Sunday, November 30, 2008

Beginning to look a lot like Christmas

Christmas is my favorite holiday. We make our homes look beautiful (and often gaudy), we go to parties, eat treats and ultimately celebrate the birthday of the Jesus. We basically take the darkest, coldest and creepiest month of the entire year and optimistically turn it into a month long party. Definitely better to celebrate in December then in July.

Lately I have been thinking about traditions and what I want for our daughter to take from all of the hub-bub surrounding Christmas. Growing up we always had a big party on Christmas Eve with extended family. Usually at the end of the evening my Mom and her sisters would dance on the coffee table to the Elvis Christmas CD. I mean they seriously gyrate to Elvis's sweet tunes. Believe it or not these were alcohol-free dance parties-they just like to boogy. My younger sister and little cousins would usually join in too. I guess without realizing it, they created a tradition one year and now Christmas does not seem complete without the Elvis danceathon. In recent years my family has also started the 'Candles' tradition. After dinner on the 25th, we light candles and share what we are thankful for in the last year and our hopes for the coming year. It is like Thanksgiving, a Therapy session and Prayer all wrapped up into one. It might sound cheesy but we all look forward to this time of introspection. What kinds of traditions do you have at Christmas?

Enough with my rambling here are a couple of pics from our decorating this past weekend!


Daddy and Lil decorating

"I would never grab the Christmas Tree" in an innocent voice.

Uh,oh. Might be too tempting. Just one little ornament...

Ta-da. The first of our 4 trees. That's right-we are going nuts this year with 4 trees. 2 are over 7 ft tall and the other 2 are more mini. You will just need to come over to our place to check it all out!

Saturday, November 22, 2008

Yum

The holiday season is upon us and Lily has started to eat 'real' food just in time to join in the festivities. At least she will be eating her own mashed yams-probably hold off on the pumpkin pie until next year. Even though I have been up in Canada for 9 years we try to celebrate American Thanksgiving. So this year a couple of willing Canadians will be giving 'American' thanks along with us. What could be better than Turkey in both October and November? Now we just need for Norway to celebrate Thanksgiving in September so we can stuff our faces 3 months in a row. Bring on the food!

Tuesday, November 18, 2008

Swing

Since it was clear and sunny Lily and I went to the park beside our house today. She loves to be outdoors and especially likes to go in the Baby Swing. She has not been particularly happy for the last week (teething we think?) so it was nice to see her have fun at the park!





Friday, November 7, 2008

6 Months

Lily is already half a year old. Everyone told us that time would fly by... but we did not quite believe them in the beginning. But lo and behold we have made it through half a year of parenting and our child is still alive! Bring on the next 6 months!

Lily Joy is just under 20lbs and 27 inches long. She is a big girl for her age. She loves to sit with her toys, dance around in her jumper and take long naps. She is also sleeping through the night on a regular basis- this is something that we are truly thankful for.

Monday, November 3, 2008

Costume Time

The Kids Dressed Up
Lily celebrated her first Halloween ( or as I prefer to call it the Candy Harvest).

Lily the Lamb.
Lily Lamb and her Cousin Astronaut Anders.

Lily and her friend Danica the Pumpkin.



The Adults decked out 1950's style
Extended family and friends gathered at the Gulbrandsen homestead to celebrate Art's 50th and Brenda's 60th birthdays. The evening was a 1950's themed shin-dig complete with hamburgers and banana splits.

Please note Ben's sweet jeans. He borrowed my pregnancy jeans especially for the evening!

Nerds for the Night- Tony and Michelle.

Renee is barefoot and pregnant and Tricia is looking swell in 1950's attire.

The Men. Very tough. Almost GQ.