Wine and Food!

Our annual tradition remains alive! Year 9. They have changed it starting last year so there is basically shifts in which you can go. We opt for the (less busy) Saturday afternoon 12-5pm. It never seems to be an issue to start right after breakfast...

For the second time we got the Prosecco tastings! my fave. Right when we got there we went straight in to see the tastings and this one started immediately so we went right in! It really is the trick to making sure you get in to the tastings.

These made a reappearance from last year! Except this year they have the radio station all over them. These also were at the Canada day celebrations in the summer. They are making their rounds...

I also don't know if they got smaller or my butt got bigger to fit in there...

Steph's first time trying oysters... basically a shot!
So good with the horseradish and hot sauce!

These nachos in a bag are the best. Lorraine even took a picture of the booth so we can be sure to find them again next year. Maybe we don't look very hard for food (because wine..) but there never seems to be anything that stands out food-wise so these are gold!

The highlights of Sept-Dec 2019 in a blog!

I didn't get to blogging in these busy months but wanted to document the highlights for looking back purposes!

September marked the start of Logan's very first hockey season! He has made such huge changes since then ad is now full gliding and quick out there... and can more backwards!

There are many times where I think it would be great to do things in the evening after work because after work days are unexciting with getting home around 5:15pm, making supper, having supper, and kids in bed at 7:30pm. So why not add excitement... well here's why not. For some reason we decided to do the Ilderton fair on a Friday after work.. despite the rain! There were a couple cranky kids who don't really like fair food but a sandwich didn't quire satisfy who wanted to go on rides but only certain ones were open and a baby who didn't want to be in the stroller. Good times! Next time we will brave the Saturday crowd... or get off work early!

The 5 minutes of happiness at the fair! The carousel was open, covered from the rain and good for both a 1 and 4 year old... a rare find!

The kiddos have continued their swimming lessons... another chaotic after work activity! But this one is totally worth it because swimming is such an important thing to learn and they both LOVE it! Logan is not at Preschool 4 and Leah goes in Parent Tot at the same time (we alternate). We start back again next week.

This was the kitty we adopted in September... we named her Minnie. Minnie was a great kitty and perfect for the kids but she turned out to have fleas and worms. Because of Leah and not wanting the nuisance of treatments 3 weeks after returning to work, we sadly had to give her back to the rescue place. It was the craziest weekend of the year... the cat incident, plus Aleksy was laid off that Friday and then our fridge died.
Our luck seems to have turned since then!











Logan is a school boy now and this picture accurately represents how he comes home. Such a little boy! Luckily now he is covered with his coat and snowpants but those things come home as if he rolled in the wet sandbox. But he is doing amazing at school! It suits him well and his favourite things are the block/building centre and after school program especially in the gym. His not so favoruite tings are art, drawing and learnign to write letters. Today he was very upset that the lower case l (not L) resembled a 1 (2,3..). He's got a point...

The commencement of Leahs obsession with "apple". Apple picking with Jon, Steph and Rachel in October at Great Lakes. So many apples and their apple cookies are the best!

This was a great day! Everyone was happy this year!

At the pumpkin patch at Great Lakes. After picking a ton of apples, eating a ton of apples we did a little play at their play area which they loved!

All ready for trick or treating! A puppy and a flower... Logan also wore this to school (for his halloween dance... the best thing to picture ever for just JK/SKs!) and picked it out of a bumble bee or Marshall (paw patrol). These kids could have trick or treated all night even in the rain.

Logan had a PD day in October which I had already taken off and with Aleksy laid off for the month of October, we both had some good quality Logan time and went bowling. He loved it and bowled for all of us.. Logan gets 10 turns and then me 1, then Logan again for 10 and so on...

The annual Halloween party! Our theme was garden party... a gardener, gnome, flower and bee.

And my last minute decision to get the kids baptized brought to you by Logan starting at Catholic school! Now they wont miss out on any of the participating in the religious things they do at school. This was November and included more meetings with a priest than Ive had in my life!

Santa Claus parade AND paw patrol... clearly Logan cant look for the picture! This was lots of fun this year... we went with some neighbours. Logan loved it and Leah wanted to walk around the whole time. She did like the candy canes though!

We got early snow in November and went sledding... both of them loved it! Over the holidays it wasn't cold enough to use the GT snow racer Logan got for Christmas and the weather has been kind of mild... even if it snows it usually melts a day or 2 later! We will be getting out for more hopefully later this month and Logan can finally have enthusiasm over the snow racer.

On Saturday of the black Friday weekend, The kids had a sleepover at their Nana and Dziadeks and Aleksy and I went shopping in the States and did really well especially finishing up for the kids! This time we really only department shopped, which was a change for us. We did Kohls, Meijer, Wal Mart and Target... although Target was in the mall but there nothing left at the Birch run mall it turns out!
We also squeezed in late lunch at the golden Corral a late supper at Chicken in the rough!

