Holidays and more Holidays

This Christmas we had planned to travel to Toronto to spend it with my family but we had a change of plans when Tate's parents asked for everyone to come to their 40th Anniversary. December 21 was their day. All their kids gathered together for photos and food. Their 6 kids collaborated together and put together some money for send Val and Viv on a trip. They decided on Cuba and are there right now. They wanted to go on a trip for a while now and were really planning on it until other things happened, like the giant tree in their yard starting to fall and will cost a few thousand $ to bring down, the old hot water tank in their house needing replaced, and Val's car dying and needing to get a new one. 

Christmas eve was spent at Tate's parents with a lot of his family. Their tradition is fondue on Christmas eve followed by the grand kids reenacting the Nativity and then a visit from Joulupukki (the Finish equivalent to Santa). Typically Val plays the part. He dresses up in some funny Santa like costume, hands out gifts to the kids and then kidnaps one of the kids in his bag. We have an exchange student from Switzerland (Jan) staying with us for a few months so we decided to have him take the role of Joulupukki this year. The kids right away knew that it was Jan but they still enjoyed it nonetheless. This Christmas Joulupukki brought scentsy buddies to 23 out of 26 grand kids. One grand kid already had one and the other was 'too old' for one. (scentsy had a buy 1 get 1 free promotion for a while so we told Viv and she liked the idea of getting 1 for each grand kid). Khyrum and keiston already have scentsy buddy's so khyrum got a horse head on a stick that makes sounds (He LOVES horses) and Keiston got a stuffed giraffe.

Christmas morning we did presents from Santa at our house. We didn't get too much for the kids because we didn't feel the need. We did get Khyrum a leap pad so that he can stop asking to play games on our phones. We got Jan a nice Canada jacket (Tate got one too). He really liked it. He showed his dad and he wants one now too. Tate and I always say not to get each other anything because we make big purchase during the year that we say are our Christmas presents. This year we got a new washer and dryer, a DSLR camera, and a new kitchen table with a bench. I love them all. But of coarse we still did a few little gifts for each other. I got clothes, runners, and a carpet cleaner that I've wanted for a long time. Tate got some clothes, runners, and hockey gloves. We know Christmas is not about the gifts but its still fun to do. As the kids get older we plan to incorporate a lot of giving into our Christmas traditions to make Christmas a little more enjoyable for another family- whether it be a family in Africa, Jamaica, or local.

Christmas evening we planned to have our own little family dinner. Viv called and said they would like us at their house if we wanted. So we decided to go there but take some of the food we were going to do. My family does not typically do the turkey or ham like most people do. We usually do fish, chicken, goat, oxtail, and other Jamaican dishes (can you tell us Jamaicans love meat?) So we took salmon to dinner. We also wanted mashed sweet potatoes but did not know how to make it so my sister in law Jen helped. I think they were the best mashed sweet potatoes I ever had! Viv did the traditional turkey, mashed potatoes, and a few more sides. All in all we had a lovely Christmas and are happy that 2012 was good to us.

For New Years we wanted to get away. We went to Edmonton to stay with our good friends the Haylins. New years eve we took the kids to Stony Plain for a kids festival. They ate popcorn and drank hot chocolate, we went on hay rides and watched fireworks. They had a great time, except Khyrum had a hard time with the fireworks. After we went to Vanessa's family's house for a party. Lots of food and lots of music and dancing. Khyrum and Maiisha stayed up until 2 AM drinking apple juice, dancing, crying, and dancing some more!