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The women won the trivia cup this year.  Let’s get that bit of information out of the way, shall we?

This year’s party was going to be tricky to organize with Max’s 1st birthday party in the afternoon on the same day.  We managed to get 90% of the party set up on the Friday night before and then lo and behold, it turns out that people were sick at Max’s party so we decided not to attend with Sierra.  Ah well, we shall catch him on his second birthday party!

The party was a great success this year and of course my plan to not stay up too late failed miserably and I believe I went to bed around 3am and woke up around 7am with Sierra.  That’s what I get for having a few more drinks with Rob!  Highlights of the night included chatting about Raspberry Pi’s downstairs with the boys, playing some vintage Nintendo and realizing that Alan is a master at Super Smash TV, and the card blowing activity went over well I believe.  With any trivia challenge, it gets a little heated at times and there was one instance where I miscounted the number of correct items that the boys had provided for an activity and that unleashed Hell on Earth.  No matter, we all emerged unscathed!

I can’t tell if Sierra was more interested in Mina’s glasses or his beard.

James showing me the ropes on proper baby holding.

Holly demonstrating proper blowing technique.  The goal of the game was to blow the card to the edge of the table so it would hang over and not fall to the floor.

Shannon helping Maureen out with the task at hand.

This year there was no gift exchange so the losers of the trivia cup ended up with a snowman plate…

…and the Jesus clock!  Turns out that Mina’s mom who was visiting from Egypt found this clock and hung it up in his kitchen for the month of July!

Rob was very enthused to receive the snowman plate again.

As always, we generally forget to get a group shot so we managed to remember to sneak one in when a bunch of people were on their way out around midnight.

Merry Christmas to all!

 

Seen at my office building, I have to say that this is the perfect piece of wood for this work of art!

The family needed to take some photos of our amazing Christmas sweaters for our annual Christmas card.  Lo and behold, Jean-Michel magically appeared on our doorstep to offer up some gifts (thanks for the beer glasses and beer!) and he manged to snap a few great shots!

This was a test shot to see how much of the tree we would get in the background.

Close but not perfect.

Bam!  Three photos later, we have our Christmas card photo.  Sierra is quite the happy baby.  I also love how Vero snuck her stocking into the photo.

Etienne and I swapped our faces for a social committee activity at work and everyone said I looked like Mad Dog Vachon and Etienne looked like our buddy Clive!

 

 

Before I forget, I have to post my all time favourite photo of Vero and Sierra!

On Sunday we headed over to the Vars elementary school where they were hosting a Christmas event put on by the Vars Optimist Club.  I have to say I’m pretty impressed by the club and their events so far.  They even managed to get Santa to visit the event!

We stood around with a hundred other kids waiting to get to meet Santa.  After 30 minutes they called Sierra’s name over the microphone and we headed over to see Santa and he gave Sierra a nice little gift.  She was quite happy about it all.

A new toy!

Sierra was actually more interested in chewing the wrapping paper that the pig came in.

We met a friend of a friend at the event and she was nice enough to snap a few shots of us together.

Later on that night, we set up the Christmas decorations and I phoned Nanny to tell her how Tom was haunting us from above with this Christmas tree that we inherited.  I can’t seem to figure out how the lights work on this darn thing every year!  Vero said “You’ve only had it two years so far.” and I said “Exactly!  We have problems EVERY YEAR!”  Ha ha.  Vero managed to figure it out though and the house looks quite Christmassy.  Sierra was intrigued by the lights!

 

Doing some dishes with Joel.

Horsing around with Silas and Jayce (Jayse? Jace?)

Navigating the sloped parking lot at Ikea.

Testing out the brew pot.

Hanging out with family.

So, I had a father moment in the Toys R’ Us the other day.  Sierra was fussing and not really enjoying the trip to the toy store so I figured there was something in the store that might have made her happy.  I came across the coolest Christmas toys ever…Yoda and Chewbacca in Santa outfits!  As soon as I put them next to the cart, her mood changed completely and she was laughing at these two characters staring at her.  I choked up a little thinking “My girl likes Star Wars!”  Needless to say, the look on my face changed our mind of not picking up something for Sierra for Christmas and we walked back home with Yoda in tow.

Mom and Sierra hanging out with the other kids in the nursery.

Not all moments are fun!  This was the first time we were trying formula with Sierra.  She was NOT a happy camper.  I can’t blame her.  She has allergies to cow’s milk protein and soy so we had to get some formula which I’m pretty sure is boiled down aluminum.  Luckily, the next time we gave her the formula, we smartened up and mixed it with some breast milk.  Over the next week, she has been getting used to it.

