Bonne Fête Mon Amour!

A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away...  (far away from B.C. anyway)

This adorable, budding filmmaker would grow up...

...to become this handsome fellow.  

Who, aside from all his talent, charm, wicked sense of humour and mad computer skilz, is a magnificent Papa.

...not to mention a magnificent husband and my very, very best friend.  

Bonne fête Stéphane.  We appreciate everything you do, even when it seems like we don't.  Ahem.  

Bisous partout,

Theresa, Liliane et Alice xoxo

The Holiday Moose Demands A Sacrifice

 Hey kids, come and decorate the Christmas antlers! Don't be scared, it's the Christmas Bull! 

Glaring down at you with his red head and freakishly huge horns. Mwah ha ha ha.

This part is actually cute.  I like the baubles and streamers. Nice use of almost-traditional Christmas colours, too!  

But honestly.  For the love of eggnog, what about a mounted moose (reindeer?) head (albeit a DECORATED and SPARKLY mounted moose head) says Happy Holidays, Shoppers!  ?

A hunting equipment tie-in perhaps? A promotion for taxidermy? (the olde-tyme hobby that is good, clean, family fun!) A subtle warning that Santa is not to be trifled with?

Points  awarded for not using orange and keeping the decorations near the ground a little more... lighthearted.

Is anyone else noticing a theme here?  What's the decor like in your favourite mall?

Père Noël

I don't know about you, but around here we are TIIIIREEED.  I opened my eyes at 8:45 this morning and had to wake the girls up.  It wasn't easy.  But we're in the home stretch!  Christmas Eve in a week! 

So, as most people know, parents or not, tired kids = cranky, sassy kids.  And this is when believing in Santa comes in handy.  I know we should teach our children to do what we ask because they WANT TO but let's be realistic. I do that all the rest of the year. A cranky, over-stimulated, gift-obsessed  5 year old doesn't respond to much but let me tell you, the threat of no presents gets her butt out of bed. 

I'm such a Grinch.  But it works!

While we've been able to use that trick for a couple of years now, this is the first time we actually sent a letter to Santa.  I wrote what Liliane dictated. Stéphane ensured that we didn't just skip right to the list.  He contributed the small talk at the beginning.  It was a family affair.

 It only took a couple of weeks to get an answer.  And oh, the excitement.  

 Such a nice touch, a little handwritten note with her name and everything.  Even Alice got her own letter since Stéphane Liliane made a point of mentioning her.

Speaking of Alice... 

She's a different story.  Too young for Santa but since she doesn't talk, it's not such a big deal.

As long as she has her babies,

and the TV, she's all good.

I can haz bonhommes?

Don't worry, we end up talking more about the baby Jesus around here than we do Santa.  Reason for the season and everything.  And thank goodness there IS a reason for this season, otherwise this sleepy Maman would be having some motivation issues.  

But overall I'm overflowing with gratitude.  I was already feeling thankful before Friday morning, but when an unthinkable tragedy strikes, it's a powerful reminder of how rich our lives are.   How great my own life is, lowdown Santa threats and all. 

Now, back to item #675: baking the shortbread.   

Welcome to Christmas... in Hades!

I think these pictures are elf-explanatory.  

 Complete with traditional yuletide jester in complementary fiery tones:

I mean COME ON. 

BONUS: Taken at a totally different mall.

Say hello to this fancy looking Christmas tree but don't get too close!  See those tangled, spangled weeds sprouting from its deceptively decorated branches?  They lure young children and naive short people with their sparkly weirdness (wait, what IS THAT?) then whoosh! Gone.  Eaten by the tree.

We didn't have ours with us but I swear I heard it burp as we walked by.

Am I the only one who doesn't get Christmas decorations anymore? Is this the NEW NORMAL?  

In that case, I think it's time to reintroduce spray-on snow.

Trois

THREE FRENCH HENS: The Piercy Arbour Family Story

O Christmas tree!  O Christmas tree!  My husband would like to forget thee!

 No, not entirely true.  He would much prefer a tasteful artificial tree that we put together from a box instead of a messy real tree that we have to bring home.  The needles!  The needles!

This girl is very enthusiastic about choosing a real tree.  We learned that she is NOT enthusiastic about candy canes about ten seconds after this photo was taken.

But then I heard about this beautiful species called the Fraser and our tree-buying experience has improved dramatically. And expensively, but worthwhile-ly.  

 Oh, and they deliver!  

Yes friends, we had our Christmas tree delivered to us for FIVE DOLLARS.  

