st. nick day

I was a day late for St. Nicholas Day!  Usually the shoes get put out on the eve of said day.  Oops.  I'm pretty sure the kids, other than Maddy, didn't notice.

I couldn't find any chocolate coins!  Horrible.  What is St. Nick day with out gold foil covered chocolate coins?  Well, I don't think the kids noticed that either - but I always but those in there because it reminds me of the story of the real St. Nicholas putting gold in stockings for the dowries of the girls.

But this year they did get hand warmers, candy canes and lip stuff.  Almost like chocolate coins.

And Cade got a balance bird and a mini terrarium.

The girls all got pony tail holders (purely selfish on my part…. I'm tired of having all of mine go missing).  Then Lucy also got fabric bows for her hair as well.

And Maddy and Mia got tank tops/camis.  A fairly practical St. Nicholas we have.

flock of moosen diorama

Or is it meese?

Whatever the case, moose are a big deal here in our house.  And Lucy even did a diorama for school about the habitat of a moose.  The wetlands.  It corresponded well with the song that she and her school group wrote (more on that later…..).  She did a delightful job - and did the whole thing (almost) entirely by herself.

She's got some skilz, this one.

do you wanna build a snowman?

We have had some good playing in the snow weather lately.  You could hardly ask for better.  And thankfully there have even been a few days when the snow will stick.  Those are the days for snowmen!  The first one of the year:

There is a small hill on the court from the snow clearing.  Not much to look at yet, but enough to play in.

Cade has done a significant amount of work on it already - digging out a rather large home!

Christmas stree chopping day the kids and their cousins also spent some time building some rather ginormous snowmen.  The photos do not do their size justice.  They also made a dog and a cat.  The cat had a rather hurried and untimely death (the very next day, sniff, sniff) so I only got a picture of the dog.

Mia also made a Mick Jagger mini snowman.  I don't think she intended for him to resemble Mick.  In fact, I am pretty sure she doesn't have a clue who Mick Jagger is.  But she went a little crazy with the red food colouring for the lips, so Mick it is.

Hoping that there will be a lot of snowman weather in the future.  Right after the big blizzard that I am praying for!

neustaedter gathering

November 28th was our annual Neustaedter family gather for Christmas.  I look forward to it each year we are able to go.  It is amazing to be blessed with a big, wonderful family.  Sadly, there aren't a whole lot of my cousins still around the area.  But it is still a great time.

The kids manage to have a great time, even if there technically is "nothing to do".  We just meet in a senior centre that doesn't have much going on in it - but it is a great space to run around and have a good time.  Obviously the kids don't have much of a problem finding ways to have fun!

And there is always a lot of good food and treats to have.

I helped my mom out with bringing some of my Christmas stash and throwing together a few table decorations.

We sang a few Christmas carols, as we usually do.  I love singing Christmas carols.  Unfortunately, Kim and I caught a temporarily incurable case of the giggles during one of the songs because of my cousin Paul (I can't even remember what he did now), and I wasted almost the whole sing-a-long acting like a 10 year old school boy reading a book about farts and setting a fine example for my children.  And reinforcing to my uncles and aunts that no, Carla surely has not grown up yet, even though she is almost 45 years old for crying out loud.

But it was really really funny.

Then came the "performances".  Now, back in the day, we sang our for-real Christmas concert songs, or my sister Jann, cousin Mark and I completely geeked out and p r a c t i s e d  a song (Heirloom, by Amy Grant - her first Christmas album…. it's awesome…. can't really be Christmas until you listen to Sleigh ride and Tennessee Christmas by Amy) to perform at our family gathering.  Oh yes we did.  And sang it in the meeting room at Fernwood.  Yup.

Nowadays, our children seem to make up a bunch of kookiness and go on stage and act like fruitcakes. You know - Christmas fruitcakes?  The stuff that everyone throws away?  Yes, you see the similarity….  Anyway, Shandy did sing all verses (she didn't even skip the third verse - Kim and I were noting that when carol singing, the third verse is usually the one that is skipped…. what is up with that anyway?).  I'd tell you what she sang about but she sang rather quickly and quietly so I am not too sure I'd get it right.

Then Lucy went on stage to…, well, to go on stage.  She did end up singing her wetlands song to the tune of Jingle Bells though, so that was fun.  Well, for the Ackermanns at least.  We've had a lot of fun with that song!

Maddy is thoroughly enjoying Lucy's song.

Then all the "medium" girls did some random Christmas play thingy.  I think I understood none of it.  Maybe it is just my bad memory.  Maybe I just blocked it out like other painful things in my past.  Whatever the case, it had something to do with the girls crawling around on the floor,

look up longingly at Brooklyn,

and fall down and die??

Glenda did a lesson for the kids (and everyone) on gratitude.  It was fantastic.  And I even remember it. She is gifted, that one.  And I am grateful for her (boy, looks like I learned the lesson of gratitude, didn't I!!!??)

Then it was time for the gift exchange game.  We did the kids' and the adults' games at the same time so I didn't pay much attention to any fun that they had.

I came away from the gift exchange with a rather nice food scale.  Maddy got herself a $10 gift card for Tim Hortons.  Cade and Lucy each got chocolate - because that is what they needed…. a huge chocolate "two-ney" and Mia got a lego mini-figure, which she gave to Cade, and some candy.  Eric missed the whole thing, being in the fatherland - so he got NOTHING!  Ha.

It is always great to be with my family.  But it is a little sad how so many are so far away.  I guess we were one of those too.  Maybe others will come back sometime too….

Update:
I learned something from Glenda.  She gave the kids post-it notes to write notes about things we were thankful for.  I stuck them on the kids.

christmas house

We have been very blessed with a fairly mild winter so far.  Well, except for the week that Eric was away in California visiting family.  Then it was pretty miserable.  I'm sure he selfishly prayed for crappy weather for us so he could enjoy his time in the sunny-state more.  Anyway, decorating the house for Christmas was a pretty easy and relatively enjoyable task.

I got to bust out some of the decorations that I've been keeping for a long, long time.

The double wreaths I hung up indoors in our house in California for several years.  The large sleigh is a new purchase from a garage sale this summer, and the one pair of skis is from the thrift store last year (the other skis are from Opa, which makes them that much more special).  All the scarves and skates are from years gone by as well.

(if you look at the thin window beside the front door, you just may see the cutest boy known to mankind, wrapped up in a blue blanket, starring out the window)

The garlands have white lights on them and sadly the only thing that shows at night.  I like a pretty, lit house, but that doesn't happen, unfortunately.  And now, actually, the garland is gone too.  A few windy nights and one section came down.  Eric reattached.  Another windy night while he was gone, and another section came down.  So in order to save my marriage (and my sanity) I just ripped them down.
I had a fabulous time while he was putting them up though.  He took out the extension ladder and as soon as I heard that noise of the metal being pulled out, I burst into laughter.  It made me think of Christmas vacation when Clark is putting up the lights.  Every time he moved the ladder I would laugh.  No words needed to be said - just the sound of the ladder was enough!

My children would be happy if I also ripped the double wreaths down.  And I don't blame them.  When the wind blows, they made a creepy scratching sound on the windows - not fun when you are trying to fall asleep, even if you know what it is!  I'm making them tough it out until Christmas, I think.  It'll build their character.  Next year they'll go back inside.

Someone wanted to be in the picture as well….

Surprisingly, everything else has stayed up, even with the wind.  

I still hope that maybe next Christmas we'll have some actual lights on the house, but I ain't holding my breath.