December Daily - December 22nd Words & Photos

Despite Aiden still being sick, we started off our trip home with some fun.  This afternoon we headed to a local skating rink for some ice time with family and friends (we left Phea at home with my mom).  We had to make a quick trip to Canadian Tire to buy some new skates for me, and get all of our skates sharpened (bad idea - never get your skates sharpened by a machine!), and then it was off the rink.  Aiden had fun learning how to skate with Daddy, and Mommy had fun trying to remember!  haha!!

In the evening we got a bunch of family together to take pictures for my Nanna for Christmas.  This did NOT go as planned.  Most of the babies were miserable (tired, hungry, someone looked at them, someone didn't look at them, ... etc) and so this ended up just being a gathering for a good time.  We did manage to get a few ok pictures of our kids and family though.

After this we dropped our kids off with my parents and headed out for some appetizers and drinks with a few friends.  A jam packed day of fun!

December Daily - December 21st Words & Photos

Today was spent driving home to be with our families for Christmas.  Despite Aiden being sick and us getting off to a late start, we made record time for the trip!  Aiden passed the time watching various movies and tv shows on the iPad (thank God for that thing, seriously), Phea was great playing with a few toys and taking two long naps, and I crocheted.  We had a fantastic dinner waiting for us when we got home prepped by Marc and Amy - salmon, scallops, mashed potatoes, rapini and salad.  Soooooo delish.  Great start to our holidays at home!

My scarf is going to be a Mickey Mouse scarf, based on this scarf I found on Pinterest (sold on Etsy).  I think I am going to change the bottom fringe to a yellow band though - we shall see!

December Daily® is a December mini-album project devised by Ali Edwards with the simple goal of capturing the spirit of December via one story per day. Read more on her website here.

December Daily - December 18th Words & Photos

Another day relaxing and visiting with family.  Kris started his holidays today so he went out to do some Christmas shopping.  We also took the new babe's Christmas photo so his parents can send out their Christmas cards with a cute little babe's picture inside.

Today's Christmas Movie - Christmas With the Kranks (me), Rudolf the Red Nosed Reindeer (again)

December Daily® is a December mini-album project devised by Ali Edwards with the simple goal of capturing the spirit of December via one story per day. Read more on her website here.

December Daily - December 20th Words & Photos

Christmas morning #1 for us today!  Santa visited us last night and brought the kids and mini piano and some fun instruments!  Both kids were very excited about the piano!  Mommy and Daddy also bought the kids a few things, including a little people princess castle for Phea and a tool bench for Aiden.  Mommy should have known better as she wasn't very in to princesses when she was little either, but Phea wanted very little to do with the princess castle and a whole lot to do with the tool bench!  Good thing big brother is a good sharer!!  The kids had a great morning opening presents, and spent the day playing with some of their new goodies.  I packed up all our stuff to head on our trip the next morning.  Poor Aiden is still sick, but he powered through today!  Such fun!

December Daily® is a December mini-album project devised by Ali Edwards with the simple goal of capturing the spirit of December via one story per day. Read more on her website here.

December Daily - December 19th Words & Photos

Today was a special day for us, however it started out a bit of a disaster, with Aiden waking up quite sick and my sister, brother and law and baby N leaving us to head back to their home.  Aiden stayed home from daycare today and spent a lot of time sleeping during the day, however we had some special activities to take care of!  When we sent our letter to Santa we let him know that we would be visiting a different city for Christmas, and asked if he could bring our presents there instead.  But he let us know that he would be coming to visit early because he had a pretty big present for the kids, and we wouldn't be able to drive home with it.  So we spent the day prepping for his visit!
I wore a very elffy outfit, we cleaned up all the toys and got the living room ready for Santa.  After dinner Aiden and I decorated Christmas cookies to leave for Santa (Aiden sampled some too, and they received his full approval), left them out on his special cookie plate with some milk, and also left out some carrots for the reindeer.

After the kids headed off to bed Santa's elves got to work setting up gifts for the kids, and mom and
dad added theirs too!  So exciting!!

