The Great Christmas Tree Hunt of 08

This year we went back to going out and hunting our tree.Sure it is easier to let someone cut it for us but we just figured we would take the kids out to get one this year right from the woods. It wasnt hard, just wet. And the tree is doing well, losing so few needles!

We packed the kids into the borrowed truck and headed off to the Jollytrees woodlot.

Excited to go!


Someone is a little bit wound up.

The great tree chooser looking for the perfect tree.

Ready for Action here! Just pick a tree already!

We didnt pick this tree in the end lol

We actually had a lot of choices that would have been fine; but we ended up going to a section that was hard to get into and picking a tree way in there through the thorns lololol

Still getting along :)
I have to say the kids were pretty well behaved considering the thorns and the mud and the wet feet.

We picked a tree and they started cutting. It was harder than it looked!

My Turn!

No My Turn!

No NO, my turn!

Carrying the tree to the truck

We are so very proud of our tree hunting abilities!


We didnt get around to decorating the tree for a few more days. It did need time to dry out after spending the night in a snow.

Scott brought it in and put it onto my beautifully cleaned carpets and I thought that sucked but I guess it was inevitable. lol It had to come in. Dripping needles as it went.

Holly helped us decide if the tree was straight or not. It was not. HAHAHHA it was eventually acceptable.

Scott put the lights on while the kids were at school. It wasnt fun; I wanted the blue then the red lights around the trunk of the tree.

It took quite awhile. lol.

When the kids came home they were right into the decorations. I decided which ones I would allow on the tree and those are what we put on. Alot of them are breakables so I can only really hope they all survive the season. Carpet will help.


Lots of cooperation made it easy to get the job done.
Dont forget that it is in front of a window and needs to be decorated on all sides! lol



Almost finished?
TADAAA Here is our tree!!!


Made some paper ornaments to go on the tree; my idea was blue and red, and the ornaments had to be the red lol

Christmas Concerts

This christmas posting stuff is going to be endless. It gets tiresome hahaha its the same thing year after year and I could just copy and paste over and over haha

But still I will post photos and try to explain what the photos are.

Complications. Caused by a jumpy school board and a storm that never happened.
We wake up to school cancellations. Usually cause for celebration Unless it is school concert day. At Douglas street school. Which no longer has students by the way.
So their concert was postponed. And the snow date? (yeah we have snow dates in Canada.) Was for the same day/night as Annika's school's concert. Yeah there is the complication. Also the same date as Taylor's Marigold Center concert with the choir. Complicated.

So comes the Snow date. DSS has 2 concerts because they are too small to accomodate all of the people who would want to come and see the concert.

I went to the afternoon concert. and took tonnes of photos.
the DSS choir always goes first. They did awesome songs.

Holly's class was very cute. She is in Grade 2 this year.

They are doing this cute song where they rub each others noses and arms and stuff with partners. too cute.

Still cute

Taylor's class dida play "the littlest Christmas Tree". It went really well. She has a solo in it!

All these funny tree costumes caused some stress...how do we make a darned tree costume?
ugh.
I figured we would wrap Taylor in pine tree garland and she would be a tree. A cool looking tree. Dressed in brown and wrapped in branches.
The night before the SECOND date for the concert, I hear a rumor that Taylor doesnt like this costume and wants a costume like all of the other kids are going to be wearing. Bristol board tree. SIGH. So much for my idea. Next morning I am making a darned tree and taking it to school just before the concert. I guess it is nice that they all looked the same; I just had this impression from talking to the other moms that the trees were all going to look different and didnt really think it mattered that TAylor had a different costume but I guess they came to the conclusion that bristol board trees were going to be easiest. For them.
Taylor's Solo. Really cute.


And she was chosen by Santa to be the christmas tree.



Ok now we fast forward past the afternoon of tree decorating, and on to the evening concerts. The girls dressed for the occassion nicely.

Taylor dressed in Choir Dull. Lol

Annika as usual beautiful in one of my favorite dresses ever!

And Holly in a dress, it happens occassionally and no blood was shed over this outfit lol.

I Dropped Scott and the older girls at DSS for their concert and I took Annika to her school for her concert. She met up with her class and quickly found her best friends who had by coincidence dressed in the same outfit lol

Decorating the tree. Im so glad that Annika's class was up first; Made for a really quick concert for us lol


Annika's class did 3 songs and then we were OUTTA there. It isnt that I didnt want to see Annika's entire concert; I wanted to get back to DSS for their very last ever concert there before they all head off to the new elementary school in January. It was a really good concert too!

The finale with the entire school present on and in front of stage. Kinda just like 2 years ago lol with the Douglas Mountain song only they added Saying Goodbye to Douglas Street School and lots of people cried lol.


This concert ended WAY late and Taylor didnt make it to her Marigold Center Recital. Maybe next year!

The Weekend Swim Meet

In Antigonish :)
Taylor's first swim meet and she was very excited to go! We went with Annika and Taylor and spent the night with my grandparents in New Glasgow!

The first day was long; We left here in the morning and drove to Antigonish where Taylor popped right into the water and I wandered around to find the Observation Deck which was kinda nice as it was a good view and great for photos if you had a decent camera which I did hahah

Taylor warmed up and her first race was right away. It went well and her time was good; for her first meet. She was not too nervous. All of her times would be personal bests as she has not been to a meet before.

Her first was 50 M freestyle. It was a good start. She did breaststroke and backstroke, both of which she likes. She got disqualified from breaststroke for not kicking right. She also got DQ'd from 200 M IM which was Butterfly, Breaststroke, backstroke, and freestyle; on one of her turns she didnt touch with 2 hands. She didnt finish her 200 M freestyle because she thought she might throw up in the pool. But she did get times in the rest of the events.

Staying with my grandparents was nice...and unsettling at the same time. Everything about being there just reminds me of my father and its hard to not think about sad things. But my grandparents are wonderful and made us feel very welcome and it was a great night. They sent us off to Antigonish in the morning with very full bellies and a lunch bag :)

Second day was a shakey day which was when Taylor wasnt feeling well and Annika was losing patience. But Taylor still had fun and loved being at the meet and it wasnt a bad day just harder lol. Something to learn for next event! lol and lots of things to work on!

Great job Taylor!


Waiting for her first event; a little nervous!

About to dive! She is going head first which is a huge accomplishment!

Dive!



Breaststroke!


Butterfly!


Crawl!


Chatting with her coach!


Pushing off for her back stroke!


Backstroke!


Waiting for another event; much more relaxed now!