Doon lantern

NOW it feels like Christmas! We had such a GREAT night! We bought tickets for this in the beginning of NOVEMBER, and I’m so happy I did cause they were sold out fast! This activity was held at the Waterloo Regional Museum, I’ve mentioned them a few times before. It has a very bright colorful outside, and then you walk thru an entire village that’s made to run and reflect the lifestyle of 1914. We showed up for the last tour of the night at 8:00, already an hr past the kids bed time but it was a special night. And even though there was snow on the ground and it was lightly snowing, we were bundled up nicely and so it turned out to be a a great night to do this. .

We meet inside the museum to watch a salient movie “the night before Christmas” before the night tours started.

They had a BIG Christmas tree set up in the café area with presents and everything. Thanks goodness they were smart enough to put up a chain barrier around the tree otherwise my kids would ran up to it thinking those gifts were for THEM! It was fun to see such a LARGE real Christmas tree though.
This is jumping my thoughts to what I was thinking later that night – but I was thinking, how fun would that have been if you lived in a small community where you had a big tree like this in your town square and each family placed one of their own personal ornaments on the tree. I really do love the tight-community feeling you get when you walk thru these old village reenactments. Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy I live in the years I do, I’m very grateful for the inventions and changes that have made life easier… but I can’t help but think, the Maninites communities sure are living a more pure, happy and ALIVE way of life. It just makes me feel like we’ve come so far, but at what cost? well, I guess that's how we know we havent made "Zion" perfect just yet... just some thoughts… anyhow, moving on.

we were divided into groupd and then our tour guids would take us thru the village and we get to go into the homes and they have ready for us some seasonal treats of the decade, and we listen to stories about what Christmas was like in 1914.
At the first home, they served apple cider. I never liked apple cider. It tastes like … well what I would imagine something else tasting like that I didn’t want to actually WRITE out on a blog. But Andrew loved it however. That surprised me. and at this home we learned how people use to have these simple table top trees cause you weren’t allowed to cut down trees unless you owned the land, and only the upper-class owned the trees so that’s why THEY would have those BIG elaborate trees. But if you were a poor guy, you would either CUT off the TOP of a tree in secret, or gather loose limbs on the ground and then whittle them into a stick. And this style just kept on as a tradition thru out the years even when the family finances changed. We also got to learn how to make those insanely fragile shaped ornaments. They start as a 1 inch tube of glass, then they’re blown into a small build, then placed inside of a shape molder and then blown to fill it out. Then they pour a metallic paint inside, swish around and then pour out the excess paint. Then they paint the outside with yet another paint, and then they paint tiny details, and THEN they would cut the tip of the excess glass! Phew! Can you believe it! What a talented labor of love for each ornament!

Then at another house we got short bread (I loved it! It was surprisingly sweet) and we learned all about the 12 days of Christmas feasting! You actually would start the 12 days of Christmas ON Christmas day and then feast on these type of treats and pastries for the next 12 days and then end on Jan 6 (3 kings days). You’ll notice there is a pineapple and flags in the middle of the table. That was always a big treat of the season if you had a pineapple cake. And they would use these flags for the top of the Christmas trees instead of angels and stars.

At the convince store we had fudge! Oh, it was so good, it MELTED in your mouth! So good! We were then explained how things worked behind these counters in those good old days, and how much things cost. You could get a Christmas Goose for $.45 CENTS! And I got to look under these glass display cases at all the pretty little knick knacks of the age. I can totally imagine that if I was a little girl in those days falling in love with so many little treasures but hoping and saving for just one small item all year long to find under the tree on Christmas day. There were items like lady gold watches, hair pens, mustache grooming kit, itty bitty tiny tea set or a naked doll you would take home and make clothes for yourself. Makes you remember how RICH and SPOILED we are today, and our kids too. If you look in this picture you’ll see this statue of a man who looks like Santa. Andrew and Amanda thought he was very cool and liked him a lot, and the store keeper laughed cause she said this was the statue of a mean minion who would hunt down bad little children who hadn’t been good that year. Now, weather she was telling me the truth about the statue or just making small talk… creepy small talk. But it was way more common to use fearful tactics with kids in those day in order to force them to behave well. I’m glad we’ve changed a little bit in that area. Can you imagine what things would be like if we still did things like that today? When you walked into Wal-mart, instead of being greeted by an sweet elderly person, you would be attacked by a man in a devils’ costume waving a pitchfork.

Next was my second favorite moment of the night. We went on a carriage ride thru the town, and since we were the last tour of the night our driver graced us with an extra long ride. It was so magical, the snow was lightly falling down, we sang Christmas carols as we rode over snow covered streets flanked with oil lanterns that flickered in the dark night. Picturesque right? When the driver pulled up Amanda started jumping up and down and said “I’m so excited! I’m so excited!” and then the driver said “oh you’re excited eh! Well come right here little darling.” and he PULLED her up over the side of the carriage to sit right next to him. The rest of us climbed in thru the back. And Amanda and Andrew got the 2 best spots on the whole buggy. They got right up front behind the horses on both side of the driver. And the driver is such a sweet guy, he’s been doing this for forever and is so great with kids and doesn’t brush them off and always has a fast answer to all their questions. And I never knew just how fun it is to be in a wooden carriage and have the horses run really fast. You pump this way and that, but it is so fun.
But the best part of the whole night was the very ending. Our carriage took us to the church that was settled ever so sweetly on a small hill. Derick and I got a pew all the way in the back and we sang Christmas carols from these vintage printed songbooks by lamplight. It was SO awesome and special! Derick said that that made his whole night! We loved it so much! It was like being in an Ann of Green gables book. The church’s motto on the back of the wall I think summed up the feeling of the evening; “One is your master, even Christ and all ye are brethren”. It was wonderful to have that Christmas home feeling again!

