Happy New Year Jan 1st - 14th

Today, Wednesday January 1st, we started dismantling all of the Christmas displays in the house. It sure comes down faster than it goes up. All the big stuff was taken down, lights, garland, figures etc both outside and inside today. Stacked boxes everywhere to be stored away. Tomorrow will be the tree for me and Ray will start taking apart his villages as well as moving the packed boxes into storage.

Mike and Deb's kids and friends decided to take the January 1st polar bear swim. Crazy kids.

They certainly didn't stay in the water long. lol

Thursday, tree emptied of ornaments and then taken down and back into it's box. Lots of vaccuming up of bits everywhere. The livingroom looks pretty empty. lol Ray put away all the cars, people and trees in his village. Trains put away leaving the tracks for now. A lot of boxes put away. Tomorrow he will start with the rearranging of village pieces so it will be easier to set up next year. Once he has figured out the placement we will be packing them all up for storage. The kitchen/dining area still very cluttered until tomorrow. :) 

We spent several hours on Friday getting the houses back into their boxes. I have my dining room back!

Saturday morning we headed out early to Nanaimo. First a quick shop at Costco and then to Kristi and Jason's. Today is Amelia's birthday party with a bunch of kids and their parents. What a blast for her. It was a costume party. 3 hours of kaos. 10 adults and I think 10 kids. I only took a couple of pictures of Amelia before everyone arrived. These days you can't take pictures of other peoples kids and post them

Papa doing Amelia's new puzzle with her.

We stayed for 3 hours and it was time to come back home. A miserable wet day.

Sunday another wet morning. The final packing of boxes downstairs. Our house is back to normal!

We received a call from Kristi this morning. Amelia had been taken to hospital at midnight last night with a croupy cough where she stopped breathing. The fire department emergency showed up and took her to hospital. After administering some steroids she was breathing ok and happy with the "Marshall" stuffy they gave her. The amount of practicing at home with her doctor kit certainly paid off as she was an excellent patient and wasn't afraid of all the apparatus they hooked her up to.

Kristi was able to bring her home at 2 am. Not much sleep for the parents. Sunday morning she was up and very active as she had a lot of steroids in her system. Here is a video of her playing with her new soccer net we got her for her birthday. :)

Otherwise, our day was uneventful.

Our week was pretty uneventful, a trip to Nanaimo for picking up Ray's new Router table so he can get to work on his winter projects and lunch out at our favourite Chinese food buffet, the Driftwood. The weather has been quite grey, either with rain or fog. 

Ray managed to finish another puzzle.

Eric Dowdle's rendition of Vancouver, BC

A very quiet week. At Kristi's house after Amelia was sick, then Jason and now Kristi. Thankfully we got all our vaccinations including the Pneumonia vaccination and Arexvy for RSV as we did not get sick after Amelia's BD party on January 4th.

Took car in on the 14th to get the recall airbags replaced. I was stuck at the dealership for 5 plus hours, but at least it is done. I had our car salesman drive me to O.J's pub to have lunch and then he picked me back up again. :) Ray stayed home.

Not much to report for these 2 weeks .... lots of puzzle time for Ray, puttering for me, cleaning areas that needed some attention. I also have been checking out our clothes situation for our up coming holiday and ordering anything extra we need, including ordering pesos. We are both exercising getting into shape for our two week trip to Puerto Vallarta trip February 2nd :)

Christmas!!!! It's finally started. Dec 25 - 31st, and it's over!

 Merry Christmas! The day all children wait for, adults too. lol

Sure feels different this morning being that there is no pitter patter of feet and we're by ourselves for Christmas morning. Kristi has to work on call this Christmas, so our main event won't be until the 28th. 

We opened one gift each while we drank coffee and Carolans for me. :) I'd bought Ray a puzzle table so he can put it away when necessary if I need space on the dining room table. He is a happy camper.

It's fabulous, has 6 sorting compartments and a silicone mat to cover the puzzle to keep it undisturbed when you shove it under the bed.

Ray got me a Samsung Galaxy 7 smart watch. Our friend Laurel visited in October and I drooled over hers so Ray bought me my own. I spent the next couple of days learning how to use it. You can choose various watch faces. I like that I can see it without glasses lol I also received a small gold wedding band. I didn't want to wear my rings when we go to Mexico, so he bought me a gold band to wear.

The lake is rising still with all the rain we've recieved. Seems like we've experienced storms for days, today no exception. Fortunately, no power losses for us as there is upisland.

Water breached up to our second landing. You may ask why I keep on about this .... a few years ago our neighbours next to us ended up with 8" of water in their basement! If the lake came up another 8" to 12" at that time we would have flooded too.

After a relaxing few hours, it's time for me to get prepped for dinner. We've invited Pat, Darryl and their daughter Gayle over for Christmas Dinner. Their big event with family is on Boxing Day, the 26th.

We exchanged a few gifts. Included in the gift basket of yummy things, Kona Coffee and Macadamia nuts plus a bunch of other things, Pat made me this beautiful embroidered angel and kitchen towel, the red truck to go with our theme. For Ray, he received a "red truck" embroidered on an apron. Thanks guys.

Darryl, Pat, Ray and Gayle

We had a great time, the prime rib turned out perfectly. Gayle was fascinated by all of Ray's Villages and spent quite some time looking for all the "Santa's" (there's nine). They went home at 8pm... as they have a big day tomorrow with a bunch of their family arriving. 

