Fun on the Christmas Lights Train

We took Mom and Dad to a place not far from out house, in the city, that has a 1/8 scale miniature train built on the property. The man that owns the house has been putting up lights and running rides on his mini train at Christmas time for the past 15 years. This year there weren't as many lights as he has been ill but the novelty of riding the train on a snowy night still was fun and exciting for all. Aidan was sick so he and Chris stayed home this time.

Mom and Dad


Allison and Dad

Sam and Allison - Sam makes a face as per usual

Allison and Mom

All ready for a train ride

Christmas at the Culligan's

Christmas was eventfull at our house this year. We began Christmas Eve with 6 little ones running around the house full of excitement! Our friend Jody came over for the evening for dinner with her 3 little girls, actually they aren't so little anymore!!

These are the umbrella drinks I made for the kids to enjoy with dinner. They were a hit!

From left to right: Jonelle, Aidan, Ben, Ariane, Sam and Claire enjoying lasagne and ceasar salad.

Chocolate fondu for dessert! Yummy!

Sam getting some help from Gramma.

Sam quite enjoyed the chocolate fondu as evident by the chocolate on his face!

Tracking Santa on NORAD!

Everyone checking out Santa's location, "He just left Dartmouth, NS!" Aidan says.

All ready for bed in their new Christmas PJ's.

The loot!

Aidan: "Santa's been here and he ate all the cookies we left for him!"

Ben: "Except for one bite of cookie. He must have been getting full!"

Sam: "All the carrots are gone, the reindeer ate them".

Merry Christmas 2010

Visit with Santa 2010.

Merry Christmas to all of our family and friends!

The Farm

Whenever we visit Red Deer we take time to go to my grandparents farm and take pictures in the field. The last time Chris was out here was 2000. I have been out with Aidan in 2002, and Ben and Aidan in 2006. It is the first time we have both been out here with the kids.

Here we are with the field behind us. This year there is wheat planted in it.

Sam got right in there and loved the tall wheat! Great-grandpa would have been proud.

Smile!!

The boys with Auntie Elaine and Uncle Mike (my dad's sister and brother-in-law).

The old farmhouse was sold a few years ago to a man named Bill, he lets us walk around his acre whenever we are out there. This year we enjoyed looking at the "Woodshed Saloon". There is no back on this building and it is where Bill stores his wood. He's very creative!!

Aidan on an old plow. I have pictures of Aidan on this when he was 6 months old and 4 years old.

Ben's turn and again I have an old pic of him on this when he was 1.

Sam's first time on the plow!

An old manure spreader turned into a planter. Of course these two loved it because they could climb on it and move the break handle.

Sam is 3!

Sam celebrated his 3rd birthday today with lots of friends and loads of fun! We went to Tinkertown with a great group of friends and their kids. 11 kids, 5 adults, pure fun at the amusement park!!!

After Tinkertown, my friend Kim (from Greenwood) and her children Aidan and Nathan came back to the house for hot dogs and cake. Sam had so much fun opening is presents. Comments made by him included, "Oooooo!", "Oh I wike dis", "Look Ben, it's Buzz Whiteyear!"

Sam also got a new bike from us. We figured he would like it better because it has no pedels. He has a bike that has training wheels and pedels but he prefers to walk beside it rather than ride it. He rode this all over the house and when we got him outside, he was off like a shot!!

Happy 3rd Birthday Sam!!

We ended the day with a swim in a neighbours pool. It was 32C here today and hot and muggy. We swam in the pool while thunder rumbled around us. We got out when we saw lightening. It was a great day!!!

Swimming

It's been a long while since I have posted anything. The boys are enjoying swimming in the neighbors pool across the street this summer. We have an open invitation to use the pool whenever we want. We have actaully had this invitation since we moved in but now that all 3 kids can swim, we are really making use of it this summer. Here are some pictures of the boys in the pool.
Sam is swimming all on his own with a lifejacket on. It took him 2 weeks to get comfortable enough to swim on his own, flip from his back to his front and to jump off the diving board without being caught.



Chris pushes Aidan into the pool using "The Force"!

Rolls Royce

A neighbor was getting married today and rented a Rolls to take him to his wedding. The boys saw the car and the driver invited them over and told me to bring my camera to take a picture of them. Aidan wasn't all that interested but Ben and Sam couldn't get their shoes on fast enough to go see the car!

