Sunday, December 30, 2012

Polischuk Family Farm


As part of our 'family time' over Christmas we were able to head out to the Polischuk Family Farm.  This was the first year that I was able to get in on the bonfire, snowy fun out there.  The weather turned out to be lovely and the promise of fried food did not disappoint!  Fried food & a bonfire, only a combination Polischuk boys would come up with.  There was a huge bonfire with hay bails all around, a table full of great food, yummy fried foods coming from the shed and the hills were covered with sparkly white snow...oh and the evening ended with fireworks! It was such a great day!!
 
 
Snow angels were a popular activity for Amelia and she even got her dad into it.  They made some really beautiful imprints in the snow.
 
 
Stella Bella was loving it also.  To be honest we hadn't even put her full snowsuit on yet this year, bad momma.  My excuse is that we just moved, went on a holiday and then hosted Christmas.  There has just been no time for outside play, it totally has nothing to do with the fact that I like looking at the snow through my window rather then playing in it.  It was really fun watching Stella stumble around in her puffy snowsuit trying to keep up with Amelia.
 

There were some cute dogs at the farm and of course our ladies wanted to pet and give them some love (they are big time fans of anything with fur)!!!  The dogs were pretty timid but we did get some petting in to satisfy our animal loving ladies.
 


 I am going to try and take more pictures this year with Graham and I in them.  These pics are a nod to those efforts!  I am also thrilled to have snapped this picture below of big sis being so kind to little sis, Amelia putting her arm around Stella.  Although to be honest she fell just as much as little sis.




 
Just our fam fam warming up around the fire.
 
Also so cool, Uncle Mikey was around Fort Sask still and joined us at the farm.  Big news for him, he learned to ROCK STICK SHIFT!  I feel like this is a monumental life skill that everyone should know how to drive a standard.  He rocked it on the back 40 acres of the farm, in 4x4, driving over rolling pasture.  Awesome Mikey, awesome!!!
 
 
Oh the fire works!  Amelia loved them and asked for more.  Amazingly, cousin Christopher obliged!  Pretty fun day, pretty fun!  Everyone slept really good.
 
 
~ Mrs. P


Wednesday, December 26, 2012

Christmas Fun!

 


 
Present opening was a 3 day process for the Polischuk's!  We had dinner with Grandpa Ed and Maureen on the 23rd, then the ladies opened their gifts from us on the 24th and then of course Santa came so the morning of the 25th we gathered under the tree again.  Poor Amelia woke up on the 26th and asked for presents to open!  Oh girl! 
 
We loved watching their eyes light up, the girls especially loved their dress up clothes! Amelia clearly loved the present opening part and Stella was just intrigued by the whole process.  Kingston was into the first gift he opened and didn't really want to be bothered to continue opening, he ran off to play.  And Jacey Bird, well that girl just wanted to see what everyone else was doing.  There is a whole other element of fun to Christmas once children hit the scene, magical!
 
 



Merry Christmas!
 ~ Mrs. P


Monday, December 24, 2012

Christmas Eve

 
 
This Christmas has been a whirl wind!  A series of super fun activities had been planned, we hosted family and were thrilled to fill our new home with people we love. We really haven't stopped since Maui but it has been all fun! Christmas Eve was the day we planned to play a little street hockey.  It turned out to be super cold, like -26c cold without the wind chill, still the dudes in our family ignored the cold and played hard.  I chose to stay inside.  We invited our extended family and were thrilled that my sibs and parents, Auntie Jenn, our Great-Grandparents and cousin Addie's family could all join us. The missionaries came too, neither had ever played hockey and were pretty pumped up.
 It was super fun, the day felt 'Merry & Bright'!!


Personally, my favourite part was acting out the Nativity.  Gramma and Grandpa Hudkins put together the 5 minute script and my mom has been collecting the costumes for the last 3 years, so we were well dressed.  The little folk did so good.  I felt the spirit of the story as Grandpa read about the birth of Jesus Christ, the whole reason we were gathered together as a family celebrating.
  It was wonderful!
 
Shepherd - Kingston
Wisemen - Camila, Amelia & me
Joseph - Hyrum
Mary - Jacey
Baby Jesus - Baby Joe ( just one month old)
Angel - Stella
Donkey - Leslie
Stage Hand - Alyson

 
 


Adding to the celebration was some 'Pure Melted Snowman' water and some dipped marshmellows for the hot chocolate.  Coolness!  Thank you Pinterest.

 
When our family is together for Christmas we always have an evening of appetizers and this year the spread was pretty saweeeeet.  My favourite was the stuffed mushroom caps, they are a bit of work but so good.
 
Also just before bed we quickly put together a little something, something for Santa.  We hope that Santa and Rudolph were happy, perhaps we'll get a little fancier next year. :)
 

Loving the season!
 
~ Mrs. P





Sunday, December 23, 2012

Pre Christmas Preparations

I love this time of year!  I love the gift giving, I love decorating n crafts and I really love the preparations to spend time with our family.  I always want things to be special and I love traditions.  I will admit that I can go a little extreme with dorkiness but I proudly bare the family nickname Martha Stewart and take Christmas prep seriously.  The following are a few of the things we made up for the holidays.  These days a majority of my activities come from pinterest, which is an endless source of inspiration.  The Polischuk Peeps have really enjoyed the Christmas season!
 
Tissue Snowmen - These awesome crafting ladies were all over the tissue paper and glue, we added a snack to the table and boom an afternoon well spent!  Always fun with cousin Camila.
 So proud of their creations.

Oh painted wreath - Mia is a funny girl, loves the paint...seriously loves the paint!  We plan to fancy up the canvas' with marker drawn ornaments, no picture yet.

 
Beaded Candy Canes - We nibbled on canes whilst making canes, fun.  Again with the snacks while crafting, we apparently can't do anything without food along side us. Our dear friend Finley joined us while we got our patterning craft on.  Yeah we still need to work on patterns, red then white then red did not always appear on our pipe cleaners. Ha!

Reason for the Season Nativity - We had an impromptu JoySchool where each child was able to made these wooden nativity sets.   The Momma Jodi who organized went hardcore painting the wood for us so we just cut out the pics and modge podged.  So awesome and very fun to be together with some great kiddos and mommas.  Joy School starts again in January and our fam is totally looking forward to it.

Napkin Rings/Seating - We really do dig the paint and we are also big fans of reusing toilet paper rolls (we save every single one).  These sweet reindeer were made up one afternoon and you can see by the faces that our large family was a bit much for the three year old.  In the interest of time I just finished off the faces.  I love that Amelia wanted to make Grandpa Rudolf, cuteness!
They turned out pretty sweet!

Lovely Cranberry Ice - Ok, this is where my family starts to make fun of me, but the end result looks so pretty in a glass.  I had read that if you use boiled water the ice freezes clear, which I thought would be nice so I did it and IT IS NOT TRUE!  Still looked pretty in our glasses though.

Neighbor gifts - We went around our hood and wanted to 'Whisk' our neighbors a Merry 'Kiss'mas!!  I can take no credit for this adorable idea, it is copied.  I also have started hole punching Christmas cards and putting them on a ring so I can easily look through them and enjoy. Cards are one of my all time favourite traditions.

 Signage - A friend had bought a bunch of kitchen cabinets and another friend has a Silhouette that cuts vinyl.  I had seen this years ago and always wanted to make a sign with those words to have near my nativity set.  Beautiful, certainly the reason we celebrate!
 
~ Mrs. P