Xmas day 2009 an hour at a time

Inspired by Miss Fish I've been taking a photo an hour with my iPhone.

We're home and I'm tired so I'm done photo logging for today. But it was fun. Enjoy our day in reverse order :)


Moving a marble countertop vanity up the stairs - fun for the men at Xmas.

The boys went wild for these remote control cars that lit up.



Grammie and two of her boys.

On our way to party #2


This necklace from Eric of a mama bird with three baby birds is my favourite gift of the day.

More potatoes for our round two meal!

Wrapping paper still isn't recyclable right?


A tiny bit of down time to play with gifts.



Making our guests peel potatoes

Turkey time.


Watching tv and hanging out waiting for guests to wake and grandparents/aunt to arrive to open presents under the tree.

Wakeup was a very acceptable 7:15 and we opened stockings in the upstairs hallway to keep the noise down for our kid-free houseguests in the basement.

View from an iPhone part 2

Shopping at Costco on our chasing Santa day


I fell in love with these initial stockings on Etsy, but I admit, I didn't pay attention to the dimensions. Next to Kiernan's enormous stocking, they look a twitch small ;)


Sick day


Feeling well enough to do some crafts

Oh, are you taking photos? "Cheese!!"


We love our cookies



Kiernan eating donair

Time to decorate!

Our house is officially sold!!! Yay! So now I can honestly start thinking about the new house. It's a great house, but, it needs some new paint and a some new style. I thought I'd fish for some advice on what we can do in each room, because unlike others I know, decorating isn't really something I LOVE to do. I'd love your input!!

The house!! We don't love the colour, but considering the work I want to do inside, I can live with this for awhile :)


The family room. I'm hoping to remove a wall (the one to my left from where I was taking this photo) so the room will be due for some painting and stuff. If I get my way and the wall comes down then the family room, eat in kitchen and kitchen will all be attached and will need to be similar in theme. The kitchen/eat in are currently painted and wallpapered like this desk area. It'll be a shame to get rid of the wall paper border (eyes rolling) but I'm sure we can come up with something a bit better :)

Quinn and Kiernan's rooms. (Quinn green/blue and Kiernan yellow/blue). Both bedrooms have closets like that and chair rails. Wondering if it'll be easier to decorate without the chair rails? Kiernan has resquested a blue and blue room. Doesn't exactly go with his current safari themed room or the pirate stuff he has so I think we're starting from scratch and Quinn is old enough that I don't want to decorate his room in a baby theme but not old enough for me to know what his likes/dislikes will be.


Juliette's room. Definitely want to do something girly without it being too princess-y. Hopefully this dark grey won't be too hard to cover up. I have visions of wide pink/purple stripes but not sure if that'll get old too fast?
'
Our room. It's 10 and abit by 20. Our furniture will fit but I suspect it'll be a bit crowded. Our current room is a light beige on 3 walls and dark red on the last but I think that's very 5 years ago ;)


I'm wondering if wall decals are the way to go? I really like the one we have in Kiernan's room now and there are so many fun ones out there. Especially for the kids' rooms it seems like the easiest way to personalize their rooms.

If you guys are interested and actually have input (I know I'm not exactly the pioneer woman) then I'll post more soon asking for input on some of the other rooms and showing you the stuff I can't change for awhile but would like to eventually. To get an idea on our furniture you can see the photos from this house from our listing. Maybe I'll even do a giveaway. Hey, maybe the new Lowes in Orleans will want to sponsor a giveaway for home improvement tips? :) (ps I hear Lowes is having a 2 for 1 toilet sale, in case you're looking for a bunch of new toilets ;)

Ho ho ho... MERRY Christmas

This, my friends, is Santa Pierre. He is a Santa as Place d'Orleans and I think he is the perfect Santa. And Kiernan sat on his knee for his first 3 Xmas photos. This year, I was thrilled to learn you could get Santa Pierre's schedule to make sure you got him for your photo. Unfortunately, life had a little chuckle at my attempt to be so organized and despite my good intentions I never managed to get to the mall with all three kids in their Christmas best for a photo with Santa Pierre (really, I think buying a house and then getting our crazy messy too full house looking like this was a good excuse ;)




Impromptu babies with Santa photo at Billings Bridge early this week. I made an exception for convenience of location and the desire for a cute photo with the three bebes.



