Deck the Halls...

Just a few pics of our Christmas preparations...

Love that glow...

Making Bryanna's favourite cranberry dish...

And enjoying it with a yummy dinner and a movie!

And the outside...

Group 70 Festivities

It's one of the joys of our lives to regularly meet and enjoy time with the wonderful friends made through our CB connections. Our annual Christmas gathering with Group 70 at Leo and Maryann's downtown loft was a glorious afternoon full of good friends, food, and conversation. Some our friends could not make it this year, but we kept them close in spirit.

Maryann's world-famous ham...the men were drooling in anticipation of it for days in advance!

Future physio therapist?

Giggling over craft tables and snacks. The moms kept looking over in wonder...no requests for help, no squabbles, no hanging around the adult conversations. Wow - when did they get to be so grown up?

A wonderful day. Look at these beautiful girls - they make us so proud.

The Spirit of Christmas

This may be it - the last year with both girls and Santa. As it was, it took a little bribery to get Miz B to pose with the jolly old elf this evening (amazing what the promise of a large turkey sub will do).

I feel a little nostalgic about yet another reminder of how quickly this is all passing so had to post the photo capturing the look of their Christmas happiness (after I prettied up the ordinary mall photo just a bit).

However, I also feel oddly satisfied this year. Amazingly, the house is decorated inside and out, ALL the Christmas cards are written and mailed, and as of today, 95% of the shopping is done.

I don't recognize myself.

But am loving it. ;-)

New Moon

"...both hands on the clock pointed up toward the pitiless sun, and, though I shoved viciously against the crowd, I knew I was too late. I wasn't halfway across. I wasn't going to make it. I was stupid and slow and human, and we were all going to die because of it."

Bella, New Moon

Come on, how can you resist words and imagery like that???

I, like so many others, am firmly under the spell of Edward and Bella of the Twilight series. I've hooked others in and as my sister has blogged about, the tales are completely addictive. Not sure why. I've spent some time thinking about it...the writing in the books is actually quite good, but those characters...they seem to leap (or slink, or drift, or flee, or slouch) off the page and take up residence in your mind.

Several months ago when the trailers started appearing for the latest movie chapter of the series, my good friend, Ann, and I booked this past Saturday evening as the night to see the movie together (strength in numbers, you know). We roped Ann's wonderful hubby into sitting for all our kids, bought our tickets early and in complete delight showed up at the theatre an hour early.

Oh my goodness. The teenaged girls! They completely overwhelmed the place. And even though we were there so early, there was already a line ahead of us. Feeling a trifle embarrassed at our age to be lined up with the 15 and 16 year olds, we nevertheless were thrilled to be there and happily bought our popcorn and then settled in for a good time. (We were also very happy to find that we were not the only moms in attendance!)

The movie was pretty good -- I had some issues with the animated wolves, considering what I've learned from my sister over the years, and there were a couple of silly moments -- but those were minor issues. For 2 hours, we inhabited the world of Edward, Bella and Jacob and we had a blast.

Poor Ann, I even forced her to have her photo taken in front of the poster of our obsession (sorry, Ann) so we could document our "Twilight night out."

Ahh, young obsession. Remember those years?

"Bella, you seem to be under a misapprehension...I thought I'd explained it clearly before. Bella, I can't live in a world where you don't exist."

Edward, New Moon

Who could resist? Not me.

Happy Happy Birthday!

A little something for our sweetie pie on her special day...



We love you!

Auntie Lianne, Bryanna and Cassidy
xoxox

A Day of Degrees

Today had been forecast all week as THE day of the Fall...sunny and warm and calm with no chance of rain. Probably was going to reach 16 degrees celsius ... woohoo! I had looked forward to going with the girls to a sunday school potluck lunch at the rectory and then enjoying maybe the last bike ride of the year.

Not to be, unfortunately.

When we woke this morning at 6:00, poor Brya, who had not been feeling herself yesterday, was rambling and flushed with a high fever. I had been keeping my fingers crossed that those darn H1N1 vaccines would be available soon but that also was not to be and so Bryanna seems to be following the path that many of our friends have already been down. I dosed her up on Advil and after settling her on the couch, headed to Wal-Mart to stock up on more meds and buy a new thermometer. Came home and the medicine had done the trick and her temp was hovering around 100 F.

Meanwhile, the weather lived up to the predictions and outdid itself - we had a day that as Cassidy said, "was just like Summer!" As Bryanna did not move from the couch for the entire day (a sure sign she doesn't feel well), I mowed the lawns and took Cassidy out of the sick house for a little fresh air...



A happier child you could not imagine...every piece of sports equipment was pulled out and tried on, rolled, thrown or wheeled up and down the street while I kept an eye on her and an ear toward the child inside. Even managed to throw her a frisbee a few times! When I checked the temp outside, it was hovering around 67 degrees. Wow.