Today's Christmas Movie - Paw Patrol Pups Save Santa

December Daily® is a December mini-album project devised by Ali Edwards with the simple goal of capturing the spirit of December via one story per day. Read more on her website here.

December Daily - December 17th Words & Photos

Today was spent hanging out with family and snuggling the new babe.  I am so grateful that I was able to be near when my sister had her first baby!  He is such a sweet boy.  Aiden is absolutely enamoured with him.  Sophia likes him when other people are holding him, not so much when I am holding him.  haha

Today's Christmas Movie - The Santa Clause, The Santa Clause 2 (me), Mickey Saves Santa

December Daily® is a December mini-album project devised by Ali Edwards with the simple goal of capturing the spirit of December via one story per day. Read more on her website here.

December Daily - December 16th Words & Photos

Today was a day for wrapping and attempting new baking.
One of the blogs I follow posted a link to this recipe for Crockpot Candy that her momma made every Christmas.  I remembered seeing this last year and wanting to try it.  So off I went to the grocery store, Walmart, another grocery store - in a desperate search for the ingredients.  I didn't find them.  Almond Bark and German Chocolate?  Who wants to tell me where I can find those in Ontario? haha  So I ended up improvising and googling substitutions and threw together something that looked like it might turn out the same.  It didn't.  It is OK, but it is nothing special.  The next time I get a chance to go across to the US I am going to have a look see for the REAL ingredients and try again.  This is what I threw together:

Layered in the crockpot in the following order: peanuts, almonds, toffees (mix together), white chocolate, semi-sweet chipits, milk chocolate bar.

After about 2 hours I stirred - it could have used a stir earlier - and discovered that there was probably not enough chocolate.  So I added in 3/4 of a bag of milk chocolate chips, let that melt for about 20 minutes, stirred again, and portioned off the mixture by spooning small mounds onto wax paper.  They are tasty, very chocolatey but nothing amazing that I would like to repeat.  If I do find the proper ingredients and try again i will definitely use the almonds as I like the different texture of the two types of nuts together.

While all of this was cooking away I spent some time wrapping.  Still so much to do, but such an enjoyable task with a cup of hot cocoa and Miracle on 34th Street playing!  Definitely feeling back in the Christmas spirit today!  Plus I got to snuggle the new babe - bonus.

Today's Christmas Movie - Miracle on 34th Street (me), Frosty the Snowman (again)

December Daily® is a December mini-album project devised by Ali Edwards with the simple goal of capturing the spirit of December via one story per day. Read more on her website here.

December Daily - December 14th and 15th Words & Photos

I must admit, the Christmas season started off with a bang in our home.  Tree decorating, baking, cookie and gingerbread house decorating.  However the past few days I have found myself feeling a little bit Grinchy!  The weather has been quite mild and although we have had a few snowfalls, none of it seems to stick.  The missing snow is putting as serious damper on my Christmas spirit!

Plans to resolve this include holiday movies and music ALL DAY tomorrow, baking gingerbread men (my favourite), and decorating the cookies tonight with Aiden.  I SHALL feel Christmassy again!

Today's Christmas Movie - Ice Age A Mammoth Christmas Special

December Daily® is a December mini-album project devised by Ali Edwards with the simple goal of capturing the spirit of December via one story per day. Read more on her website here.

December Daily - December 13th Words & Photos

Today we welcomed our sweet nephew into the world.  He is such a cute little peanut!

Tonight was Kris' work Christmas party!  Fancy clothes, yummy dinner, drinks and dancing.  Such a great night!

December Daily® is a December mini-album project devised by Ali Edwards with the simple goal of capturing the spirit of December via one story per day. Read more on her website here.

December Daily - December 12th Words & Photos

Aiden brought home a homemade ornament today.  He was thrilled to find a special place for it on the tree (right on top of 10 other things I swear). It is so sparkly and pretty!

He also brought home a new piece of artwork. It joined our Christmas cards and other holiday artwork on the art wall. 