And of course some dunkin... to keep the shopping alive!

This was actually the night before shopping in the States... girls night at Tasting room! And because I never like ending a party, this was followed by going to Mollys and staying out until 2am! This made shopping in the States a lot lower energy the next day and definitely less appetite but was definitely worth it!

The same weekend as girls night and shopping in the States was also Aleksys work Christmas party! A busy weekend. The flu bug hit our house around this same time and Leah, Aleksy and I were not our best this day (Logan was patient zero so fine by this point). We narrowly avoided it with just down sore tummies though. Leah still ate all the candy and Logan loved the bouncy castles! They definitely throw a party with everything fun a kid could need!

New Years and the rest of the Christmas break!

Today was the first day back to work since December 23rd. All was ok... morning, work, pick up... and then we got home and the kids were clearly trying to win some sort of whining competition. And lucky kiddos are new recipients of colds! That explains the 1:30am crying last night (I'm clearly not going to be fully rested until they're teenagers).

But we had the best holidays. So much quality time with the kids and I loved it.

We kept it simple and it was great! We were packing the kids in the car to go for a hike (this was the weekend after Christmas) and when Logan asked why we werent going into the forest across our house, we seconded (and thirded) his opinion and went in our forest for an adventure instead. No complaints from these ones!

At the park a bit further into the neighbourhood was our final destination... the green park if you will. They built an outdoor skating rink here this year so perhaps if it gets cold sometime, we can go for a skate! The only thing is its about a 15-20 min walk (with the kids... without 5 min tops!)

Monday the 30th we went to Kidscape with my friend Emily and her 2 kiddos. They had this awesome display from their new years party they had the day before! Before we left this was pretty much in ruins with the kids attacking it... they must have had a full on body guard the day before to protect it.

These 2 buds love playing together and had a great time. It was chaotic though with the busyness from all the kids on break plus trying to supervise Logan and Leah who are on completely different playing levels!

Afterward we made pancakes at our house for our friends before Leahs naptime! 

New Years Eve we stayed over at Emily and James place along with Chels and Warren. I was so excited abou the first new years with others (to midnight) in maybe 4 years! This was the count down with the kids (at 8pm!) and glow sticks and all.

We then all proceeded to put our kids to bed and there was one... a bit smaller than the others who decided not to fall asleep right away. And her older brother talked away to her in the room until 10pm!! 

Pictures are always the best option 10 drinks in and post midnight right??

A cat for everyone. I wondered if this sparked our holiday fixation on going to the humane Society/catty shack to find a cat! We havent yet but a cat is definitely in the near future!

After we counted down to midnight with the ball dropping (and nearly missed it!), we broke out a game of Asshole and somehow kept it alive until 3am. And then little miss teenager sleeper at home apparently doesnt like sleeping elsewhere and was up at 6am. So this is my grand total of sleep for New years. 2 hours and 47 minutes. So much energy that day. Aleksy and I set intentions though and still managed to work out in the afternoon during Leahs (4 1/2 hour) nap.

The following days Aleksy had to work so Logan, Leah and I had low key days on the Thursday and Friday. Logan recently rediscovered his trains and actually got tired of his Youtube videos and would build tracks... or line his trains up! It was perfect timing because his tablet would entertain him for just enough time for me to squeeze workouts in during naptime and then I got one on one time building tracks with Logan!

We had some outside time so we didnt go stir crazy and this was before the snow melted. It was perfect snowball snow but Logan really didn't want to build a snowman because apparently making balls and throwing them at the fence is way cooler.

The little kid does what the big kid does.

Logan currently calls our ice rink (to be) our swimming pool. There seems to be a hole somewhere int he tarp this year but hopefully when things freeze up we will have a rink this year!

In the meantime, ice is for lunch. 

Even a park visit was possible with the mild weather. I could even push Leahs little pink car with the melted snow.

Saturday was date night. We put the kids to bed at 730pm and Aleksys brother and girlfriend came over to house/baby sit while we went to Moxies for dinner. The server was really good which sucked for us because we went through out appetizer and main and 2 drinks (for me) in an hour and a half. So afterward we walked in the freezing rain to Symposium for dessert. We havent been in so long and we werent too sure exactly what they are trying to get people in there for. Classy... for wine/coffee and cake but also available is chicken wings and beer for $5 and somehow my glass of wine was $4 on a Saturday!

Today was back to work but I came into feeling more prepared. I wrote my intentions of meal prepping, setting out a menu for the week ahead and generally organizing my time better. I was able to squeeze a workout over my lunch today kept to my healthy lunch I packed instead of grabbing coffee and a muffin and bringing back home my veggies. I know its day 1 but every small bit counts!

My 2020 intentions are meal prep, weekly menu setting and groceries once weekly, reading a self help book (which i've started), blogging more and generally keeping more organized.

