'tis the season

The boy bounced out of bed this morning and wanted immediately to put up his "transformer" tree. So once I had opened my eyes and become vertical, I made my way to the (very cold) garage and rummaged around on the top shelf until I found said tree. Into the house it came and the boy did a Tigger bouncing impression until I untied the string and shook out the branches. So far, it is devoid of decorations except for a large, red, felt star atop it as I haven't found the rest of the tree decorations. I did find wreaths and stockings and door hangers - all of which are now dotted around the house. And the two advent calenders are up and the new one is a big hit, containing as it does, small pockets for daily treats.

At 10 AM, the boy bounced again, this time to announce it was time to go and see Santa. So we got dressed and organized and off we went to my work Kid's Christmas party. As our boy's been going since he was a baby, he knows the drill. His shoes were off almost before he made it into the party room and he was inside the bouncy castle. Once he'd bounced around there for a bit, it was time to zoom off to decorate his gingerbread man. I managed to get him in the face painting line where he was adorned with a truck and a tree prior to his eating his gingerbread. And then it was back to the bouncy castle. Occasionally he would run back to me and have a sip of apple juice or a nibble but then would race off again. Then it was time for Santa - the kids all lined up and sang Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer and in came Santa. Our boy was terribly excited and waited fairly patiently for his turn with his list and Santa's gift in hand. He told me a couple of days ago that he wanted to bring Santa a present and he decided that Santa's present was 4 chocolate chip cookies ( bar cookies I made the other night from here). Santa received the cookies with delight - saying chocolate chip are his favorite - and our boy and Santa had a chat about listening to mummy and daddy and having a good Christmas and then it was present time. Our boy was the lucky recipient of a Bumblebee transformer and he and a new pal spent quite a bit of time playing with both the car versions and the robot versions before it was time to come home.

So I guess it is time for me to kick start myself into the season. Cookie baking, present wrapping, cards and parties. I do love it all, I just have to pace myself. And on that note, to all a good night!

Parties and concerts

A few weeks ago, T and I went to a children’s party. My work children’s party. T got to decorate a few gingerbread people with icing and candies. He ate one at the party and brought one home for his daddy. He loved the bouncy castles this year – the bouncy obstacle course was his favorite and he spent a lot of time in there. He is still not quite tall enough to make it over the wall so fortunately a couple of older kids were throwing the little ones up (or pushing them up). He loved the balloon animal elf – she made him a helicopter balloon. And he had a Christmas tree with sparkles painted on his face. But of course, the star of the show was Santa. When it was announced that the kids could line up to visit Santa, T was at the front of the line. I had to hold him back from bouncing up on the stage when other kids were visiting with Santa and when we got there, he sat right up on Santa’s lap. But Santa threw him for a loop – “Hi T” he said. “Hi Santa, mumbled T. Then Santa asked if he was a good boy. Did he eat his dinner? Did he eat his carrot soup the night before? Poor T was so taken aback – he sat there on Santa’s knee and didn’t quite know what to do. Santa asked T what he wanted for Christmas and T was too shy to answer. He had his picture taken and then high-fived Santa and the elf and ran off to get his present. He got an alien fishing game (Toy Story 3) which he was very excited about.

Then he ran around the room checking out the presents that the other kids got. After all the kids had visited with Santa, it was announced that if you wanted a picture with Santa you could go up. T was right back on Santa’s knee, showing him his helicopter balloon. He and Santa are best buddies now. But he still forgot to tell Santa his wish list for Christmas. So a few days later, we wrote to Santa. A huge list including:

A feller buncher, skidder and logging truck with trailer

A new low bed loader

4 case bobcats with buckets, rippers, drills, crane hooks, etc
Another track backhoe
A crane
A snowplow
A lego city fire truck, dump truck, front end loader, fire station, police car, etc

100 dumptrucks

Last week, T was in two preschool concerts as he is in both the morning and afternoon classes. The morning class concert was about 5 songs long (younger children) and T’s Uncle Mike came along which T was very excited about. The afternoon class concert was longer (4 year olds) and half of the songs were in French. T’s favorite song was I’m a little pine tree. He was very enthusiastic, especially when it came to the line – a great big merry Christmas tree – he nearly knocked over the little girl next to him! After the singing, there were slide shows of the preschool activities, so the kids would yell out “that’s me” whenever their picture popped up. All this was followed by a little party with goodies. Lots of fun.

And the excitement of little kids wearing reindeer antlers and singing Jingle Bells is wonderful to behold.