Dragon's First Christmas

Look at those big lips! I could just eat him up.

So I have to admit I haven't been as committed to this blog these past weeks but I had my husband around so sue me!

I had decided to leave all of our Christmas decorations in storage in our rental home in Edmonton. I believe this was a good decision because of our very limited space in our apartment. I made a paper cone tree out of some random French book that I found at a Salvation Army on the Gatineau side of things. I was inspired to make one similar to the one my sister-in-law Alauna made when her and my brother were living in Hawaii and had Christmas in paradise on a student budget. My mother also mailed some sparkly Christmas garlands and a glittery Noel doorknob decoration to catch Little Dragon's eye.

David completed all of his exams on December 19th (with his last exam being a 100% final in his Legislation class, gross!!) and was off school until today, January 3rd.  Over the span of two weeks we went to both the Nature Museum and Museum of Civilization (which apparently is going to be called the "Museum of History" and will NOT get the awesome world renown exhibits with the stupid Harper government cut backs), went Cross-Country skiing a couple of times, saw the Hobbit in theaters, went to the live outdoor Nativity (soo cold!) checked out a yummy burger place called "The Works" which offers delicious veggies burgers, went to the Elgin Street diner (which I didn't like very much, bit of a let down), had dinner with a couple of different friends, and some days, when it was snowing like mad and very cold, we just stayed inside and watched Netflix and the three of us cuddled it up. Honestly, those were some of the best days!

Unfortunately, I lost my phone the first weekend and the pictures of many of these events are gone, namely the Museum of Nature. We thought I might of dropped it between getting out of the car and getting into the apartment building. I put up signs and everything!!! No dice. I still have the same number and we purchased a phone, not as pretty as the one I previously had, yesterday. Life goes on.

The Works! Best burger place in Ottawa. So many unique, delicious combinations. We went there twice during the holidays because I liked it so much. I got a Ho Hum #34 which is a Veggie burger with cheddar cheese, caramelized onions and mushrooms. The second time I got  M.E.C. burger that had avocados, feta, mushrooms, sun-dried tomatoes and beech-house sauce. If you visit us, we will for sure go here!!

The theme of the restaurant is industrial. They serve water in big measuring cups with straws and the pepper and salt shakers are in glass light bulbs. I think this concept would do very well in Edmonton or Calgary. As you can see I put Dragon in his "Baby's First Christmas" outfit several times over the holidays. There are Santa faces on his feet and a big Santa face on his bum too. The waitresses fussed over Little Dragon and took him from us for a solid 20 minutes. HE even got a tour of the kitchen! Lucky boy! Or maybe I am too trusting? We gave Little Dragon his first taste of ice cold water here.  He seemed to enjoy it. His little tongue was just a-going!

We also went on a family swim. This being Little Dragon's second official swim. The first time we went swimming was at a hotel pool in Montreal and Dragon did NOT like it one bit. David took him in the water, held him close, dipped in the water slowly and we witnessed a total freak out. The first swim lasted just under two minutes. The second swim Little Dragon lasted almost an hour and was loving every minute of it. We took turns with the little critter and he loved being held under his armpits and swished around. Then we put him in baby life jacket with a floating collar and watched him bob around on his back, kicking his legs like a crazy person. We all laughed a lot. I think there will be many swim days to come. We have graduated back to the kiddie pool for many years to come.

On Christmas eve I made a bunch of different appetizers, compliments of Kyla and Angie's recipe book and we had Dave's friend from school, Ibrahim, who is originally from Mali (a very dangerous African country) but has been living in France for a long while. He has already completed schooling in France for Civil Law and decided to come to Canada to learn Common Law so he is well equipped to get into International law as a career option. He is a very nice young man and his English is pretty good considering he doesn't use it that often. We ate, chatted, and played some Wii. He definately was more of a competitor than Dave at MarioKart and I enjoyed the challenge. He was very generous and gave us presents. Little Dragon got a couple of cute Old Navy t-shirts that will fit him this time, next year and I was given Victor Hugo's, Les Miserable, the novel, which I may complete by this time, next year.

See our beautiful paper Christmas tree with a Hallmark ornament from Rachel crowning the top? (the only Christmas decoration that made the journey across Canada. It says "2012, Our New Home" on it). Also in Quebec the Cream Soda is white, if you go across the river to Ontario, it's pink. Weird, eh? Artichoke dip, stuffed mushrooms, kale chips, Greek salad kabobs, fresh pineapple, red seedless grapes, dark chocolate, cream cheese veggie rolls and some grape juice bubbly. Yum!

Can you tell who the father is??