And that is why I am still married.  Thanks to Christmas tree delivery.

It comes to the house looking like this:

Once the plastic and string are off, it starts to look like this:

So by the next day, you're ready to glitz that baby up.

TA DA!  

Actually I added garland and tinsel since I took this but you get the idea. 

I wish you could smell it!  Heavenly.  And nary a needle in sight.

Nine days to go! 

Two Turtle Doves

We apologize for the interruption in yesterday's program of "Twelve Days of Christmas Posts" but I don't really have a good excuse except CHRISTMAS IS NOW ONLY 10 DAYS AWAY. 

Ahem.  I'm fine.

We really went out on advent this year.  Counting down to the big day!  

We have this excellent app from the National Film Board where kids can see a new animated short film each day.

My Mom very sweetly sent out calendars for the girls.  The old school kind like we had, none of this Spiderman/Princess chocolate randomness.  Good old fashioned paper, maybe with sparkles.

Except Liliane's has stickers for each day. 

 She likes it.

And then we have this going on.   SOMEBODY (rhymes with Zephane) got an early birthday present and has been playing with it every day since.  Literally.  (Thanks again, Mom!)

And our old favourite, the advent calendar we bought when Liliane was a baby.  Here it is, circa 2008:

Awwww, mini Liliane! 

There are 24 little books and once you read the day's little story, to the tree it goes.  The girls have a mini tree with lights in their room just for this purpose. 

I was the only one without an advent option until our friend Ariel sent me this online calendar and I had so much fun with it that I immediately bought this online calendar also.  TA DA! You can't turn a corner around here without a visible reminder to how very few days are left. But don't panic! 

Seriously, for the Moms they should invent an advent calendar with WINE.  Like everyday you get a new sample that you can drink slowly after dinner and not freak out.  I'm going to get on inventing that!  

But after Christmas!

Which reminds me, I have to go now, my TO DO list is about to eat the kitchen.

What kind of advent traditions do you have at your house?  

And A Partridge in a Pear Tree

Bonjour!

I took a little break there to deal with sick/teething/cranky children and get the house decorated, etc.  Still don't have the stupid outside lights up (why oh why didn't I do it when it was 10 degrees out last month?  Now it's minus 10.  Naturally.)

It came to me as I was rocking Alice to sleep AGAIN in the middle of the night AGAIN that a) she must be getting her molars because I remember this crazy neverending cycle of not sleeping with Liliane and b) I could get back to blogging and do a 12 Days of Christmas series! 

Yeah, I know, it's been done before but Christmas is all about cliché giving and I would like to give you, dear readers, the gift of  goofy photos.  Who needs myrrh when you can have this?

So the first of the 12 posts goes a little something like this: 

HOW I SPENT MY WEDNESDAY MORNING: GINGERBREAD MAN STYLE 

(Whoop whoop whoop! Anybody else have kids crazy about the Gangnam style? Please say yes.)

Stéphane has been away since yesterday morning so I was on my own last night.  I can neither confirm nor deny that there were stern words and howling and lots and lots of Advil flowing from about 1-2 AM but then I heard nary a squeak from the shared bedroom until 8:45

EIGHT FORTY-FIVE. (Hallelujah)

Since I am lucky enough to be a lady of leisure someone who works from home, I let the girls sleep (because I was up at 8 of course).  I already knew I was going to keep Alice with me because she had an appointment to see her pediatrician and she's been so unhappy, I figured she could use a pajama day.  

So, gingerbread.  Liliane's entire daycare went to see a show yesterday morning about the gingerbread man.  From what I can glean, it was the story of the gingerbread man who was tricked by the fox in the water and gets gobbled up at the end.  But the highlight was that all the kids got to eat their own gingerbread man and there was a recipe for gingerbread cookies in the program! Can we make them, can we make them can we make them?  Now? Now? Right now? 

Because I am sometimes awesome, I had all the ingredients in the cupboard and Liliane and I made the dough last night.   Since we were already so late this morning, we decided to stay home and bake the gingerbread.  Because WHY NOT? 

Here is how that went down:

And then the pain d'épice went on the renard's nose like DIS! 

And the renard ATE HIM!

I went the soft, chewy route which was apparently NOT what they ate at the show yesterday.   

Oh well, I thought they were delicious.  

It was a pretty excellent morning all in all.  Like Saturday, but on Wednesday! Also, spontaneous happy childhood memory: CHECK.

Bonus: Alice is fine.  Congested and teething but no other infection.  

12 days to go, friends!  Are you on track with your preparations?