Christmas 2007

As much as I have complained about how busy it is in the house with two little ones... somehow I managed to do more baking than I ever have before! It is also super fun to bake with Rya and have somthing to do after nap time in the afternoon. We made three different kinds of Shortbread, Gingerbread men and ladies, and two Sweet Potato pies! (nummmy). For all those who may have wondered... yellow sweet potatoes are no sweeter than regular potatoes.. yes I bought the wrong kind. Thankfully I Googled "Sweet potatoes and yams the difference" and found out the truth before I made the pie. Yams are best if you want it sweet. Just so you know.

We had Christmas at my brother's house this year with our parents and also Jen's(Malcolm's future wife) parents. They live in Brakendale just passed Squamish. It is the Bald Eagle catitol of the world. This time of year there are so many we saw upwards of 20 just in and around the river walking distance from Malcolm's house. Pretty cool.

Rya loves the Christmas tree and all the ornaments. Notice the tiny little ranger outfit to the right. Grandma brought that back from her trip to the Grand Canyon... it is freakishly cute! It should fit Sebastian by the summer... there will be pictures forsure!

Rya is having Grandpa read her favorite story from the Berenstain Bears. We all read it several times on this trip. Rya loves the doctor story and talks about the stethoscope and autoscope and the "shots". She is very interessted in all things "Doctor" these days. We went for a checkup after Christmas because her cough seemed to be getting worse.. and well it was a good excuse for her to go while she is so into the Dr. Se blew our Dr. away by naming all the things he was to do to her while getting the check-up. Named the tools too! It was pretty funny. Then she said "don't forget the booster shots"! She didn't need any this time... hopefully she will be this easy when it is time for those shots!

This is the family Christmas Eve taking in a Danish tradition from Jen's parents Joan and Paul. They prepared a full 8 course Smorgasborg (sp?). Inbetween each course we toast and drink a full shot of shnapps(sp?) those who were breastfeeding were excused of course! By the 5th toast it was getting pretty funny!

We had a 5 dog Christmas. The dogs were almost as spoiled as the kids. Sorry about the allergies Mal.

Rya loved all the dogs... especially little Patches! When she first saw him she said "there is a teeny tiny dog!" It was love at first sight.

When we had had enough of the doctor story, Rya had to read it on her own.

Auntie Jen reading "The Night Before Christmas" to Rya.

Jen and Richard Christmas Eve... after the Shnapps.

Rya was pretty excited to get the last two characters from her fav. DVD The Little Einsteins.

Sporting her Christmas cracker crown and her Kinder eggs

Poor Sebastian... gotta sport teh darn reindeer antlers. Cute though... can't help it.

Merry Christmas little man!

Uncle Malcolm had to wear the reindeer antlers too.

This clip is of Sebastian rocking with his Maracas from Jen and Mal. I walked into it and could stop laughing.

Here is Rya opening her gift from cousin Tynan. It arrived late so we got to open it at home. For Rya Christmas just kept on giving. I filmed the first half of opening the box but for some reason I couldn't upload it. This was the best I could get.

Thanks again Tynan She loved the pressies! especially the toy camera... she slept with it last night. (sigh)

SNOW!

I heard on the radio that is was suppose to snow but I didn't believe it. This picture was taken in the morning before it REALLY started to snow. The flakes were huge and it piled up so fast. It was a great snow day. I am doing this the very next day and the snow is all gone it is 12 degrees and sunny. I do love this Sunshine Coast weather. Rya was a little disappointed this morning though when we went outside and the snow was GONE!

This is from the week before. Richard hung up all the lights. This was our first time decorating the house.

This is just outside our front door. We ended up with 20cm of snow by the end of the day!

Our Christmas card picture, not exactly Hallmark but good enough.

Here is Rya helping Richard shovel the driveway.

The finished product! I was secretly hoping for a Griswald Christmas. Perhaps we can build up to that. Or would that leave too big of a footprint for the "Green" folks.

This video clip was as close as we could get of our super smiley, and laughing boy. He just doesn't really perform for the camera.

Finally some proof of "LaughingBoy"

Halloween and November

Halloween 2007... We re-used the elephant costume from last year... it still fit and it is just as cute! Richard decorated the front door and bought a ton of candy hoping for the best. We got one trick-or-treater. Thats what you get for living at the end of a dead end road with no street lights. Oh well at least this way we can both take the kids out and not feel guilty for not being there for trick-or-treaters.

Sebastian dressed at a green monster. Rya said "what a cute little monster!"

This was the first year we made Jack-o-lanterns. I forgot how fun it was and how much I love oven roasted pumpkin seeds yum yum. Richards is the one on th left and mine is the one on the right. Rya has gotten into the habit of signing "cheese" when she is supose to "say cheese".

Back at home after 6 houses, a couple scarey skeletons, and some rain. Pretty good haul!

Here is Rya, Sebastian and Grandma... again with the "cheese!"

Here are teh kids at the Holiday Inn. When Mocuite had to go back to Ontario we decided to stay at a hotel for the last night. Her flight was a little to early to make it there on the first ferry so we made a little Vacay out of it. Gotta love Hotel TV! They both turn into zombies! (watch the drool!)

Life on the Coast is great but we still need to go to "the City" for a little visit with friends. This is Rya and her friend Odin. Getting a little action.. and attitude. I love her face in that one! Sorry Odin... no Love.

Mommy and the kids

Sebastian is smiling now a lot... but getting a picture of it is almost impossible. He usually stops smiling as soon as the camera comes out and just stares.... Here are a few of the best ones.

Here is Sebastian's first bottle. It took forever to get all that liquid gold into the bottle and he barely took any... didn't want to waste it so it ended up in my cereal. (kidding)

And one more picture of the sweetest ham in town. I really just wanted a picture of the dress.

These are just some rather lengthy clips of Rya entertaining Mommy...

UPDATE ...

Here he is at 6 weeks old and 9lbs 10oz.

I have to admit... no brown eyes. sigh... those Verbickas genes are just too strong. Thats ok... I still love em!

This is a few weeks ago

Here is big sister Rya... UBER COOL!

UBER CUTE

Our friends Melly and Dave

Malcolm and Mocuite and baby Sebastian

Here are some clips... Sebastian with the hiccups and mommy being cruel,

Big sister Rya as a Violin(?) playing pixie,

and Big sister Rya helping in the yard... while mom looked on and laughed.