Today's Christmas Movie - Mickey's Christmas Carol (again), Pluto's Christmas Tree (again)


December Daily® is a December mini-album project devised by Ali Edwards with the simple goal of capturing the spirit of December via one story per day. Read more on her website here.

December Daily - December 11th Words & Photos

Today we had a pretty big snowfall!  After dinner we bundled up the kiddos and headed outside to shovel the driveway and play in the snow. Both kids had a great time. Aiden helped daddy shovel and Phea crawled around trying to figure out what all the cold white stuff was. Such good winter fun!

December Daily - December 10th Words & Photos

Today was filled with baking and Christmas Cards!  My mom began her second yearly baking tradition - tie plates. So delish. I forgot to take a picture but I can assure you they are amazing. And she made oodles. YUM!!

While she was making her tie plates I was drooling (kidding) and working on our Christmas cards!  Just have to pick up stamps and send them off. 

And also, sneaky Phea is doing THIS.
All. Day. Long.
haha

Today's Christmas Movie - A Charlie Brown Christmas


December Daily® is a December mini-album project devised by Ali Edwards with the simple goal of capturing the spirit of December via one story per day. Read more on her website here.

December Daily - December 9th Words & Photos

Today we received our first Christmas card!  Aiden and I walked to pick up the mail and found it in the mailbox.  He was so excited to bring it home and find out who it was from!  We are hanging all of our Christmas cards on our art wall for the holidays - I think it will look so festive mixed with some of Aiden's holiday artwork!  With just one card and one picture hanging up there right now, it looks pretty bare, but once we start to fill it up I will share a picture!

Today's Christmas Movie - Frosty the Snowman (again)


December Daily® is a December mini-album project devised by Ali Edwards with the simple goal of capturing the spirit of December via one story per day. Read more on her website here.

December Daily - The Pages: December 1st to 5th

I had some time to sit and scrap the other day and got my first five days of December Daily scrapped!  This project is just so fun!  Here are my pages so far!

December 1st

December 2nd & 3rd

December 2nd

December 3rd

December 4th & 5th

December 4th

December 5th

This last one was scrap lifted from Cathy Zielski.  She posted something on Facebook a few days ago and I took a screen shot of it.  For the life of me I can NOT find a link to it again to share and link you back to her.  SORRY!!

December Daily® is a December mini-album project devised by Ali Edwards with the simple goal of capturing the spirit of December via one story per day. Read more on her website here.

December Daily - December 8th Words & Photos

Another low key day until the evening. I left the house in the early afternoon to finish up some Christmas shopping, pick up some items for Kris' work Christmas party this coming weekend, and then meet up with Sara to exchange Christmas gifts and celebrate her birthday with dinner. We met up at Milestones, drank too many Bellini's (so good), and overall just had a great time. We were supposed to go to our school's Advent Liturgy afterwards but once we got to talking time just flew by and we missed the whole thing. Ooops.  It was a great night with a great friend. 

December Daily® is a December mini-album project devised by Ali Edwards with the simple goal of capturing the spirit of December via one story per day. Read more on her website here.

December Daily - December 7th Words & Photos

Today was a very low key day. We spent the day around the house, doing a little of everything. I worked on some crochet gifts during the morning, and added chocolate peppermint bark to the Christmas baking checklist (while kiddos were napping) and we watched some Christmas movies in the evening. 

These two snuggling during Mickey's Twice Upon a Christmas is too much for me. 

I put together a Christmas Activities checklist to add to my December Dailly - formatted to 6x8 so I can just punch some holes or add it right into a pocket. It is based on a different checklist I used a few years ago that I found online (sorry, can't find a link to the original), but I changed a few things as the original was meant for families who lived where there is no snow for Christmas. I also added a list of our favourite holiday movies to watch as well. You can download below and use this in your own December Daily if you wish!  

Download Christmas Activities Checklist Printable (PDF)

Today's Christmas Movie - Mickey's Twice Upon A Christmas (kids), The Holiday (adults)


December Daily® is a December mini-album project devised by Ali Edwards with the simple goal of capturing the spirit of December via one story per day. Read more on her website here.