However, by 4:30 when the most recent dose of medicine wore off, our new-fangled thermometer displayed another degree that wasn't so pleasant...103.2 F and Brya didn't even complain when the cool cloth was put on her head and more medicine poured down her throat. *sigh*

I'm just praying that a night's sleep will show some improvement tomorrow and that this kind of degree does not pass on to her sister.

Images of Halloween

My sister was musing on her blog about her sometimes scrooge-like feelings toward all things Halloween. I totally sympathize, and in brief moments of costume frustration, I know where she's coming from. But most often I just love it.

As I reflected on past holidays, I too went looking for childhood pictures in my own old photo albums, and funnily enough, the only one I could find was the same Halloween that my sister posted a picture of. However, my picture is of the two of us, in grainy 1970 colour, grinning under lots of black make-up...

What fun days those were...I still remember the keen excitement of running from house to house in the dark, surrounded by crowds of other children (there seemed to be so many more in those days). And then arriving home, sometimes cold but just delighted to rummage and sort through all our sweet loot.

So, though the mom work of preparing for Halloween can drive me to distraction, and though my children's choices of costume sometimes leave me baffled, I can't help thinking back to the feelings of absolute joy as Halloween night approached.

Here are the images of the dynamic duo enjoying Halloween 2009...to be honest I wish I could run from house to house right along with them, instead of doing the responsible mom thing and trail with the other parents along the sidewalk.

I was somewhat surprised that Cassidy chose to be a princess for school celebrations yesterday. Loved it though!

Proud of her pumpkin design!

Bryanna was determined to be a fat pirate this year. A fat pirate??? Even though we put together this cool outfit (I even sewed the eye patch!), she wanted to stuff her shirt with a cushion for the school monster mash. I didn't get it, but went along. Turns out that what she had in her head was Smee from Peter Pan...and as it turned out that the cushion didn't really transform the outfit into the red and striped round pirate image in her head, I was just as happy that she went back to the cool, swashbuckling style tonight.

Silver braid and all...

Costume two for Miz C...the happy cowgirl...

Fueling up for the big event...

A check of make-up and off we go...

After 15 minutes, the winter coats were on...

And zipped...


Keeping warm...

The big girls stop at home to warm up and pet Charlie Brown, then they headed back out with another mom.

At the end of the evening, Bryanna headed to a sleep-over and Cassidy sorted her piles of candy. Wow...another Halloween has passed in the blink of an eye. *sigh*

Hope you all had a happy Halloween too!

We give thanks...

It was a lovely day to celebrate with family and give thanks for all our blessings.

New outfits, heading off to church.

Church began our thanksgiving celebration and there was an added poignancy this year as all the children brought fresh food to St. Matthew's. With arms full of carrots and apples, squashes and potatoes, pomegranates and turnips, they processed to the front of the church and placed their offerings at the altar. The food was blessed and was delivered to the Daily Bread Foodbank today. Really helped bring home how very much we have and are thankful for.

After some quiet time at home, nanny and papa arrived and we headed off to the Aberfoyle Mill near Guelph. Our family tradition for the last 10 years or so has been to go out for Thanksgiving dinner and we have visited inns and mills all over the place - first up near our cottage in Orillia, and in recent years closer to home. This year we returned to the Aberfoyle Mill which we hadn't been to in over 20 years. What a wonderful treat - lovely pond out back that we explored a bit...

And then inside to the cozy mill restaurant filled with antiques and the orginal mill works still in place... kind of a nice link to the past and the local farmers who had brought their harvests of grains to the mill for many decades.

The dinner itself was phenomenal and though the Thompsons all stuck with tradition and enjoyed a three course turkey feast with all the trimmings, we cannot wait to return and try some of the other gourmet treats on the menu.

We were SO full at the end that dessert was really unnecessary but we just had to try the chocolate mousse and spiced pumpkin cheesecake.

Cassidy overjoyed at the first taste of her chocolate dessert.

Happy thanksgiving to our family here and in the States (who will celebrate in a few weeks themselves) and to all our friends. We are blessed to have YOU in our lives.

Flexi-girls!

Just a few photos of the dynamic duo displaying their gymnastic prowess. Mostly for Miz S. who loves this stuff. ;-)

We see the moon...

The Chinese Autumn Moon Festival was in our minds all week as we planned for and then made moon cakes on Thursday - to deliver as gifts to the girls' teachers and for us to enjoy all weekend. I shopped for our celebratory feast for tonight (okay, it was roast beef instead of Chinese food, but the intent is the same!) and we had a great day and evening together.

But with the rainy skies the last few days, it looked like Autumn Moon would pass by this year without our traditional moonlit walk. However, after cleaning up from dinner, we looked out the window and the girls were thrilled to see that the thunderstorm had passed and the winds had blown all the clouds away...leaving a crystal clear night sky with the glowing moon shining down.

The girls rushed to pull on their new winter jackets and grab flashlights and lanterns and off we set for the pond. We really couldn't have asked for a more perfect night to think about family members in China and California and to offer our thanks for them, even so far away.

Wishing you and yours a happy Autumn Moon!