How long?

Yep, 10 years of marriage plus the five and a half years before that. We're making good time...

Yeah, what they said

Hope the holidays were great for everyone. We spent a lot of quality time in our pajamas and when we weren't doing that, we were spending time with friends and family. Obviously haven't been updating here, but I almost regularly update our Flickr photos, so cheers and happy new year!

Warm and fuzzy

Things are abuzz with holiday activity. We have Lily's Christmas concert next week, but it's not called that anymore. Now it's the Winter Celebration. Since they've taken religion out of the holiday season at school, I don't feel as bad for Lily's lack of exposure when she exclaims, "I just saw a bunch of people in a cave on that lawn!"

That, people, was a nativity scene. Oh, the innocence of a child...

Excerpt from the first Grade One report card

Up to now

Seems we missed October and it's more than half way through November. Up to our eyeballs in many things.

Lily started Sparks, which is the first level of Girl Guides. She's also been in gymnastics, a two-hour class (though when we went to try-outs, she was recommended into four hours a week). The end of October was filled with her three best friends birthday parties; one was at It's a Blast!, one was a night-time Halloween party, and the last was a sleepover - which she easily survived a night away from us and had to be woken up at 8:30 a.m. to go to gymnastics. And then there's all that school. It's really forced her to shape up. She reads everything and writes most things, too. She's less quick to anger. She's more open to discipline. And she sleeps. I can't remember the last day she got up before 7 a.m. Now if we could only get Finn to stay in bed...

Finn has just recently become a total terror. He gets into everything, now with more broken dishes. He rides the dog, he throws everything down the stairs and he out-yells Lily. The boy's got to be heard! He's also talking up a storm, dancing to Elmo songs, and generally figuring out that he has free will and is starting to get that "I do it" attitude. But he's funny and sweet and gives nice, closed-mouth kisses and tight hugs. I think we'll keep him.

We went to Edmonton for a weekend in October. We gathered up as much baby gear as we could fit in the van and toted it up to Nigel and Jessica's new townhouse. Hit the Science Centre and IKEA and the kids were FANTASTIC for such a long road trip. Finally, after six years of no success on the road, we've finally gone on a road trip with no trauma.

Most recently, we've been spending the last couple weeks at the hospital. Nana has an infection she can't kick so we're pretty worried. There are bad days interspersed with some good ones. We just wish she'd hurry up and get better. Here's hoping...

Excellent, excellent

You came home on Wednesday with this:

It's a certificate of excellence for your excellent progress in grade one. You said only three other kids got one and everyone clapped when you received it. It's even signed by the principal. How nice to have this when I always hear your teacher tell the other parents what kind of trouble their kids got into that day - like the boy who got afternoon recess taken away because he was chasing girls with a stick over the lunch hour and someone got hurt. True story.

It might be because you draw rainbows so good. Or maybe that's just a side effect. While it's lots of hard work and the days are long, you are doing great. I wish we all our days were full of rainbows on giant pieces of paper.