we are in full-fledged christmas celebration mode over here.
here are some of the things we have done this past week.
december 4 - we went the santa claus parade in high river. high river is a smaller town so we anticipated it being an OK parade, but it ending up being amazing! i think the small town feel made it even more exciting for the boys - most of the 'floats' were just heavy machinery decorated with lights. we saw tractor trailers, fire trucks, off-road vehicles, enormous tow trucks, buses, and all sorts of farm equipment. my word, combines are huge!
here are some of the things we have done this past week.
december 4 - we went the santa claus parade in high river. high river is a smaller town so we anticipated it being an OK parade, but it ending up being amazing! i think the small town feel made it even more exciting for the boys - most of the 'floats' were just heavy machinery decorated with lights. we saw tractor trailers, fire trucks, off-road vehicles, enormous tow trucks, buses, and all sorts of farm equipment. my word, combines are huge!
december 5 - we picked out our christmas tree from ikea, brought it home, and decorated it (along with the rest of our home) while jamming out to christmas tunes.
december 6 - matt helped the boys make little sled christmas ornaments out of popsicle sticks. it took much longer then matt anticipated, but the boys loved cutting/gluing/drilling the sticks with their dad.
december 7 - we had a christmas themed FHE with our clarke cousins and grandpa larry. jane taught us about the nativity and then we made more nifty ornaments for on our tree. this time our ornamnents were made by coloring on solo cups with sharpies, and melting them in the oven.. very fun!
december 10 - we visited santa at the mall. i didn't plan on doing this, but we skipped out on our ward christmas party and i didn't know where else the boys would get a chance to see santa this year. i was expecting to have to wait around for a couple hours (based on what others had told me) but we basically walked right to the front of the line. a christmas miracle! the boys were excited to see santa and enjoyed chatting with him. while at the mall, we also got to decorate a gingerbread man, write santa a letter, and plop it in a special north pole mailbox.
december 11 - we had a christmas playdate with almost all of the leavitt cousins at aunt marci's house. marci had set up a pretend store in the basement for the kids to buy, and and wrap up, a gift for their moms. chet got me something and can hardly wait for me to open it!
december 12 - we decorated our gingerbread house! and then headed up to pure hell airdrie to check out the festival of lights there. it was sooOOoo cold. airdrie is only 50 minutes north of our home, but it was so much colder. by the end, holden was inconsolable (he gets his tolerance for cold weather straight from me - it's funny how similar we are in that area). despite being in legitimate pain from the cold, we did enjoy seeing the lights and riding the little train around the park. we drank a whole lot of hot chocolate that night.
coming up:
- chet's kindergarten christmas concert and celebration.
- the annual leavitt adult christmas party.
- the annual christmas eve party with all of matt's family (we have a really great performance in the works for the talent show that night!)
- we think it would be fun to check out the lights at spruce meadows and confederation park.
- it's tradition to visit the live nativity at heritage park.
coming up:
- chet's kindergarten christmas concert and celebration.
- the annual leavitt adult christmas party.
- the annual christmas eve party with all of matt's family (we have a really great performance in the works for the talent show that night!)
- we think it would be fun to check out the lights at spruce meadows and confederation park.
- it's tradition to visit the live nativity at heritage park.
these candid photos of the boys working on the house are my favorite..
i also like the background of this one..
this is a blurry picture of us at the airdrie festival of lights, all bundled up.. and still cold!