Sierra watching A Charlie Brown’s Christmas

Chowing down at the Vars chili supper.

Hanging with Uncle Mike.

Trying out solid food (well, if you can call runny cereal ‘solid’) for the first time.  She quite enjoyed it!

 

 

 

She likes chatting with Mom and Dad.

She likes tummy time with Mom.

She LOVES Spidey.

She really loves talking about her day.

She loves the bottle!

She likes trying on new clothes.

She likes going in the stroller.

She likes hanging out with the Cantin clan.

She LOVES the Apple store!

She loves Aunt Trish!

 

She loves flying like Supergirl.

She loves kisses from Mom!

She likes turning on and off the music box in her crib while she sleeps.

 

It’s been quite awhile since I brewed some beer but Etienne and I were both getting the itch to try our hand at it again.  I have to say that my compressor on the kegerator has been acting up and Procrastinator Palmer is in full effect so I haven’t really got around to fixing it in the past year.

But the surefire way to kick my ass into high gear is to make a batch a beer.

I made a batch of scotch ale using my old equipment and to get back into the swing of things.  It was a little hard to remember all the little steps, but it wasn’t an arduous task.

Sierra helping with our first batch of beer for the year.

The next week, I decided to get rid of a lot of my old stock that I had sitting around.  A lot of grains and hops that have been accumulating for the past few years needed to be used!

I went to Brewtoad and figured out how to search by ingredients and found an interesting ale…the Christmas Ale!  It also asked for cinammon sticks, ginger root and nutmeg.  Sounds intriguing!

For Black Friday I splurged a little and bought myself a wort chiller so I can cool down the wort quickly (instead of letting it sit overnight).  Mike also hooked me up with his old eight gallon brewpot which has a thermometer and a drain valve attached to it.

Come brew day, I was excited and ready to go!  Sierra and I were on our own as Vero had gone for a haircut.  We did have to drop by DeFalco’s to pick up a piece of PVC tubing for the wort chiller and a few hose clamps along the way, but that was a minor detour.

It’s always better to get all the ingredients ready beforehand!

I have to say, I learned a few lessons that day using some new equipment and having a helping hand from Sierra.

Lessons Learned

• While not impossible, it’s pretty well near impossible to make a batch of beer on your own while looking after a six month old.  At one point I timed the addition of hops to the wort with the addition of milk to my baby’s belly!  It was an interesting exercise in time management.  1) Add hops. 2) Run to couch and feed kid. 3) Burp kid while running to wort to add more hops.  Repeat.
• I have to remember to wait for a good rolling boil…not when I see a few bubbles.  Don’t be afraid to get that thing rolling like a stone.
• When you have a new toy to play with that involves a drain, DO NOT FORGET TO PUT IN THE WIRE MESH BAZOOKA TUBE THAT PREVENTS THE DRAIN FROM GETTING CLOGGED!  Not only did I get a clogged drain while draining the boiling hot wort, but this was surely going to happen with the addition of all these ginger roots and cinammon sticks in the mix!  MAYBE I would have been alright if I had made a regular old batch of beer, but NOOOO, I had to be all adventurous like!  The wort was trickling out slower than those old guys who can’t seem to urinate like they used to.
• I had a very small leak from the drain but it seemed to stop after awhile.  I’m not sure what to make of this but I’ll look into tightening the connections before my next batch.
• The wort seemed to have scorched at the bottom.  I can only imagine this was due to me adding the liquid malt extract and not stirring it enough.  Why wasn’t I stirring it enough?  See bullet point #1.
• The wort chiller needs a good spot to be rinsed after being in the wort for the 23 minutes it took (not bad actually!).  Perhaps I should rinse it in the shower in the bathroom?

All in all, I can’t complain too much about the brew day.  I got to test out some new equipment and while the clogged drain could be considered a disaster, it didn’t ruin the beer.

The new setup.

Up next: get that compressor working on the bar fridge, fill those kegs and enjoy some beer while dreaming up the next recipe!

 

 

 

 

 

Not only is it the first snowfall here in Ottawa, but it’s Sierra’s first snowfall ever!  I’m pretty satisfied with everything we got accomplished around the house this year to winterize it.  The only thing we didn’t get around to was cleaning the chimney but honestly, I think it’s better to do that task in the spring when there isn’t some snow on the roof!

Not all photos are fantastic.

There, that’s better.

She’s loving it!

Two minutes in, and already a mitt has been lost.

I was honestly surprised at how well she stayed on the sled!

Vero trying to pull some G’s for fighter pilot training.

Too much fun outside.