Whoa, it’s already the end of January? Where has the time gone?!
We’re really happy that the weather has changed for the better and we actually have some SNOW around Ottawa these days. But it’s touch and go sometimes. Hovering around zero degrees brings forth the freezing rain and currently everything is quite icy. Did I ever tell you how much I hate freezing rain and ice? It doesn’t let us play outside!
But at the same time, we have been walloped with some good snowstorms so the forests are full of snow and the front yards as well. Snowmen have been built, sleds have been used and Sierra is learning how to shovel snow! She also is smart enough to know that once she feels she’s done, she just lets me finish the job.
Sierra continues to be quite hard headed and not listening to what we have to say. We will have to nip that one in the bud soon enough! I think she’s just complacent…”No TV? It’s ok Dad, it’s ok.”
A typical routine with Sierra starts with some oatmeal in the morning, brosse, brosse, brosse les dents and getting dressed. Sierra LOVES dresses these days. She is quite upset if she doesn’t have a clean one to wear.
We then get into the car (usually with a baby or Froggie in tow) and arrive at the daycare. She knows to take her boots off, hang her jacket up and put her shoes on. Lately she hasn’t been hugging or kissing me goodbye which is fine. She used to have a hilarious routine which I swear would expand each time. The last time she hugged me the routine was give a hug, kiss on one cheek, kiss on the other, kiss on the lips, rub each others noses, give one high five, give another. Quite the routine! But nowadays she’s content with going to play with her friends.
Speaking of her friends at school, I suppose the class will be divided when September hits as we are going to be registering Sierra for kindergarten next week! That shall be fun. Registration that is…I’m not sure if I’ll be happy when the next level of parenting comes our way…PD days, making lunches, homework! Actually, I hear that the school she is going to doesn’t give out homework so we will see how that works out. I suppose kindergarten probably doesn’t usually have homework to begin with.
I can’t remember the name of this place we went to at the EY center…the Garden of Lights? Palace of Lights? The entire family headed out and I had a bonehead moment when I arrived with the tickets I had ordered the night before and the ticket taker said “But sir, these tickets are for YESTERDAY!” That’s what happens when you are on holidays…you get your days mixed up! Luckily a quick visit to the customer service desk allowed us to go in.
It was a fun activity to bring the kids to. It was probably not the regular admission of $40/adult but Vero had scored a family pass from a friend which brought the price down significantly. We needed to get the kids out and do SOMETHING considering freezing rain had kept us indoors most of our holidays!
During flu season this is what we all loved to see happen!
I can only imagine that Grandma is teaching the kids how to play a game.
Sierra showing Poppa how to play Connect Four
Bahahah!
Fun sled times!
A trip to school one morning
Vero got to go out with some friends one night while I just left the kids alone in their bedrooms to fend for themselves. Vero, I’m kidding!
I smartly asked if we could bring a friend along to the park with us (aka, I wanted them to do all the work)
It was quite icy in the park so I was showing the girls how much fun they could have rolling down the hill. They had so much fun that they decided to continue on flat land!
This would be Sierra’s second haircut. Her first one was a year before at the hairdresser but she didn’t want to go so Maman decided to do it herself.
This photo was taken on January 5th. It was the last day of us opening Christmas gifts. It started out quick but Sierra (or us?) lost interest after a few days and Sierra was happy with what she had so we didn’t push her too much on opening gifts.
Princess Sierra
I love how I didn’t realize my finger was holding the button down for so long. Google made a hilarious collage of essentially the same photo. I never get tired of the walk down by the river across from the Parliament buildings.
I can’t even remember the reason for this photo. I would like to think that it was because Sierra chose my outfit but we all know that I probably put this on myself because I am very stylish.
I took back all my comments about Ottawa weather when I noticed this temperature forecast for Kapuskasing!
A big moment in Sierra’s life…her first attempt at playing an adventure game on the computer! We were playing a remake of Space Quest II that had just been released. I was showing her how to use the mouse to move the character around a room. Her first attempt was decent. She kept clicking the mouse buttons which would change the cursor’s function so sometimes she couldn’t walk around. But it’s a good skill to teach her.
Hanging out at the park one morning
We will have to send this to Paul and Ringo one day!
And Maman says she doesn’t like computer games! Here she was showing Sierra how to play Donald Duck’s Playground…a favourite of Maman and Matante Anne-Marie!
Sierra was nice enough to shovel the porch after a big dump of snow
We went out to Larose Forest and found some friends were heading there at the same time!
Other than the focus being off, I’m glad we got a shot of all of us out for a walk. We had gone down a trail I wasn’t familiar with so we decided to come back the way we came in case it took us somewhere where it would take us hours to get out. Poor Sierra’s hands were hold so she was anxious to leave. We bought her some different mittens after this excursion so we are hoping they will do the trick on future treks.
I think this is called an ice jam?
Mom and I have been playing Carcasonne on the iPad. I send her these victory shots from time to time after I win a game.
The snowbanks are getting high around the daycare so Sierra likes to climb them.
Vero and I are starting to eat less meat (after we watched a documentary called Game Changers) and this was Vero’s attempt at cauliflower wings. I have to say I enjoyed them a lot more than I thought I would!
Sierra was quite well hidden during hide and seek!
I believe this may have been the second time Sierra had ever been on skates. We assembled this skating aid that morning and decided to take it out for a spin on a very mild day. I have to admit that I feel quite useless when it comes to teaching her how to skate because I don’t even know how to skate!
Fun in the snow!
The snow was incredibly sticky that we built the largest snowman known to man!
Frosty lives! I love how the previous Frosty’s scarf and toque were buried in the snow and ice and I had to chip it out to use with his reincarnated form.