Yesterday I was all set to get THE Xmas photo. Santa Pierre, however, was not working until Saturday. Saturday. I knew it would be insane and really, life is insane enough without adding Saturday crowds to the mix. So, I decided instead we would go back to Billings Bridge. My mother in law and I got all three kids in their clothing (no easy feat, let me tell ya) and got out the door only to have Kiernan announce he was NOT going to have his photo taken with Santa. I knew better than to force the issue so instead we went for lunch.

After lunch he agreed to go see Santa so we drove to Billings. Guess what, we arrived and he was on a lonnnng lunch break. So we did a few more errands and then instead of heading back to Billings again, I decided we should go to Carlingwood since it was near my in-law's and we were having dinner there.

We got there at 3:15 and Santa wasn't there until 4:30. HA HA HA! :P We spent almost the entire days chasing after Santa with three young kids. FUN TIMES.

We waited and despite some impatient and tired children (mommy messed up naps for all 3 with all that galivanting) we got the photo. Carlingwood has a pretty good system where you get to choose from several photos right there and photos are ready within 15 minutes! (So much nicer than the 2-5 hour wait at a lot of other places) and I'm loving the option a lot of malls are having now to get the photo on a CD. By getting that option at Carlingwood I actually got all 3 photos that they took so the pressure to choose the best one on the spot wasn't so bad.

I am beyond thrilled with how cute they look in their matching Christmas outfits, despite my friend's comment encapsulating perfectly how I felt about this Santa "My Santa, what big teeth you have"

and I'm trying to resist tracking down Santa Pierre for one last shot at a photo with him this year. :)

It's elf yourself time of year!

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

On being three and a pain in the ass

Mother nature is very smart. She made babies cute and lovable so you would take care of them even when they scream like banshees and wake up 20 times every night. They look like their parents so people believe they are their children and stick around. It's a good design.

Now I realize how her cleverness extends. By the time they are 3, cute isn't enough anymore. It's a good thing they are so charming and amusing or the whole "I feel the need to assert myself" thing might get them booted out the door. sigh.

25 days of Christmas - the calendar

I'm pretty proud of our 25 days of Christmas calendar, and for the most part it was fun to make :)

We mostly used stickers and gluing to make all of our squares.

We lost our focus a bit at the end... with the all spiderman and dora sticker squares, but that's ok. :)

Tomorrow we start! Happy December!

25 days of Christmas

I love starting new family traditions and Miss Fish's 25 Days of Christmas challenge was right up my alley. Thanks to other participants like A little bit of momsense, Turtlehead and Some Kind of Wondermom, I didn't even have to do much thinking to come up with my list, which is REALLY up my alley right now.

Here's our list. I totally reserve the right to change dates as I see fit and I can't wait to post pictures of the calendar Kiernan and I have been working on making!

1 Put up Xmas lights in windows
2. Cut out paper snowflakes to decorate the windows.
3. Write and mail a letter to Santa
4. Listen to Holiday music
5. Make a paper snowman for the wall. Play ‘pin the face on the snowman’
6. Buy a toy and bring it to Toy Mountain.
7. Bake gingerbread cookies
8. Read Christmas stories at bedtime.
9. Put up more Christmas decorations
10. Make Christmas cards for your friends.
11. Select 2 toys to donate to other children who need toys.
12. Put up Christmas tree
13. Attend a gingerbread house making workshop
14. Take a drive to look at the Christmas lights
15. Sing Christmas carols
16. Put up Christmas stockings
17. Go visit Santa at the mall and have a photo taken
18. Make hot chocolate with marshmallows
19. Bake and decorate Christmas cookies
20. Get dressed in Christmas outfits and take photos in front of tree
21. Make gift tags for presents.
22. Wrap presents.
23. Bake cookies for Santa
24. Unwrap one present after dinner (mommy and daddy get to pick which one)
25. It’s Christmas Day!!

