A November and December update

Well, after a flurry of new updates in late October/early November -- I seemed to have gone silent. Sorry about that. Life has just been busy and yet, there hasn't been much to write about. But here's a quick update of what we've been up to.

The weekend of November 13, Ryan's sisters Krista and Jamie and Jamie's boyfriend came for the weekend. We went to the Royal Winter Fair on Saturday (where the kids had a blast) and then went bowling on Sunday morning (where the kids really had a blast). Apparently, bowling is fun regardless of your age.

The following weekend, Ryan went to Michigan with some guys. They left early Friday afternoon, where they went to the Windsor Casino, a Michigan football game and a UFC fight in Detroit before coming home on Sunday afternoon. I've been told it was a good time.

Since it was just me and the kids all weekend -- we kept busy. Austin had a PA Day on the Friday so we went to the Science Centre. Then on Saturday we had a daytime playdate, followed by an evening playdate/dinner/movie. After such a busy two days, we kept it pretty low key on the Sunday -- even though it was Santa Claus parade day. Instead of braving the crowds with the kids by myself, we opted to watch it on TV while drinking hot chocolate.

The following weekend, November 26-28, the kids went to Nana's house in London, giving me and Ryan two whole days of quiet. I drove them down on Friday afternoon (making the trip in 6-hours including the time I hung out in London for a bit). So, on Friday night, Ryan and I went out for dinner -- because we could. Saturday morning was spent Christmas shopping without the kids and Saturday night was spent at Ryan's company Christmas party -- which is always a big do with lots of free food and drink. On Sunday afternoon, Ryan drove down to London to pick the kids up. I've been told the kids had a good time, even if they did tire Nana out!

This past weekend (Dec. 4-5) we were in Orillia for the day where Ryan's grandmother had an early family Christmas dinner. In all, 21 people were able to make it and it was a really good time. It had been many years since we'd seen some of the people there.

That's about all that's been going on. Austin still loves going to school each day and at his parent teacher interviews last month, his teacher had nothing negative to say about him. She said he's learning quickly, listens well and is all around a good kid (whose kid is she talking about?).

And Alex's big news is that she's now potty trained. Three weeks ago, I decided enough was enough and told her she was done with diapers and took them away. It had dawned on me a few weeks earlier that the reason she wasn't 'getting it' was because if she was wearing a pull-up, she was too lazy to go to the bathroom. (Pullups worked for one kid, but not the other.) The first two days were rough -- and we went through a lot of pairs of pants -- but after that she started to get it and now she rarely has an accident. She still wears diapers at night and a nap time and we'll get there eventually.

That's all for now. If I don't get back to the blog again this year -- Merry Christmas, Happy Hannukah and Happy New Year.