Amberism

When did the meaning of Christmas turn into misery and colds?

Callum woke up a miserable beasty Christmas day and has remained miserable and beastly ever since. He has to be attached to either me or Steve at all times. Its incredibly annoying for me considering he hasn't really been all that needy and let me tell you, I didn't appreciate that enough. Yes, I suck as a mother, but honestly, I don't care. I have never wanted to have to schlep my kids around or physically force them to let go of my leg. I certainly don't want to start now, either.

It also means that we're taking turns sleeping with Callum (neither of us like to sleep with him) and that means that mostly I sleep with Callum because Steve is grumpy without a certain amount of sleep and he's sick, and I'm sick, and honestly, dealing with a grumpy sick kid and grumpy sick husband when I'm grumpy and sick? Not that high on my list of things to do.

So Christmas was not exactly idyllic, but it was nice. I wish that the Grandmas got to see Callum happy and toddling around instead of snotty and attached to my hip (he wouldn't let anyone else touch him) but what can you do? I also wish Air Canada put my damn luggage on the plane, and that the Vancouver Airport wasn't the most confusing airport every built. And that they had changing tables in the bathrooms (its AN AIRPORT - what the hell?!). You know, if we're wishing for things.

Its a Girl!!!

and now you can talk amoungst yourselves... ;)

Christmas This and Christmas That

The trip to see Santa wasn't all bad, we did get a picture and some unsolicited parenting advice from a mall Santa. In the end I decided that telling Santa to fuck off was inappropriate. But man, I really wanted to.

Friday night I finished off the top secret craft, in time for Christmas with my Grandma on Saturday night. It turned out really well. Especially considering Steve did most of the cooking while I helped Callum play with his toys and carefully avoid the Very Scary Rocking Horse that we got him for Christmas. Him and the dog avoid this horse like the plague.

Sunday we did the Christmas Latte and beach thing. This is where its too cold and rainy to actually go to the beach so instead you buy a $5 coffee, park at the beach and sit in your car. Its rather enjoyable, actually.

Sunday night I made shrinky dink pins! I can not tell you how much fun this was. I mean, like, stupid fun. The joy I got out of making these is immense. A lot of joy was had.

Holidays

I have been madly working on a super top secret craft* for the Grandmas (and feeling guilt for not making one for the great-grandma, but the great-grandma actually does her own super top secret crafting. That's my excuse anyway). This project is both ambitious with a one-year old and well, stupid frankly.

It also means that its been all I've been doing and I'm ready to not be doing it anymore to work on other, not so intensive, craft projects.

Thankfully, the kid is well adept at entertaining himself for a certain amount of time. Of course, the contents of most of my kitchen cupboards might be on the floor within half an hour, but at least he isn't whining.

We have a very Christmassy afternoon planned. Picking up some pictures from the photographers to put into our Christmas cards (which are ready to go, minus the pictures, thankfully) and then off to the mall to see Santa! Should be exciting! I bet any money we walk away without a picture with Santa, however. But I figure a good Mama at least tries. So try I shall.

*I trust some of you already know what a secret top secret craft is. Banking my mother doesn't. Or at least, hoping.

Merry Christmas! To Me!

My grandma (who is the best grandma EVAR) gave my little family a digital camera for Christmas since the old camera was on the fritz more often than not. Not having a reliable digital camera has been annoying because you can't just be all click happy with film. You gotta frame the picture, think about lighting, and hope for the best instead of just clicking randomly and deleting later.

So in honour of the click, I present to you some Christmas Crafts!

Some felt* cupcakes I made for my god-daughter and neices. I am totally in love with these little things. I'm easily amused.

They look tasty enough to eat, yeah!?

Callum thinks so, too!

Add in some chocolate chip cookies and you've got yourself a tea party!

(*and because I'm all thrifty and recycle-y, the brown felt is thrifted felt. heh.)

Lets Entertain my 1 Year Old!!

Now that Callum is older, he also bores very, very quickly. And as much as I love spending my days sitting on the floor and being a human jungle gym, Christmas is fast approaching and I'd kinda like to get a few gifts I'd planned on making made. Or say, even just one of them would be nice. Or even to have a little uninterrupted time where I could order something online...

I'm very quickly running out of ideas of things to do to entertain this kid. Toys are all well and good, except he's now officially bored with every toy he owns. And this close to Christmas I'm not bringing anything in. He's too small to color (I've tried) although he can happily play with my scrapbooking markers for a solid 15 minutes and is doing that as we speak...

I need ideas! If he would walk, we could go outside and hang out in the yard but he doesn't so... a walk around the block in the stroller takes up a grand total of 20 minutes and I need things to entertain him while at home.

Today we've already played in a bowl of water, played with all our toys, played in the baking cupboard (and dumped a bag of flour all over the floor), played with all the tupperware and read about 15 books. This afternoon I'm planning to make Tarrah's play-doh. And in that time the only thing I managed to do was a load of laundry (not yet folded) and attempt to type this post...

Give me some ideas that you use to keep your kids entertained! I'm pretty relaxed (yesterday we went swimming in lima beans on the living room floor - I'm really relaxed, and still picking up lima beans)