Big sigh

I feel like a big whiner but the last couple of weeks have been kicking my ass.

The babies have given up easy bedtime. Kiernan has decided it's time to start testing all of his boundaries. Teeth are coming in and that makes everyone cranky. Mornings aren't running smoothly so everyone is stressed out and I just can't seem to make myself get out of bed earlier to help things get going. Oh, and did I mention my grandmother died last week (something we expected since she was 95 and her health had been declining steadily, but the emotional reaction and the lack of time to deal with it is an interesting circumstance as well).

I need to push myself a bit harder to do things like chores when the babies are sleeping or I have no kids attached to me, but it's so hard. But living in a sty sucks too.

Anyways, wah wah wah. It'll get better and I'll start feeling a bit less out of control soon, but for now... grumble.

Hanging out with a three year old

I remember Sunday afternoons cozied up on the couch watching movies... although it has now become a fairly distant memory. With young kids, the chance to spend a lazy day in front of the tv just doesn't happen anymore. But, this past Sunday, I had a headache (because I indulged in ONE whole drink the night before) and so I came up with a bright idea.

"Hey Kiernan, want to go to the basement and cozy up on the couch and watch Wall-E with me?"
"Ya!!"
"Great, let's go"

So we headed down to the basement and I found a pillow and loaded up the movie and got Kiernan to lie down on the couch in front of me.

But that wasn't comfortable for him, so he tried lying on top of me. Which was comfortable, for 1 minute, then he thought he'd sit on my hip.

"What's Wall-E doing?"
"Collecting trash and making it into cubes"
"cubes?"
"yes, cubes"
"why?"
long explanation from mommy
"why"
break to go back to lying in front of me
and then on top of me, and then across me

"MOMMY! We're an X!"
"yup..."

"Kiernan, no jumping on the couch"
sitting on my head... sitting on my hip... lying on top of me...

"What's Wall-E doing now?"

Not quite what I was hoping for....

A view from the iPhone

The random photos I take on my phone give an interesting glimpse into the things we've done this month - I thought it would be fun to occasionally post a bunch here.

Quinn's first time sitting in the cart


Kiernan waiting for the doctor wearing my coat


What can keep four rambunctious boys quiet for more than 30 seconds? Games? On a computer? You think?


Quinn in my coat waiting for the doctor.


Would you look at those eyelashes!





Toqued up kids at the park

6 months old!

Quinn and Juliette turned 6 months old already and it is amazing to see them grow in size and in personality.

Quinn now weighs 17 lbs 11 oz (I'm pretty sure Kiernan barely weighed that at a year)
He is chatty chatty chatty and has all kinds of new sounds, including "d"s and "h"s.
He is a cuddle bear - more than Juliette or Kiernan. He will just sit and cuddle for long periods of time, and he likes it best pressed right up close to my face.
He's rolling really well from back to front but still hasn't rolled from front to back and he's not really sitting up very well.
Despite being a big chunkamunk, he's a very picky eater and so far only likes carrots and a bit of oatmeal cereal - he hates apple sauce which is just weird.
He's got two snaggle teeth that have poked out of his gums in odd places but it looks like we can expect his two bottom middle teeth within the week.
He is a giggle monster - it's fun and pretty easy to really get him going and his laugh is incredibly contagious - check out this video for proof.

Juliette weighs 14 lbs 9.6 oz
She is a smiley smiley girl and super friendly.
She is social and wants to be a part of every conversation.
She's a good eater and likes just about anything we offer her. She eats more than Quinn does which always seems surprising to me. She also eyes everything we're eating with a lot of interest.
She first two middle bottom teeth are almost completely up.
Her hair has really come in in the last couple of months and there is now enough to put a hairclip in it - so cute!
She chews anything and everything. Whatever you hand her goes automatically into her mouth.
She's also rolling really well from her back to her front but not the other way and she is sitting a bit better than Quinn but not totally stable yet either.