December 2-4

Time to start Advent in earnest with the first Monday of the month. But first we had to finish off our Thankful poster. It is now full of things we are thankful for. One item for every day in November leading up to and including Thanksgiving Day. It will now make its home on a wall in the boys’ room.

I am so glad I put our Perler bead Advent calendar where I could find it this year! We have had this one for years and years and the kids just love taking the different shapes and putting them on the board each night. THEY remind ME! For those keeping track, this is Advent calendar #2!

We have jumped into our Christmas/Advent themed worksheets with both feet. I am getting MOST of these from our favourite crafting and print out site – Activity Village. Their link is on right.

It also gives me a chance to introduce our THIRD Advent calendar – a paperchain we tear the rings off each night. I printed off the Activity Village version that had the numbers and lines to trim on ready to go but you could just cut the papers.

We hit midweek with weather that allowed the boys outside to play in the snow. It is funny. Alberta has been hit hard by cold and snow… us way less so!

Of course we had to enjoy a Wild Kratts that covered an animal we had not yet made a mini poster for!

Burrowing Owls

BUT the big excitement stemmed from our assembly of our Thanksgiving unit into a lovely duotang. There was so much to enjoy revisiting and a lovely stack of finished work to compliment each other over. You can find our resources HERE.

Completion in wake of beginning Advent… the best of both worlds!

Remember to check Art for Kids for thematic how tos on drawing and more… link on right.

November 29-December 1

Well, here in the US Thanksgiving is on a Thursday… so confusing. Why not a Friday or a Monday? While it is not a government holiday the Friday after IS a holiday for many places. And of course it is BLACK FRIDAY… a huge shopping day when a lot of deals are there for the grabbing. Ken and I did minimal shopping with a quick trip out to our local and honestly not so busy (comparison wise) Target. Yesterday’s post of the lovely Christmas matching dresses (HERE) was one of our finds as was a couple gifts on the kids’ Christmas list that were must have and long requested and on sale!

We did our minimum of basic schooling  before the cousins arrived for a weekend visit. Of course we put the willing and somewhat willing hands to work making more little hats to go on the Christmas tree. Nana sure can motivate!

On Friday

And again on Saturday

Echo snuck her time on the computer playing Minecraft… though I am not sure how far she made it, she did enjoy it!

On Saturday the girls enjoyed a cozy tea party.

Echo dressed up for the part in one of her favourite “blue dress” dresses.

Bit of an Alice in Wonderland feel

The weather held out long enough for the kids to spend some time in the backyard. Coats are now a definite necessity!

We started December with the whole family heading to church. There was no Sunday School as it was Thanksgiving weekend. It was not a full service but we enjoyed it. Sitting in the back with crayons and paper and attempting to be patient is always a bit of a struggle but I think we didn’t do too badly.

They had a fair for Advent the day before and there were special treat bags for the kids left over so they gave them out at the end of the service. We had 5 very excited kids when that happened!

With it being the beginning of Advent we started our calendars counting down. We have THREE! Trinity’s is a Santa face where you fill in the beard with cotton balls.

The girls got their Christmas vibe on with some pretty picture making. I love stickers and buy up the 1.00 books whenever I come across them!

Super fuzzy sorry!

And that was that. We are done with Thanksgiving (resource and book work to follow) and onto Advent and the days to Christmas are ticking by!!! Where has the time and the year gone?????

WARNING TONS OF IMAGES!!

Let’s skip forward in time to today – our very special and relatively new tradition, going to the downtown Minneapolis Macy’s and seeing Santa. We had to alter this new tradition from last year and go without Baba who is on contract work until he leaves for his next big adventure – Roatan… but we managed.

Ready for Santa and the debut of the matching Christmas dresses!

We shot for around noon to miss the rush of potential school trips and the evening or weekend visitors. There was no line up to get in and a minimal line up at the actual wait for Santa.

Santaland entrance

There was lots to see… elves and singing trees… penguins and squirrels. Echo was crazy excited about it all and the kids (even though this is the same display as the year previous) still had eyes wide open spying things they had missed last year. The twins taking great joy in reading the signs and messages themselves.

I love the candlelight setting on my camera

Santa was AMAZING… his outfit was spectacular, his white gloves pristine. The kids all climbed up… well except Echo who was TOTALLY unsure about the whole thing. The pictures were varied and the expressions wild…

But we picked the one that was the most… well… them…

The official copy

After they chatted and covered all the main Santa related topics: behaviour, wishes, whether or not school was going well (they instantly answered YES!). It was time for buttons.

Once Echo got her buttons she was totally ready for Santa… she gave him a huge hug when he asked. It was ADORABLE. I am so glad I managed to snap a quick picture of that!

Echo and her after hug

After Santa we went over to the giftshop and wrote short letters for Santa.

I actually think is this is my favourite that Ken took of me

That left family photos…

I love the really candid ones

And a chance to snap pictures of some off the old fashioned Christmas card styled wall hangings on the way out.

We also took the ESCALATOR on the way down to the elevator to get us to our parking lot level. Trinity was able to get off solo but needed help getting on. The big surprise was Miss Echo being willing to STAND and ride on a couple escalators (there were like 4 or so).

After such a busy visit with Santa we went over to Calver’s for a delicious and absolutely filling lunch! Amazingly enough we came out with FIVE clean kids!! I am not sure how that happened. Nana took us on an amazing Christmas themed adventure. I am so glad I was able to get pictures through it all!!!

So Merry Almost Christmas!!! and enjoy the rest of the massive number of images!!!

With angel bear

Action hair shot!

Even elves go to school

Bitty chicks

Yes yes on the phone with Trinity doing a selfie

Mood lighting on the phone

Squirrel!

YAY TOGETHER

…and done!!!