Author: Heather

Happy Birthday!

I have to admit, I love my birthday.  I also love celebrating everyone else’s birthdays too.  This past week has been a very interesting but ultimately fun birthday.  I did not have my usual skating party with friends because I am still coping with the after effects of whiplash.  I am usually good and can get through the day with the help of pain killers and caffeine (I am not sleeping so well).

We spent the first weekend of 2013 up at my parents enjoying their ample supply of snow with some snowmen, a bit of backyard sledding and Glenn & Katrine went skiing.

I was feeling a bit sad because it took all of my will power to crawl around in the snow helping to fill pails to create the snow pair and push the girls on the wee hill.  No skiing for me. :(  Well, didn’t my parents turn it around.  A special dinner, gifts and GF cake!  Who can feel down when there is cake?

My actual birthday was wonderful. I went for lunch with Elspeth and my fabulous mother in law before enjoying dinner at home.  It was great to watch how excited both of the girls were for my birthday this year.  Katrine loves celebrating things and has always been enthusiastic which is wonderful to enjoy.  Last year Elspeth watched but this year she participated.  All day she was like, “It mama birthday.  I give surprise toe nail polish.  You do my toe nails?”  Okay, she still has to work on the concept of what constitues a surprise but at least she was eager to celebrate.

The gift theme this year was chocolate (oh, and nail polish).  Mmmmm.  Chocolate tea, chocolate soap, chocolate lip gloss, chocolate coloured drapes 🙂 and of course chocolate cake.  It smellt SOOOO good.  Then to top it off the girls made cards which were adorable.  Katrine made hers pop-up while Elspeth managed to copy To mama and print the current version of her name.  I love my girls.

 

Did I mention that I got chocolate cake?  Yes?  Well this was a particularly awesome cake.  First, Glenn made it as a surprise.  Second, it has a half pound of butter and 6 eggs so that alone should make it delicious.  Third, devil’s food cake.  Fourth, it is absolutely adorable.  Glenn made me a gigantic cupcake cake.  As you can see, I could hardly wait to dig in. (Oh and my new scarf was a Mama T creation)

So here I am, 39 and proud.  I have enjoyed every year and earned every wrinkle.  I can hardly wait to see what this year will hold.

 

 

Calico Adoption Play

The Friday before Christmas, I took the girls to visit my Nana Brown.  We had our little Christmas celebration with her.  She got to open the gifts that the girls had made for her and they got to open her gifts as well so that she could enjoy them.  Elspeth received a Christmas Calico Critter set.  It had a Santa dog, some gifts and two small baby/toddler animals.  Now for her birthday, Elspeth had received a family of pandas.

Okay, now that the scene has been set I can relate how the adoption theme was played out.

Upon returning home Katrine placed one of the new critters on the kitchen table and announced that he was a toddler who lived in Africa.  Then she placed the other critter on the kitchen counter and announced that she was a baby who lived in China.  Then she gathered up all of the panda family and began her diaglogue….

“Where are we going on this plane?”

“Don’t you remember?  We are traveling to Africa to adopt your new brother and then to China for your sister.”

“Oh.  Cool.  Will we be home in time for Christmas?”

“Of course, and it will be so much fun having new brothers and sisters to play with.”

“Plus, Santa Critter will bring us more toys!”

The critter plane (played by Katrine) arrived at the kitchen table and the pandas were unceremoniously dumped onto the table top before being lined up in a row to meet their new family member.  Now that is not at all intimidating poor guy.  Toddler deer reacted by silently staring at the 6 pandas who in turn were staring at him.  Then the Mama panda went over and scooped him up just in time to as he started to cry.   After some bonding and hugs the whole family were loaded back onto the Katrine plane to be flown to China for there second adoption. (Seems that there is much less red tape invovled in adoptions in Calico Critter land)

“Okay, here we are in China.”

“Is this baby going to cry or do nothing?”

“I hope that the new baby doesn’t smell.”

“Well, I hope that she can play with me.”

“I am just glad that it is not another brother.  We have enough boys in our family.”

“Hey!”

“Stop fighting.  Here she comes.  Can you see her?”

The baby bunny was already bawling and mama panda began to sooth her right away.  Once again there was a bit of bonding time before they were herded back onto the plane to head for home.

We never got to see how the family’s first week at home unfolded as dinner was ready and the next time we played the previous theme was forgotten in favour of Christmas and rearranging furniture.  Made me smile though.  Never saw the arrival of new toys playing out quite that way.  Kids are simply full of surprises.

 

Concussion update

Okay, we went to see the neurologist last week and received some positive news.  He gave clearance for Katrine to resume skating and her full school schedule as long as she continues to besymptom free.  At the same time he had us do some blood work in case her fatigue was the result of something else.  So it briefly felt like we had returned to some sense of normal.

 

On Sunday afternoon I took thegirls skating.  Nothing new, done it many a time and it should have been plain old fun, right?  Nope.  A kid fell took me out and I smacked the back of my head on the ice really nicely.  For the past few days I have been nursing a mild concussion and a case ofwhiplash.  Just as progress was being made on feeling better ( right now I am typing while I wait for my last Advil of the day to kick in) a blood vessel in my left eye popped so I have a red eye.  Apparently that can take up to two weeks to clear so it looks like I may have some actual red eye in this year’s birthday photos.

That is about it.  Happy new year to everyofeeling soon I will postphotos of my mason jar triffle.  They worked much better than the Christmas cupcakes.

Merry Christmas to all.