2020 adventures will be a waterpark excursion in Niagara in a few weeks with 4 other couples and all their kids and in February we have a cottage booked for the family day weekend for a winter getaway the 4 of us. We are currently dabbling into the idea of a cruise/some sort of getaway in Mayish, so we will see where those plans head to!

2021 will be a friends trip to Florida which we are super excited about!

Christmas 2019!

I have fallen off the blogging bandwagon. Th last few months of trying to establish a manageable routine/time management of parenting plus working plus the additions of swimming, hockey twice a week and workouts as much as we an get in (not to mention the craziness of December Christmas things), I found myself without time for blogging or the time I did find I wanted to veg and watch tv!

I am now wanting to document my memories again and will start with the Christmas season faves!

December 9th we went to the mall to get Christmas pictures with Santa. It changed a lot this year and we actually took our own pictures and the only option for a professional picture was if you did the whole storytime with Santa. That would have been  disaster with "busy" Leah (aka Leah who wants to run around on her own terms and probably knock everything down). We got there right when a Storytime was starting so had 30 minutes to waste in the mall. We went to the Disney store where Logan decided it would be great to change his whole established list for Santa.
But there was minimal line (it was also about 7:15pm by the time this was taken!) and free! 

Logan's first school Christmas concert! It was right smack dab in the middle of the busiest week at work and during work hours... and a blizzard. But we made it (Aleksy from work in St Thomas) and it was the best ever! Logans class sang Away in a Manger and Santa Claus is coming to town and Logan was front row centre with Santa Claus is coming to town and his singing and dancing was on point. Especially the starting bum wiggle.

One of the 3000 things to do for December aside from Christmas shopping, wrapping, baking, and making sure Logan was on top of the 12 days of Christmas his school decided to orchestrate (along with Leahs festive days)... teacher gifts and presents for Leahs daycare friends! Keeping it simple all the way... Winners gift cards in the gold boxes for his teachers and little antlers for Leahs friends.

Sunday December 22nd we hosted our Christmas PJ brunch with friends. Leah and I had matching Christmas dresses for the occasion. It was so much fun... and is every year. Something about the time for day probably and happy morning kids!

Logan even made it to hockey beforehand!

Every event that we host at our place is a crazy living room mess. There's not a whole lot of space for 14 kids to play so this is the result!

We are dabbling into the idea of building again... maybe a 2 yearsish in the future project to fulfill! As these kiddos age, we are clearly going to need more space!

Finding time to bake was soooo hard this year! Most of this baking happened from 8-10pm after the kids went to bed and it was 4 separate baking sessions to accomplish. Always worth it though... Christmas wouldn't be the same without it!


















The Christmas brunch crew!

I went to work for one day on December 23rd (the Monday... the kids had a sleepover at Nana and Dziadeks) and then on Christmas Eve we had Christmas at my Mom and Pauls as always!

We have officially been placed at the kids table now, which isn't the worst because our kids can run free after being done with their 2 bites of supper after 10 minutes... Bu present time was the best with these 2. They were both SO excited and got spoiled! Outfits, sweaters, pajamas and a cute Snowman dress, paw patrol car, remote control car, puzzles, a baby, Leah's picnic basket and of course the kids display of star lights for their rooms... these go on now every night.

This was taken at 9:40pm... late but definitely not the worst, latest time ever!

Santa's cookies and egg nog all ready! These cookies were specially decorated by Logan for Santa.

Immediately after this picture perfect moment, Leah fell off Logans lap to the tile floor and Logan in his sleepy state calming stared at her. Late night Christmas eve problems!!

First glances of Christmas morning! Logan was up at a very reasonable 7:30am and didn't clue in that it was Christmas morning until we reminded him... but then (for the first time) he got it and was so pumped! We woke Leah up shortly after (our little teenager sleepinner has been waking up at 9am all through these holidays!) and this is when they came down the stairs.

Stockings first! Logan got a watch, some blocks, play dough and Leah got some jewelry, stacking blocks and dress up shoes and tiara (and play dough... tons of play dough this Christmas!).

These kiddos after opening all their presents under the tree! A GT snow racer and baby bed and stroller, Play dough, Hot wheels accessories, magnet builders, magnetic drawing board and so many more things!

Although Logan almost cried after opening Operation (Santa really offended him with that one!), it seemed the others were hits!

With his new (regular sized!) Lego and Magnets!

Christmas morning breakfast! I made these little shapes with the Christmas cookie cutters and Logan was obsessed and I have made pancakes since these and he is still asking for shapes!

Alongside mimosas without the OJ. Because who remembers the OJ anyways...

After a great Christmas morning (seriously great with no noted kid behaviour at all!!), we headed to Aleksys parents after Leahs nap. The kiddos got to open presents before and after supper and loved every minute of it!