Walking back to the car when it was all over, Derick and I held hands and just kept saying what a wonderful night it’s been and how we’ll always remember this. It was just the thing we needed to feel the Christmas season come into full bloom. So Merry Christmas my loved ones!

Like an angel passing through my room

This is such a BEAUTFIL song! I have a personal attachment to the melody and the words. We were listening to it while watching our Christmas DVD of “the Mormon Tabernacle Choir with Sisal”. She dose such a lovely job singing the song. I would LOVE to be able to sing it myself someday. It’s so touching listening to it, I even cry at times. I’ve decided to add this song to the list of things I want song/done at my funeral. Yes… I have a list. Derick and I talk about stuff like this on road trips. Yall might think that’s depressing, but think about it. It’s the BIGGEST “moment of dedication of YOUR life” you will EVER get, we like to think about how it would be since we probably won’t get to see it ourselves. You never know thow. Maybe we do get to watch that part after we’ve passed on thru the vial. Either way, it’s your party and it’s kind of fun to plan it out. Derick and I mainly like to talk about what songs we would want song and stuff like that.
But anyhow, you HAVE to check out the song at this link
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PX1ipS6BNj8

Snow crafts

With as cold as it’s been for a while now, I thought it would be a perfect time to try some of these winter-crafts I’ve always wanted to do but never was able too before.
This one, was a great way for us to use some more of our recyclable items for FUN projects. We took our leftover orange cartons, cut the tops off, and filled them with different things like leftover fast-food toys, pine cones, nuts, seeds and stuff like that. You then fill it up with water, and food coloring. And then leave them outside to freeze over thru the night. Then the next morning run them under hot water, shake them out from carton and then put them outside for decorations. if you notice I HAD planed on hanging them, thats why there's a purple ribbon hanging out of them. but I just desided to put them on the rail outside on the portch. I just hope they dont stain the wood... mmm... I may need to rethink that part.

Then we got to do a snowflake activity. (I’VE AWAYS wanted to do this!) it’s where you take a piece of black paper, hold it out as the snow falls to catch the snowflakes and then you’re able to really see and observe what the snowflakes LOOK like! Do you know I’ve NEVER really SEEN what a snowflake LOOKED like till I came here? Really! I mean, I’ve seen snow, and I’ve seen pictures of what snowflakes looked like, but I thought that was on a microscopic level or something, cause when I looked at snow falling down, I never saw that pretty little shape, I just had NO IDEA that you could see what they looked like with the naked eye. But here in Canada, you can get snow that’s just tiny little individual snowflakes falling down. It’s the best when you’re in the car and you watch them land on your window shield. SO cool! I can actually say I’ve really have seen snowflakes now and know what they look like!
It was really fun to do this craft with Amanda, but sadly I couldn’t get a good enough shot to show you the cool shape of snowflakes themselves. I tried though. You can kind of see them if you can zoom into this picture.

Snow day fun!

I don’t know what it is, but as SOON as the snow starts to fall, the kids want to go out to play in it. I told them we had to let it collect a big before we could go out to play in it. We did of course go out eventually. And I am glad we’re trying to take advantage of the snow while it’s here. I hope the kids will remember being here and playing in the snow like this.
Here the kids are all decked out to HIT the snow in their new snow outfits.

And as soon as we opened the back door, that’s what they did first. Amanda HIT the ground to make a snow angel… aw… my little angel, making an angel. How sweet.

As you can well see, there wasn’t a WHOLE LOT of snow on the ground, but it was enough for the kids to have fun in it. And it was VERY cold! It’s so weird to me that there can be days when it’s not that bad cold-wise outside at all, and sheets of snow will come down, and then there are days where it only snows a little and yet it’s FREEZING outside! So weird to me.

Amanda loves to just ROLL in the snow! Man this girl NEEDS a dog badly! But on a side note, I’m very grateful we don’t have a dog and live in a snowy place. I feel so bad for the poor suckers here that have to get all bundled up and go outside at all hrs of the day/night, freezing weather or not to let their dog pee or poop and then have to pick it up and carry it back home. I can imagine that when people walk their dogs out, they’re hoping they need to poop. It’ll be something warm to hold in their hands on the way back to the house. Ok… this is gross… MOVING ON!

He he he he. Is it a snow angel or a leaf angel, I won’t tell her if you won’t.

Pour little Andrew, his mittens just kept falling off! The suit was just right for him but the mittens that came with it were apparently too small. I gave him mine of course, he’s wasn’t too happy about them either. but I know his little hands were just so cold! – don’t you think it’s kind of odd… when you get too much sun to where it’s bad for your skin, your skin turns red, and in the snow, the same thing happens. Just a thought.

Things were getting kind of old kind of fast so we walked over to our park.

Climb boy CLIMB! Pour little guy, it’s NOT as easy as it looks. Especially with all that extra padding.

They were spinning around the pole. Luckily they’re too young to “triple dog dare” each other to do something stupid! (lol) (I’m talking about putting their tongue on a cold pole here – you know, from “A Christmas Story” movie)

Just another snow day

How weird is this? Everyone here has been telling me that “this NEVER happens / that Canada is NEVER this snowy this time of year”, but it’s been pretty white for a while now. I think it’s because WE’RE here and Gods just pouring his blessings upon us – literally. I’m very grateful for the snow we’re had so far. It’s been really great for the kids.

Just look at how many inches we got

Amanda just loves to roll down the small hill outside our house.

Andrew likes to roll down the hill too, but it’s so funny when he’s lands on the ground. He has the hardest time getting up. It’s all that padding. It’s so funny to watch him get up. just look at that cute little butt!