Christmas day we Facetimed our families and then went out to find a nearby cross country ski trail. We tried to go to Leamy Lake but apparently they close it off to traffic during the off season. Then we pulled off the road to try some multi-use trails. David backed out of one spot to try for another closer to the trail and unfortunately we got stuck! Little Dragon was snoozing in the backseat so that made the situation a little less stressful. After about 30 minutes of digging and pushing, three guys came down the trail and saved Christmas. Thank you random strangers with muscles!

So then we were all like, "No more parking in make-shift lots!! EVER!" (Maybe we would be more brave if we had winter tires, but here's to playing it safe in 2013). We ended up parking across the street from a park by the river and did a 30 minute trial run with Little Dragon in the Chariot. He was quiet the whole time so we interpret that as "He LIKED it." Whether or not that's true, only time will tell. We find that many times when we go outside and it's a bit chilly, Dragon gets quiet and just snuggles into his snowsuit or blanket and stares around. I call it his "Survival mode".

Exhibit A:

Later on in the week, after we got dumped on some more, we went to a park called Mer Bleue. It has a ton of multi-use trails, great for hiking/biking in the summer and cross-country skiing in the winter. Our friends from church told us this would be a good, free spot as there is a fee to use the Gatineau Hills for skiing. The snow was perfect for skiing on and it was magical to see the large amounts of freshly fallen snow hanging on the tree branches.

 The Chariot worked well. Dave took it one way and I hauled it back. We are all about equal opportunities, right? Ha. When wearing the harness it was interesting to feel the kind of echoing, delay of what the Chariot was going through, whether uphill or down. It isn't a huge weight but it does slow us down a bit. It is also a little awkward for sharp turns as, like carrying a trailer on a vehicle, one must be mindful to turn wide. Little Dragon was such a champ as he tolerated nearly 2 hours of this. Mind you, he was sleeping for more than half of it. The last five minutes of the trail he told us he was tired of it.

This is what he looked like at the half way point. He somehow fell asleep in this position. I don't think I had him buckled in tight enough. Bad mommy.

Also, during the holidays I finally got a church calling. Meaning: an unpaid job at church; service! I am the First Councillor in Young Womens. Woot woot! Meaning: I get to be in charge of 14 and 15 year old girls and teach them on Sunday and plan and attend activities on Wednesday nights. Another translation is: I get to extensively interview a few girls that would make excellent babysitters! I am really looking forward to this and thankfully for the girls I can't get too hardcore with Little Dragon shadowing me. No Iron man hikes or camps for at least a year.

I had a bet going as to whether I would see a raccoon or Stephen Harper first. If we would have known about the Prime Minister's open door policy for Halloween, the PM would have won. But a few weeks ago as we were walking to the Subway down the street, I saw a raccoon scurry across the road. Man, those things are creepy! Almost as creepy as Steve.

For New Years eve we went to the Ottawa side to this big family-friendly party. It is put on by a city councilman named Rick Chiarelli (who is second cousins to the former major of Ottawa, Eww! Politics are like religion. So many close relations!). They had a big skating rink in front of the big building and wagon rides in the back parking lot. Inside the building, there was a big foyer with hot chocolate, hotdogs, chocolate bars (all $1 and all the proceeds went to an organization similar to M.A.D.D), old men doing magic tricks and playing acoustic guitars, face painting, games, colouring and a jumbo slide. All in all it was pretty fun.

The temperature remained mild that day, I think it only got down to minus 6 degrees that night so it wasn't too bad waiting in line to go on a sleigh ride. IT was funny how Dragon was sooo good when we were standing in line but as soon as Dave sat down and they started the sleigh ride, he roared!!! We tried to soothe him by singing Jingle Bells and had the whole wagon load of people going, including the driver, but no. It didn't work. They had a 10pm countdown to fireworks so we ditched out at 9:30pm as Dragon was asleep and we thought it would be best to duck out early before everyone left at the same time and we would have to fight traffic getting out.

We were able to see fireworks from our apartment. They were distant and little but fun nonetheless. Also, I found a couple of envelopes that contained letters that each of us wrote to eachother from Dec 2010. We were supposed to open Dec 2011 but I had them hidden and I forgot about them. It was neat to see how far we have come as individuals and as a couple! 2012 was a stressful year for Dave and I, what with the baby coming, figuring out Law School and moving clear across the country.

God bless you all! We hope good things come your way in 2013. We survived a bunch of end-of-the-world days this past year and know that 2013 will present a lot of unique opportunities for all of us. Here's to living life to the fullest and seizing every day!

Little Dragon at midnight.