This is a 1962 original Rolls Royce worth $250,000. This is the car Queen Elizabeth rode in when she came to Winnipeg (2002).

The driver let them sit right on the bumper.

Ben's face in the crome on the hood.

Easter

Easter this year was a lot of fun. All three boys were into it. We survived indoor egg hunting with only one broken lamp!! Aidan got a little excited trying to beat his brother to an egg behind the couch and knocked a lamp off the table. He offered to give me $10 to replace it! He's so cute. Lamp replaced and all is good (we did not take his money). Ready to hunt for some eggs outside!


Sam found one in his lawnmower!


Ben shared some that he found with his brothers!

Aidan and his basket - he is super keen but shares and helps his brothers find some eggs too!

We had company come for Easter dinner. Why cook a turkey unless you have a crowd to feed. So Jody and Theresa came with the 3 girls and we also had Chris' boss (who is posted away from his family at the moment) and another friend of Chris' from work who was here from Halifax and away from his family for Easter too all come for dinner.

Jody has 3 girls about the same ages and the boys and well, there was a wedding for Ben and Ariane. It was a lovely wedding. The bride wore a pretty pink dress with a beautiful veil. The groom sported a Nike shirt and a couple of cars instead of flowers. Jonelle was the officant, Aidan the best man, Claire was the maid of honor and Sam was along for the ride! The happy couple celebrated their wedding with a fine reception. There was turkey, killer potatoes, and vegetables. A wonderful angel food cake was enjoyed by all for dessert!

The happy couple!

The Wedding Party!

My Big News

I just had to share my big school news. I made the Deans Honor List this past semester. I will brag it up while I can because it will probably never happen again!!!

I Met This Man...

This is Leon Leyson.

Leon is an amazing person with an amazing life story. He is courageous, lucky, kind, strong, and just plain amazing. I had the privaledge of hearing him speak at our school on Thurs. Leon is a survivor of the Holocaust. He is one of the survivors on Schindler's List. He told us his amazing story of life as a Jew and what being on Schindler's List meant to him and his family. He spoke for a little over and hour and it did not seem that long. His story was so riveting. He did lose 2 of his older brothers and his grandparents during this time but his parents, a brother, a sister and himself survived. He came to the US in 1949 as a displaced person and ended up in LA. He married and had two children of his own. I think it's important to remember this time in our history. Now, in the words of Leon himself, "You are all witnesses of what happened to me and you can share that so others don't forget."

Ben & The Olympic Torch

Ben came home from daycare with this picture in his backback.

He didn't tell us about this special event at daycare. Apparently the director of the daycare new the woman who is in the white suit who ran with the torch and she agreed to bring it in to show the kids. When he was asked about it he was quite excited to tell us all about it. He said that it was pretty heave, but not too heavy for him! (Although it is almost as tall as he is!) He explained that when he was holding it he did a little jogging on the spot just like the runners with the torch did! We told him how special it is that he got to hold the torch and not many people get to touch it. Personally, I am a bit jealous. We are so proud of Ben!

Festival du Voyager

It was the first weekend of Festival du Voyager here in Winnipeg. Chris is away in Florida (rough life) until tonight. The kids were climbing the walls, I was going to get no studying done, the weather was beautiful - only -6C. So I bundled them all up and headed down to the Forks in the van. After finding a parking spot, we walked around and took in all the sights. I didn't bring skates because we all know what happened last time I went skating. Plus, Ben and Sam aren't strong skaters so it would be pretty hard to get them all going on the ice.

An ice castle. Ben was disappointed he couldn't go inside. He will have to go to Quebec City sometime when he is older.

Typical boys watching the train going by on the train bridge!

This street car is open and has benches in it for you to put your skates on. Winnipeg is proud to have the longest outdoor skating area in Canada.

I propped the camera up and took this picture of the 4 of us.

This is a sun sphere. It is constructed of aluminum pipes and then they places a fine mesh netting over it and sprayed it with water. So it essentially a frozen sphere suspended from a train bridge. There is a hole in the bottom and if you crawl up inside there is a bench made from rope for you to sit on.

The boys inside the sphere.