Merry Christmas!

It's 8:20pm on Christmas Day. Drew & Mara are in bed, Kai is playing "Race to the Mall with Polly Pocket" in the living room, Bob is sleeping & Norman Roufus is out in the yard with Grant, hopefully learning how not to pee in our house.

The last couple of days have been busy, but glorious. On the 23rd we hosted the first of what will hopefully be an annual Christmas party. We had 40 people here - almost half of them kids! It was a very loud, but successful, first attempt. We copied Nana's ornament exchange and it ended up being a really cool part of the night.

Savannah, Jaya, Mara & Kai
(Kai just had to change into jammies halfway through the night)

Em, Drew & Savannah "help" Curtis open his ornament

Bright & early the morning after the party Drew & Grant went to pick up Norman. We then spent most of a warm and sunny Christmas Eve outside playing with a very enthusiastic snow digger. We must have really tired him out because his first night away from his mum & brothers went off without a hitch...until Drew woke him up at 3:30am. (more about that below)

Last night DK both left their wish lists out for Santa. Both of them were quite worried he may not have known what they wanted because they didn't see him at the mall this year. Thank god he got their letters at the last minute or else the morning would have been a disaster! It was fantastic to witness their excitement and unwavering belief that Santa was on his way. We tracked him online and when he was getting close they went straight to bed, but struggled to get to sleep. Drew came out of his room a couple of times because he was positive he heard the bells.

As mentioned above, Drew came into our room at 3:30 to announce,

"HECAME!HEREALLYCAME!!!
HELEFTDADANDMEHOCKEYSTICKSANDHEATEHISCOOKIEANDDRANKTHEMILK!!"

Grant & I were exhausted but excited. Somehow we managed to convince him that he had to wait a few hours to open anything, but by that time Norman had gotten into the spirit and was ready to play. Grant then spent the rest of the night up with him. I, quite honestly, felt not one ounce of sorry for him.

And so it began...

...and continued

Pure concentration

Kai gets her pink Nintendo...

...and her pink guitar

At Bumpa's this afternoon, they found 100 more ways to be spoiled

Mara has a very bad cold, but she still managed to
drool & smile her way through her first Christmas

Tonight (now that the house is quiet) we can see that we are truly lucky & very blessed. We hope everyone's Christmas was as wonderful as ours!

Merry Christmas kids...your parents are crazy

His most impressive "take me home" face

Meet Lou/Louie/Auzzie/Truck/Doodie/Norman/Doug...(a name is still in the works - Truck was Kai's first pick). Mara had her time in the spotlight (she'll get used to it, she's #3), and now there is a younger, smaller Belbin movin' on in on Christmas Day. These pictures our of a 5 week old Retriever/Bernese cross who has stolen our hearts. He was born on my birthday (it's fate) and I meet him for the first time yesterday. I had been hoping for the cliche puppy-jumping-from-present trick on Christmas morning but good ol' Daddy "forgot" that was the plan & leaked the photos to the kids. There was no turning back after that.
Honestly, we do realize we're crazy, but hey, he's cute and really, what fun is life without constant disruption?

This last weekend we were so happy to have Scott, Vicki & Jorja come to stay with us. The girls played dress-up & Scott spent a great deal of time drawing with Drew. On Saturday, all three kids endured blue ice at Tube Town with the dads while the mums & Mara went shopping. It was a blessing to have 4 sleepy kids at the end of each day so the 4 of us could actually get a word in & talk like big people for a few hours! Come back anytime guys, we'd love it - and rumour has it, we'll have a friend for Jett next time too.

Cousins

The girls in a tub full of Barbies - Drew was most happy to sit this one out


An instant classic - the kids on the ski hill for the first time together.
A sign of great things to come!


Thanks Gruncle Scott & Grauntie Vicki
I really love my Bumbo, can't you tell?

Jolly Jumper action

Mara took to her Jolly Jumper for the first time last night. She was quite impressed with herself and the reactions she got from DK. Grant & I are just shocked that she can balance her head!

A little bit cool - a lot creepy

For the past 3 days we have been taking care of Josie, the Hansen's dog while they are on holidays. I doubt it's possible to find a dog that looks and acts more like Bailey did. The 2 of them became friends last winter when Katrina & kids stayed with us, and now with extreme mixed feelings we have Josie with us. She is a wonderful dog, but the resemblance to Bailey has made her stay surprisingly emotional for us.

Drew has been so loving & caring with her & he's even taken her for walks to the end of the street on his own. He spent 2 hours on Saturday playing fetch in the snow with her, and with the enthusiastic hopefulness only kids have, he said, "It's like Bailey has come back to us for just a little while."

What family blog is really complete without baby-in-bath photos? This is Mara's favourite place to be & since she spends a great deal of time in the tub I thought we should document it at least once.
For everyone who remembers Kai's rubber band wrists, check out version 2 on Mara. She's healthy to say the least & we love every single developing roll!


And, this photo below may not be the most flattering picture in the world, but I had to take a shot of her first time in this cozy wonder suit from Patti. About 10 minutes after this picture was taken she was out like a light in her car seat. She slept for a whopping 9.5 hours! She fell asleep on the 2 minute drive to pick up Drew from school and woke up at 11:45pm. She then had her "dinner" and went promptly back to sleep until 6:15. Thanks Patti! We may never take her out of this suit, ever.