We hope that you all had a wonderful day today.  It was quite a nice day here with us.  The morning began with stockings and the girls must have been very good this year because Santa delivered – Calico critter house and a new Om Nom had Elspeth smiling while Katrine was doing a happy dance over her new bedset (complete with fluffy pillows) and Moshi Monster guide.  After a delicious breakfast it was off for presents.  Elspeth did much better this year.  She gets the whole “gifts are meant to be unwrapped and hold good stuff” this year.  Two of the girls’ favourite gifts were their new glasses with their names (a big deal because you pretty much never find stuff with either Katrine or Elspeth on it).  Glenn?  Can’t you tell that he absolutely LOVED the Santa mask that Katrine made him out of pipe cleaners? :-)   Me?  A ticket to the gala performance of the WorldFigure Skating Championships for next year!!!

Once the gifts were done, the kids were pretty wired.  Left my parents and Glenn inside to work on getting the turkey in and lunch ready and went outside to play in the snow with them.  It was awesome.  Our finished product was as cute as the fake snowman one of my gifts came in.

Of course, the day ended with LOTS of food and some games as a family.

Christmas Eve Catch-up

Just realised how far behind I was in updating so here goes:

Elspeth’s nursery school hosted a ‘Cocoa Party’ one afternoon last week.  The girls were quite happy to decorate a cookie (Katrine ate all of hers while Elspeth just picked off the candies), drink hot chocolate (Elspeth actually just poked at the floating marshmallows and giggled) and eat treats.  Me?  I was thrilled to get a photo of all of us together!

We celebrated Christmas at my brother and sister in laws two weeks ago and it was a blast -yummy food, great company, and decorated sheep.  I suppose everyone loves to be festively dressed on special occassions.

For said celebration I was asked to bring dessert.  My mom had mentioned seeing a photo of cupcakes in mason jars in a magazine.  Well , I figured that I should do something creative and designed a mental picture of a beautifully stacked red, white and green cupcake jar of yumminess.  Hmmm.  Didn’t work out quite as I had invisioned.  Funny thing is, just saw on the cover of a magazine while waiting at the check out that they had instructions for making….red, white and green cupcakes in jars!  The featured cupcakes looked just like my vision.  Sigh.

Although Katrine is taking a break from the ice, I had Elspeth out the skating trail this past week.  One time her beloved blanket sheep had to accompany us and skate.

Yesterday we went to celebrate Christmas with Glenn’s extended family.  It was fabulous.  The girls have been blessed with a great group of cousins once removed (?)/second cousins (?).  Anyways, for five hours there was laughter, play and smiles.  Plus, Glenn and I got to partake in adult conversation and get caught up.

Today we will be cleaning and doing some last minute prep before heading out to church.  Then it is set up for Santa which is a big deal for me as I know that Katrine’s days of believing in Santa are quickly ticking away so I want to treasure it while I still can.  Then tomorrow and the next day will be Christmas present chaos.  Then Thursday is the big day with the neurologist.

That pretty much brings you up to date.  Have a great Christmas if you are celebrating and if not, enjoy the little bit of snow that we actually have thus far.

No more Speech!

Elspeth is no longer involved with Speech and Language. She was discharged this morning!!! Apparently our little sweetie has gone from delayed to being normal. Yippeeee! Her favourite part of the appointment? Certainly not performing on demand for the therapist. Nope, loved the fake cupcakes and the Mr Potatoe Head.

Some Christmas fun

This is just a random post of Christmassy stuff we are doing.  I have been pretty stressed over Katrine as well as Elspeth’s upcoming speech assessment (hoping it is the last) so this post is a way of helping me to focus on some of the positives happening right now.

1. Christmas nails: Now it was suggested that I try to paint reindeer on my nails but that seems a bit out of my level of expertise.  Instead I chose to go with a candy cane focus…at least for this week.

2. Christmas Treats:  It might seem small potatoes to some but I was out at a doctor’s appointment with Katrine this week and when we stopped for a snack I was able to buy one.  A nice cup of pepperminty yogurty goodnes. Yum!  Gotta love it when companies are smart and mark gluten free on a product’s poster! 🙂

3. Cookie/House decorating:  I haven’t yet mastered gluten free sugar cookies but you can get great premade cookies and then let the kids at it.  Here are their interpretations of decorated cookies.  One done by Elspeth and the other by Katrine and a friend.  Can you guess whose is whose?

 

Katrine Concussion update

Well, turns out that the girl whose symptoms were disappearing and we thought was getting better by the day was not so much.  This past week she hit some particularly rough spots and opened up to us that she has simply been coping.  Instead of telling the teacher or us when numbers and letters are dancing she forces herself to focus.  When he head hurts at the end of the day, she yells at us or Elspeth.  When she feels dizzy skating, she shuts up.  Overwhelmed while in a group, walk away.

Why?  Because she wants to be at better and able to get back to her full skating training schedule and working on her axel or flying spin.

Needless to say, we are working through some parental guilt right now and have scaled back her activities yet again.  Plus, we have a referral in to a pediatric neurologist.  Keeping our fingers crossed that the referral comes in record time.

I will finish on a happier note with some photos of Christmas baking (gotta fill the extra free time some how).

Oh, and I love this picture that Elspeth painted.  Her Baba and a snowman.

Santa – a unique take

Last year a local big chain outdoor store had a Santa who you could go fishing with.  Elspeth would have nothing to do with it but Katrine was game.  We thought that this year, perhaps…maybe…if mommy was nearby, Elspeth might give it a go too.  Well things got changed up a little as you will see and neither girl got to fish with Santa.  However, they did get to shoot arrows, air guns, drive 4 wheelers and race cars while waiting to see the big guy.

My grandpa T would not have been very impressed with us;  duck hunter that he was.  All of the wooden ducks were laughing as we marrily missed them all.  The floor, as you can see, was pummeled into submission by streams of arrows. (No, I didn’t let Katrine go out without pants of a skirt.  We had come from skating and she refused to take off her jacket so it just looks….interesting).

He he.  The gun is camouflaged by her jacket.