Finally, some winter we can enjoy!

We have had a very cold winter here ... unseasonably cold. It is frustrating to see -25 everday, and then notice that the average daily temperature is supposed to be -12 or so ... I was not pleased for several weeks. But, finally, we've had some respite from the frigidness and we were actually able to get outside and enjoy ourselves. On Saturday we took the 'kids' to the Provincial Park for a walk, and then stopped at a lookout for some hot chocolate. It was such a nice day that we were peeling clothes off as we walked. During our stop Ainsley had her first taste of snow.





Before our nice Saturday, we had quite the week! I drove to Edmonton last Monday to pick Peter up from the airport. On the way down I started feeling sick and proceeded to be sick for the next 5 hours or so. Initially we thought it was food poisoning, then, the next day after we returned home Peter also got sick. Not fun at all ... then, just as I was feeling better I hurt my back! I actually had to crawl for a day or so because it hurt too much to stand up straight. This was very annoying to me, I hate not being mobile. And I especially hated not being able to properly take care of Ainsley. Peter was feeling better by this point and was taking care of us both. Thankfully he had the week off so he was around all day.
A few pictures of our girl from the last few weeks ...




Yesterday morning Peter left - again - for Dresden, Germany. He was supposed to take this trip before Christmas, but it got postponed. He's doing some testing at Airbus and then returns home on Saturday.

In the meantime, Ainsley & I have some playdates lined up and some swimming and lots of other fun stuff : )

Team PM & Ainsley

Baby in a box

I just had to post these pictures. Ainsley was watching me take down the Christmas tree and other decorations last night. I put this box on the floor and she was fascinated by it ... and then I wanted to see what she'd do if she was in the box!





Team PM & Ainsley

Oh the weather outside is frightful ...

And, if we had a fireplace, I'm sure the fire inside would be delightful ... but we don't : ( Its actually very nice and sunny out today, but c-o-l-d ... too cold to be doing much outside. Incidentally, the other day we drove over to the base to go to the rink ... on the way in, we noticed that the digital billboard was listing the temperature as -127 degrees Celsius!! ... now, it might be cold here - but not quite that cold!!

We hope you all had a very Merry Christmas & Happy New Year 2009! Peter has been off since the 19th and we've been keeping very busy. The week before Christmas we spent some time baking cookies so we could deliver them to our friends and neighbours. We made shortbread cookies, holiday cookies and some chocolate balls.




Then we took our little 'Santa' out and made the rounds!




On Christmas Eve we went to our church's candlelight service. Afterward we were invited to a party at a friends house. The boys went out and played road hockey, while the girls stayed toasty inside and played a board game. It was rather chilly out, so when the boys came in from outside they were a little frozen ; )



Christmas Day we slept in until our usual 8:00 am ... its nice to have a child who is still unaware that there were many waiting presents for her under the tree. Ainsley was certainly the star of the day - she was very fortunate to have a lot of nice presents sent to her from family, friends - and of course, some from Mommy & Daddy too.




That night we went over to the Colbourne's for Christmas dinner. After dinner some other friends came over and we had a little sing-a-long while Corey played his guitar ... that was really nice! Ainsley was getting tired so she lounged around and relaxed while we sang.


On Boxing Day we took Ainsley for a walk in her new sled that she got from her Grandparents for Christmas. We also drove around Cold Lake to try and find some crazily decorated homes - this one took the prize!



This house actually had a short range fm transmitter playing music in time with the lights (which flashed, blinked etc. to match the tunes), and in between songs the owner of the house explained how/why he did this to his home! It was like nothing we've ever seen before .. very entertaining!

Our holidays were made complete by a sleighride we were invited to go on on the 27th. It was a nice day - only about -14 and sunny. We stopped partway through the ride and had venison strips grilled for us over an open fire, as well as hot chocolate. It was very nice - and exhausting for our little Ainsley : )




I would include pictures of our New Years Eve .. but we didn't do a whole lot. We were supposed to go to a party at a friends house, but Ainsley was sick and running a fever so we stayed home.

That's all for this time - I'm sure there will be more adventures soon :)

Team PM & Ainsley