It was a Merry Christmas

We made a quick trip to our parent's houses for Christmas.  We enjoyed getting ready for Santa's arrival, Max was definitely into it this year and could hardly wait for Santa to come down the chimney at Grandma and Grandpa's.  He made sure that nobody would be lighting a fire on Christmas Eve! 

 Much to our surprise, Max was very methodical as he opened his gifts taking each toy out of his stocking, playing with it and then would dive back in a bit later to find something else.  He was the same way opening presents and even used scissors to cut the wrapping paper!  What a guy.  I hope everyone had a great day - thanks to Santa and all his elves for spoiling us again this year.

T'was the night before Christmas

Max has asked for this poem at bedtime the past few nights.  Here is his rendition.

Another Bump

Yep!  Almost 7 months - surprise!
I have neglected to take belly shots this time around...sorry baby #2, but the novelty has worn off.  Max took this photo of me one afternoon, it must have been a number of weeks ago as I can no longer zip this coat up.  We are having a girl, which is delightful news, it will be interesting to see how this little one differs from Max's personality.  We have been discussing this lately - he is such a good little fellow, will we be blessed with the same easy-going nature for the second child?  Not counting on it, but it would be nice...little baby, are you listening?
I have been feeling good, similar to the last pregnancy and so far no issues - in fact I just returned from a trip to Asia and got along just fine.  Happy to get back and get in the swing of things for Christmas.  After the holidays we've got more house work planned to get ready for this little peanut, I'm excited to plan another little nursery.  March 1st, you will be coming quickly!

Silly Cousins

Love this shot of the two silly cousins.  We hung out in Okotoks on Saturday with Carmon's family, and had a really fun time exploring the shops in the Old Towne.  The boys were in awe of all of the Christmas decorations, Max just can't wait for Santa to come - Oh boy, does he have a bit of waiting to do! 

Halloween

Well it didn't start out so great tonight.  Max had a busy day and by 5:30 he was totally pooped.  We soldiered on though and once we were out in the (freezing!) fresh air, and he saw how easy it was to get candy, his mood changed instantly.

We met up with Max's friend Luca and did a very quick tour of Luca's street - the boys had fun and were very brave walking up to stranger's houses together.  Luca kept saying "it's OK Max!"

 

We left the lights on at our house and put the candy on the porch - we were pleased to see that a good portion was gone by the time we got back.  No idea if that was just one person or 20 though!  

where to start...

Well, what can I say it's been way too long.  It's been a busy 8 months....(OMG! 8 MONTHS since I've blogged, seriously??!!)  We celebrated Max's birthday and then the house renovations began.  Our main floor entrance, living room, dining room and hall were completely gutted back to the barn board of this 102 year old house.  We started with replacing all of the knob and tube wiring, opened up most of the rooms, removed a strangely placed 1/2 bath, ripped up the splintering hardwood and dry walled over the pop corn ceiling.

Let the dust fly!  Wall to the basement, under main staircase was knocked down, drywall came off to get to the wiring and to open up rooms.

Back to the barn board.  Carmon pulled out old newspaper, blue jeans and mice nests from between the walls - good times.

You can see here where the 1/2 bath was on the main floor, not ideal as it was right next to the dining room and teeny tiny.

Carmon ripped up all of the hardwood, underneath was years and years of dirt and dust.  He also pulled up every single nail...back breaking work.

Our little helper, sanding the sub-floor.

Drywall up, rooms are defined, hallway is much brighter and open.

New stair railing, now our basement stairs are open to the main floor.  Painting the railing has yet to be done. 

We REALLY wanted to have a fireplace in the living room.  We had to rethink our furniture layout and made it work.

No going back now!  The hole has been cut thanks to our friends at Hearth and Home Fireplaces.

This is our end result - we absolutely love it.  The mantle is custom concrete and was made by 2 Stone here in Calgary. 

Putting everything back together has been fun, most of the furniture came with us from Toronto but we've also added a few HomeSense finds like the Ikat stool, our hall and dining room light fixtures as well as our huge linen shade from Restoration Hardware.  There is still so much to do, the list is endless actually and a tad daunting when we plan to do most of the work ourselves.  Carmon is such a handyman and an impressive contractor so we are always planning the next phase.  

Still to come for the main floor - new windows, doors, window treatments, baseboard and railing painting.  Don't even get me started on the rest of the place!!  Stay tuned!

...nearly 3!

Just a couple of days away until Max is officially 3 years old. He waited patiently all week for The Party and we had fun getting ready for the festivities. Max decided that he wanted a Rainbow Cake and fortunately, I had come across the 6 layer rainbow cake that has been appearing in blogs and also Martha Stewart. It looks daunting but actually it was a lot of fun to make.



The balloons were a hit - Carmon and I put them out when Max was in bed last night, when he came downstairs this morning and saw them he was so excited. "I LOVE my balloons!!" he squealed.


Take-out nuggets and fries for the kids...a good way to keep kids interested and the food contained!

Birthday weekend

Really? Another year older?! It was my 32nd on Monday. We celebrated by taking a mini vacation in Canmore and signed ourselves up for a Dog sledding trip while we were there. It took Max some time to 'warm up' to the idea. He was not thrilled at all as we stood in the cold for 1/2 an hour getting a bit of a tutorial on how to operate the sleds, commands for the dogs etc...I only half listened, trying to keep him entertained/warm and somewhat enthusiastic about getting in a cold sled and being pulled through the bush.

"This is NOT going to be fun", "I want to go home" oh and, "I want to go play in the sand!" were a few memorable quotes before we got going.

Once the lesson was over, we got bundled in our sled and he was much happier...no squeals of delight or anything like that, but when we finished he said he wanted to go again. We hit the pool in the afternoon, found a good spot for dinner and were all in bed by 7:30!