As we were having dinner, Pat got a call that their granddaughter and parents were unable to come over on the ferry tomorrow, as it was cancelled due to the storm. Their big Christmas dinner is now on the 27th, which we are invited too.

When I was going through old pictures of my aunt, I came across some of Ray's old Christmas Villages. What a difference.

Christmas 2003 in Port Alberni.

2007 in Nanaimo

Big difference compared to now!

Who knows what he will come up with next year!

Boxing Day, we spent by ourselves, eating leftovers. The sun came out for a little bit, so we took advantage and went for a walk. Just got back in time for the showers to start again. Ray watched football and I the last of the Hallmark movies I'd taped.

The morning of the 27th, the rain finally quit. Time to start prepping for our Christmas visitors tomorrow. Our sleeper sofa downstairs will be used for the second or third time since we moved into this house 6 1/2 years ago. It was my Dad's. I blew it up to make sure it held air or Ray would have had to go into Duncan for a new air mattress.

December 28th, our Christmas Eve. Let the festivities begin!

The lake is still rising with all the rain.

Kristi, Jason and Amelia arrived at 11 am and we decided to go out for lunch at JV's for burgers so I didn't have to make lunch. Jason's parents and Aaron arrived shortly after 1pm. I'd done all the prep for the dinner earlier in the morning so it's easy to get things going in the afternoon. I cooked a ham and put a chicken on the barbecue rotisserie. Their were many presents around the tree. A bunch of them in behind the TV stand too. Tomorrow gift opening is going to take awhile. :)

All squashed into our livingroom, 7 adults, 1 child and 2 dogs. Notice all our coffee table displays and food is gone due to the dogs and Amelia lol

Cookie decorating with Uncle Aaron.

Dinner served at 5:30 pm.

Aaron, Kristi, Amelia, Ray, Deb, Nadine and Dale

Bedtime for Amelia. Granny and I also had to read her a story.

We told Amelia that she may hear a bang on the roof not to get up because it's Santa .... the next morning she told us all that she heard the "bang" lol She inspected the chewed up carrot and half cookie left on the plate.

After Amelia retired, we all assumed our positions and watched "The Man Who Invented Christmas".

Me and Olaf. He is a lap dog lol

All of us tired and in bed by 9:30 pm!

Our Christmas morning, December 28th. Amelia woke us at 6 am. We started out with our stockings and when everyone was up, started on the massive pile of gifts around 7 am. Of course a lot of them were for Amelia. She also helped everyone else open theirs.

Necklace from Pat

New remote barbie car from Granny and Papa Dale

We kept at it until 9am when I made breakfast before tackling round 2 of presents.

My awesome kitchen crew cleaning up. I don't know how I missed Dale as he did the majority of the dishes that did not fit in the dishwasher.

After they were done we started on the second sitting of present opening. 

Ferry Costume from Santa

Kristi received a new work blazer from Nadine and Dale

Jason made all of his gifts for everyone this year. WOW. All made with exotic wood. Wenge, Pedak, Purple Heart, and maple in cutting boards.

Coasters for Aaron

Nadine's Cutting Board

My Cutting Board

Picture Frame for Kristi's Office

And the most amazing live edge slab bench for Ray. First words out of Ray's mouth "Oh My God Jason" and then speechless!

Jason's neighbours across the street from him, took down several large fir trees. Jason and a buddy made them a deal for half the wood. Jason's friend had an Alaskan Mill and they slabbed a whole bunch of the wood, giving the owners half. Matt gave Jason some of the wood and this is what he made.

After these major surprises, we gave Jason his new sander that his parents and us went in on.

First Jason received sanding paper as a clue!

We;d hid the sander in Darryl's garage next door.

Happy Camper ... just wished he had it before while he was making all our presents. lol

Well everything was finally opened from under the tree and what a haul for everyone! Stuff everywhere!

Playtime!

Game time with Amelia's new games.

Time to play Jason's new game from Aaron.

Aaron is also a whiz with electronics, so he took apart Ray's tilt a whirl to fix the gears. He brought his own tools. :)

The Victoria crowd left by noon and then it was just the 5 of us. One tired little girl.

Kristi, Jason and Amelia stayed over one more night. Everyone retired\ early, Amelia at 7, Ray and Kristi at 9. Jason and I stayed up until after 11 watching a show. Jaso perhaps had too much Rye lol

The next morning, New Years Eve Day. Jason found himself "worshiping the porcelain alter" :) He was quite sick with a migraine headache for several hours before his meds kicked in and he could get up.

We tried to keep Amelia quiet so she built her new Magnatile castle.

Ray, Kristi, Amelia and I went out for lunch at Jakes so he could sleep longer. 

Once we got back, Jason was up and within half an hour they were on their way back to Nanaimo. Although a cloudy day, at least it didn't rain so an uneventful drive home for them.

A great Christmas this year. Lots of tidying up for me with 4 beds to wash, 5 bathrooms and vacuming up all the dog hair before we can put Christmas back in the box. At least my livingroom floor is visable now. :)

Tonight (New Years) we were invited over to Mike and Debra's for a drink and some appies. Yay! I don't have to cook. :)

Lots of appies mostly made by the kids. Their kids have lots of friends who visit all summer at the lake.

We were home by 8:45 pm. Happy New Year!