Go For A Ride Dad

Since the weather has turned cold, Arabella has been enjoying some of her outdoor toys in the house. Her favorite one is her cozy coupe...she loved to make a big loop around the first floor and usually she has either Jay or I push her around. She loves it. However, a few weeks ago, she asked Jay to take a turn and she would push him. This is how it ended....

Jack The Elf

I love Christmas! I think most of my favorite memories are from the traditions that my family kept alive over the years. I have so many wonderful memories of making Christmas cookies with my mom and brother, the fruit cake my Poppy would always get from my Aunt Rose, the angel wings and pizzelles, Christmas Eve spent with the whole family at my Great Aunt's house, Christmas stockings, and planning Christmas morning with my brother. We always had a pact that no matter who woke up first, they had to wake the other one before heading down to see the loot that Santa brought. The list of memories and traditions goes on and on. So this year I decided to start a new holiday tradition with Arabella and so far she is loving it! The Elf on the Shelf arrived from Amazon at Auntie Lori's house before Thanksgiving. I couldn't wait to get to Connecticut for Thanksgiving and to start the tradition on Thanksgiving night when Arabella went to bed.

So who exactly is Jack The Elf? First, Arabella named him after we read the story behind his arrival and that is where he gains his magical powers. And even though Arabella is just now figuring out Santa and Christmas, we have started to tell her about being naughty and nice. And this is where Jack comes in. He is Santa's eyes and ears around the house. During the day, Jack "watches" Arabella and then reports her behavior back to Santa at the North Pole each night. By the time she wakes up the next morning, Jack has returned to a new "hiding" place in the house to watch over her again. Each day the cycle repeats with a few small rules - Arabella is not allowed to touch Jack since he has magical powers that if he is touched may disappear and then he wouldn't be able to return to the North Pole. Jack also can't talk to her, but she can talk with him and send messages to Santa. On Christmas Eve, Jack returns back to the North Pole for one final check in with Santa before he leaves the North Pole and then Jack won't reappear until the Christmas season the next year. One positive of having Jack around is all I have to do is say "Jack is watching" when she is acting up and she stops the behavior immediately...too bad jack can't stick around all year!

Jack made his appearance at Aunt Margo's house in Connecticut and even knew when we were leaving to come home. He ended up in car and Arabella was amazed that he knew to get in the car before we left! Yes, it was a little hard to have Jack staring at me for 6 hours while I drove but Arabella enjoyed it and it kept the magic alive.



Now each morning when Arabella gets up, she looks to see where Jack is hiding and as soon as she finds him she says "There he is!" I just love the surprise and wonder in her eyes when she spies where he has moved to - and it is that wonder that makes the Christmas season beautiful!

For more info go to: http://www.elfontheshelf.com/.

Santa Claus Is Coming To Town

Yesterday, Santa Claus arrived in Montreal! And to make the special occasion, Montreal had its annual Le defile du Pere-Noel or Santa Claus Parade. Since this was the 60th year for the parade, it was a pretty big deal. We decided to take the train into Montreal instead of driving and fighting with traffic or finding a place to park. It worked out perfectly since we only had to walk 2 blocks and we were right in the middle of the action and it was really cold and windy!! We arrived early, so we checked out the animated window at Ogilvy (a department store) and then decided to to so "window shopping" inside to get warm from the cold. After that, we decided to grab a late breakfast and then stake our claim on the sidewalk for a prime, front row seat of the parade. Once we were all bundled up and Arabella was in her stroller with her down foot muff...I actually wish I had it to sit in...we waited for the parade to start. Once it started, it was great. Arabella loved every minute of it, except for the life sized snowmen - they freaked her out - and she was asking for more once it was over! We had so much fun and it is a great way to get into the holiday spirit, I think that this will be a family tradition for us!

Ogilvy's Window

Arabella & Giacomo

After music class yesterday since the weather was horrible, Arabella and I decided to head over to Zig Zag Zoo and meet up with a few of our friends. Zig Zag Zoo is a great indoor play area for kids where they can run all round, climb, slide and burn off energy and where mom can relax and enjoy a coffee and girl time with her friends. Arabella loves it, she runs off with her friends and then will come back and check in every so often to say Hi and grab a quick drink or snack and then she is off again. We spent about 3 hours there yesterday and when we left, she was wiped out! Right before we left, she and Giacomo (a/k/a GiGi) decided that they wanted to take a ride on the jeep. It was so adorable and thankfully Cynthia had her iPhone and was able to snap these super cute pics! When I asked her when we were driving if GiGi was her boyfriend (like she even knows what that is) she responded with "Sure", it was so cute.

Never Again

I am really good about looking at and reading the ingredients on food labels. We try to eat as much unprocessed and organic food as possible, which is not as easy living here in Canada as it was when we were back in the States. We don't allow Arabella to eat chicken nuggets on a regular basis, but after seeing this, she will never again be allowed to eat them! And the first thing I did before reposting this, was run to the freezer to make sure we don't have any of that CRAP in there...and luckily we didn't or it would have been in the garabage. You decide for yourself if you will eat chicken nuggets again....

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Fall Clean-up

Since this is our first Fall here, we had no idea what it would be like when we started to clean up the yard in preparation for the snow that is sure to come. And, we have lucked out when it comes to having to rake leaves, unlike some of our neighbors who have tons of trees and have been out doing yard work every weekend now for what seems like the past 6 weeks. Since all we have in the back yard is pine trees, there was no raking that had to be done. And we only have 5 other trees that will drop leaves and they are all fairly close to one another in our front and side yards so it was pretty easy to do all the raking. When the raking was done and the piles of leaves had been made, Arabella had a blast playing in them!

Skating With Dad

Arabella has been doing good with her skating lessons even though she only lasts about 15 or 20 minutes of the 30 minute lesson. Usually she will say "All done, too hard" and we explain to her that it is hard since she is learning, but that over time it will get easier for her. She also asks for Jay to skate with her sometimes instead of me, so this week, he broke down and went and bought new hockey skates! Yesterday, he went on the ice with her and she had fun, but when she was done, she was done.





Hopefully, now that they have the rink up at our neighborhood park and once the ice is ready, we can go up and practice when we want. It still boggles my mind that a town park would take on the liability of having a skating rink that is unsupervised and open all the times on public property...must be the litigator in me!