Happy Christmas!

Happy Christmas everyone! (It's still Christmas in PST, and I might be on EST, but can we let it slide? It's been a busy day...) 

It's been a good day here. Hope it's been good everywhere else too! I think that my crafted gifts have been well received in general. I was hoping to post some pictures of people in their gifts, but it wasn't to be. Not with all the rushing... but I did get a picture of them before and a few other fun things, so be prepared for some pics!

So, let's start with some semi-bad new. Xavier's Twisted Tree Sweater? Too big. WAY too big. Wanna know how I knew even before Christmas? This is him in his sweater from last year... (taken Dec 23rd, 2008)

At least it's still cute on him! And although I was initially suspicious that he was only wearing it to please his aunt Jeanne, well the permanent tomato something-or-other stain on the shoulder placated me. And on the bright side, at least he can wear the Twisted Tree eventually right??

My other (finished) crafted gifts were Caliometry (I can't spell that name) for the girls in the family. (Sister, sis-in-law & brother's gf.) This is the one the gf got:

A blue striped and a green with a funny cable added were also made. I still think I like the grey one.

But the sweater for the unborn niece was appreciated. 

& There are about 3 other unfinished Christmas gifts still to come...

But, back to the gf... toques off to her! She's only been around us crazies for 6 months and she already passed the packy snow test. Say what? you ask. Well... this is what we did on Christmas eve day. 

It started out at about noon. I was playing outside with Moxie (the dog) and couldn't help but notice that the snow was packy. When I got inside, I called my bro's cell and said: "John, I have two words for you: packy snow." He said, "I know and A (the gf) is going to come prepared."

They arrived about 2 hours later and we didn't get outside until about 2:30pm, and since John and I have been doing this forever we just started rolling snowballs. 

BIG snowballs. 

There were no questions. No discussing. Nothing. We just started. We've done this so often, always with a slight variation, but there wasn't much to talk about. 

When you grow up 'in the middle of nowhere' with about 1.5 acres of snow, you learn how to use it! It probably started on some snowday where we got to stay home and Mom made us play outside.

So, we start rolling these snowballs... and not that long afterwards this conversation was heard:

A - "This one's getting pretty big."

John - "Keep going."

A - "But it's getting big. We won't be able to lift it on top." 

John - "Just keep going."

A - "Isn't this going to be the middle ball?"

me - "Middle ball?"

A - "For our snowman?"

me - "You haven't explained to her what we do?"

A - "We aren't building a snowman?"

John & me - "No."

A - "What are we building?"

me - "Um... a big snow thing."

John - "Sort of like a tower. Sort of. You'll see. Just keep rolling."

A while later my other brother arrived. And this year by some stroke of genius or because we were remembering our 7th grade science basic tools we decided to use a ramp... proving in fact that the pyramids could have been built using manual labour.

But they would have needed better organization than us! That's what you get for having 3 engineers on the job. We probably had about 20 conversations that started: "Wait a sec. What's the plan for getting this on top of that?" And at least once someone said: "I don't think we are up to building code! And we definitely don't have a permit."

Well, enough bad lead up. This is what my sister saw when she finally arrived at 7pm:

Impressed?

I'm even impressed with us. It's two people high, and that huge ball required five adults (+ one supervising toddler) to roll it up. Unfortunately... it didn't last until morning. The ramp is still there, but the top snowball has fallen... But the fun is in the making.

Hope you've had just as good a Christmas. 

Merry Christmas! (and happy boxing day.)