Happy Winter Solstice!

Okay, so it is 1:00 am. We are all packed, the house is relatively clean, we've had a very successful and fun solstice party and now I'm ALMOST finished Tiegan's playmat so soon I will be going to bed! Only to get up bright and early in the morning in time to catch our flight......but hey, then I can sleep all day, right?!!

Yesterday as I was driving three kids around the city, I overheard them singing a song - "Jingle Bells, Malfoy smells; Crab and Goyle laid an egg; Hermoine created a spell, and Harry saved the day - hey!" and I realized that times really are a-changing for me. What's wrong with good ole batman and robin and the batmobile?!!!!!

Tomorrow we're off to Ottawa, for a fun-filled but very busy holiday season. I'm sure I'll find the time to post once or twice but until then, happy holidays to everyone!!!! xoxoxoxxo

new kitchen

new kitchen
Originally uploaded by the four mckays.

THIS is the fabulous new kitchen that Jamie built the girls for their solstice gift! It's all out of scrap plywood and paint we had around the house - and one door opens down like an oven, the other out like a fridge! The girls love it, and have already begun playing all sorts of games with it!!!!!!

Busy days!

We're getting ready for the holidays in full force around here - I can't believe that it is just one more week until Christmas morning!! Aggggghhhhhhhh!!!

This Sunday Kea had her mid-year show for Cirkids so we all went out to watch that. It all looks like so much fun, I wish I could take classes at the same time.....when I'm not quite as pregnant, that is!

And today the girls and I made our way up to Grouse Mountain to enjoy a little winter wonderland. They have an outdoor skating rink with a bonfire to warm up by, santa's shed, a couple of reindeer, sleigh rides, hot chocolate and "A Charlie Brown's Christmas" playing in the movie theatre - there's something that seems so civilized about living in a city with no snow most of the winter, and only having to drive 15 minutes to get here!

Dec. 14, 2006

Dec. 14, 2006
Originally uploaded by the four mckays.

Just getting bigger and bigger! And realizing that the end is approaching and although I'm not feeling overly ready for the arrival of a brand new baby, I am thankful to almost be not pregnant anymore!

My back still bothers me off and on, but not nearly as bad as the weekend when I was crawling around the house in tears - lots of massage, chiro, stretches, ice and epsom salt baths have been helping! The baby is definitely getting nice and squished in there, and Jamie and the girls LOVE feeling all of the different movements! I definitely don't sleep as well, and can't push myself as much, but that's okay - I'm learning the fine art of sitting with my feet up and working on my knitting or reading a book!

The girls are both nice and healthy - for a while it seemed like we would be up every night with their never-ending coughing, and then the other day we woke up and realized that it had been a couple of days since we'd heard either of them cough! yay! Hopefully we all manage to stay healthy for a while now!

The weather has been CRAZY here - snow, rain, boil water, more rain, hurricane-force winds and this morning we woke up to another light sprinkling of snow. Luckily it doesn't seem to have affected us much - still have our power, we haven't driven much and we didn't even lose any trees. I'm curious to see how our new apple trees and raspberry bushes fair next spring, but since there is so little that I can do about it, I'm not going to stress about it right now.

And now we're caught up in the chaos that is the week before Christmas - Kea puts on a never-ending stream of holiday music and LOVES decorating up the house - we've been doing window drawing, popcorn/cranberry strings, paper snowflakes, winter lanterns and Jamie even created a small tree the other day that is decorated with preschool art! We have a few gifts for the girls to finish (that I'm COMPLETELY procrastinating on right now!), I baked all my cookies today, we're doing laundry and beginning to pack up our stuff - and in 5 more days we board a plane for Ottawa! Crazy how fast time flies by.........before I know it, Christmas will be over and we'll be heading into Feb! CRAZY!

Tiegan just cracks us up....

She is such a character!

She has all these crazy questions for us lately, and when Jamie absent-mindedly answers with "I don't know" enough times, she gets really exasperated and stomps off declaring "Me no like all these 'idunnos'"!!!

When she's really tired, she also likes to create a meltdown by going after the impossible and when we can't make it happen, breaking down. I had bought a new toothpaste for us all to try, which everyone declared they hated and would not use. So when Jamie went to a conference, he brought that one with him, and of coure it got confiscated at the airport as it was in his carry-on. Well, that solves that issue! Except that the other night, Tiegan decided that that was the toothpaste she needed, and she would pretty much die without it. Once Jamie got her calmed down (after a good 10 minutes of passion over this stupid toothpaste!) they talked about what happened with it, and Tiegan declared that from now on she would be the keeper of the toothpaste when we travel by air. "I'll put it in my backpack and when they say they have to take it I'll say NO (with her hand up in the STOP motion) and *I* just won't let them." Great - I can see travel with this kid is going to be so much fun!

She has also decided that short skirts, absolutely no tights and usually no undies, and a t-shirt are the perfect outfit for this chilly season. And let me tell you, she's a very difficult person to convince otherwise! Thank goodness for one-piece snowsuits that she'll compromise with (and the agreement that undies are worn out of the house!)

The kids are sick. Blah. There's a brutal cold going around Vancouver right now, and all I can say is that I'm thankful Jamie and I haven't caught it. But I'm needing a lot more sleep, and I'm feeling a little stir-crazy as we do the responsible thing and stay at home, rest lots, drink lots of tea and eat soup. Kea and I have been reading a lot of "Farmer Boy" (the second in the Little House series - she is obsessed with this series!) and we've all been watching Harry Potter.

Jamie and I also got a great start this morning on the play kitchen that we're making the girls for their Solstice gift - I think it's going to look awesome, I'm really excited about it! I'll definitely post photos once it's done, which will hopefully be before the 21st!