissed at 11:15, so is it really worth sending him for about 3 hours of bus riding (including return trip which is always shorter) for 1.75 hours of learning? I dunno. I think it'll depend on what kind of mood he's in when I wake him up.

Enjoy the video! You'll either think it's really cool or really pathetic. I think it's cool...

Real or Fake?

No, I'm not talking about my boobs, I'm talking about Christmas trees folks.

Real or fake?

I always had fake trees growing up. Who else remembers the fun of the color coded stems? Hmm...is that orange or rust?

Then I met Aaron who had always had real trees.

For the years before we had our kids we had real trees and then once we had kids we had borrowed Heather's fake tree. My girlfriend said eventually there won't be any real trees so we'll keep on getting real ones until there are none. Which then got me to thinking - should we buy a real tree? Our boys have no idea what the difference is. I miss the smell of the pine but is it really environmental to use a tree for a few weeks and then take it to be recycled?

What do you guys think?

I ended up buying a pre-lit tree today with my boys. They picked it out, I wanted the white lights but was vetoed and we went home with the multi coloured lights.

And then the whole fiasco of putting it the van...picture this a silver "sporty" minivan parked in front of Michael's with 2 of 4 car seats sitting on the sidewalk amongst many bags of gifts to accomodate folding the seat down to allow room for the lonnnnnnnnnnnnng box the tree came in. And at the same time my boys are singing "wee-who" along with The Sweet Escape at the top of their gloriously loud freaking lungs. With the back of the van open everyone in a two block radius could have heard them...priceless I tell you!

Oh yeah, and to solve the whole pine smell dillemna I ordered to Frasier Fir candles that Christine had burning the other night. They smell amazingly real!

So tell me, real or fake?

Yeah it's Friday

I had another 'first' today. First phone call to come pick up your puking kid. Actually that's a 1/2 truth. Aaron got the call. Today of all days would have been a great time for the school to call me. I only had a couple kids and there was enough room in the mommy wagon for all of us. Aaron on the other hand just left his meeting to pick up Joey without even calling me. But whatevs, it's done. Oh, and the pukey boy?!? Well, according to Joey he was dancing and spinning around and around and then got a sore stomach and puked. Hmm...I think the puking is directly linked to the spinning. He's been fine ever since. (I'm knocking on wood just to be sure) It was stamping class at Christine's last night. What a fun group of ladies! There were probably 6 or 7 conversations going on at any given time and it was a lot of fun :o)

Thursday Thirteen

13 Phrases That I Said Over and Over All Day Long

1. Are you poopy?
2. Damn you Haley-O for posting Peak Freans!
3. Is it Friday yet?
4. Who's ready for a snack?
5. Where does the time go?
6. No really, I can't make that shit up!
7. Don't worry, it's homemade -that was at stamping class-
8. Tissues not fingers
9. No I don't want to smell your butt - that's Joey being a charming 6 year old-
10. Why didn't I start Christmas shopping earlier?
11. I have GOT to phone Tina - uh, it's too late to call, but HAPPY BIRTHDAY TINA!
12. I can't wait for you guys to be in booster seats - as opposed to 5 point harnesses. I don't mind doing them, safety first and all, but 4 kids in the cold is a bit tiresome and there's no easy way to get at the kids in the backrow.
13. Got to remember it's ER night - uh yeah, I totally forgot.

It's not a good sign when an unopened parcel arrives wet and soggy

Here's the box....Any guesses on what was inside the box?Snowglobes - WATER INCLUDED!!!
So, I ordered 20 snowglobes for Christmas presents this year and they arrived yesterday. I'd say 75% were frozen and the other 25% were slushy at the very least. Only 1 was irrepairablly (is that a real word) damaged. 12 were fine. 7 had dents in them. Such as the one in the photo. My assistant was able to pop out the dents on all but 2 so far.
But really people, why would you ship them all filled up? Isn't it easier to let me fill them and put the little cork in myself?

The fruits of my labor

Hmm...that didn't sound like I thought it would. Anyways, here are the pics that will be in our Christmas cards. I had planned on taking the boys in for the semi-annual photo shoot but time seems to have gotten away from me once again so I did some home pics instead. And then the fun began. I put the pics on a disc and brought it to wallyworld to get some wallets made. Sounds easy enough doesn't it? Well, it wasn't. As soon as I went into the photo area I asked one of the techs which machine to use to print wallets from a disc and she pointed me to all of the machines and said pick one. So I did. I had no problem browsing pics or selecting pics but couldn't find wallet sizing anywheres. So I bugged the tech again to ask how to do wallets from a disc and was told to choose ID print from the first menu. Uh, yeah, couldn't tell me that from the get-go couldya?! So, I ordered what I thought was an assortment of poses and when I picked them up later on I realized that I ordered the same pose. Hmm, thanks for the help byatches!

Greatest insider tip of the weekend

One of my fave places to shop has always been United Library and I just found out this weekend that I can still shop there. Love love love! AND I can still get my 30% discount. Could it get any better than this?

The only downer is that they are only open during daytime hours during the week. So, that would mean Aaron'd have to be willing to watch the kiddies for me so I can sneak down there to buy some new books. I know, I know, I just bought some new Usborne books but I've seriously been having ULS withdrawals...

So how was your weekends?

Our Beaver bottle drive was cancelled due to freezing cold weather so I cleaned house Saturday while Aaron bought a new TV/stereo system for the family room. Then we headed over to Brooklyn's birthday party and then to one Christmas party followed by another Christmas party. Aaron was sick and really just wanted to curl up in a ball in bed but I on the other hand was having too much fun with Leanne...we really should get together more often :o)

Bunco Friday night was a success! I brought 2 new girls in as subs and they were FABULOUS! Nicola and Traci were a lot of fun...Nicola, Christina and I didn't even leave Andrea's until after 12. That's definitely a sign of a good Bunco night :o)