Lots to catch up on

Yes it is December 31/08 and we have passed yet another milestone. We celebrated Christmas and it was fabulous with only 1 minor hiccup, and then next came our 13Th Anniversary.
Christmas morning came and once again we had to wake the kids up. It was finally just after 9:00am and the kids started rolling out of bed. Oakly was the first too grace us with his crazy hair, then came Avery with no stocking, she forgot to even look at the end of her bed for it. She was so excited she ran back in to her room grabbed the stocking, it was filtered through in about 2Min's and she made her way down to wake up Aspen. Aspen had already been awake early that morning to go through her stocking and fallen back to sleep, so she was ready to get in to the gifts under the tree.
We called G & G over to watch the kids open gifts, that's when Grandma told us that Grandpa had been gone since 6:30am, their was a water break in town somewhere and they had to find it. The other end of town ended up getting the water turned off for the whole day and they located the pipe late that afternoon. Grandpa missed presents at each of the grand kids houses and also at their house, but the strange thing was not having him around for Turkey Supper. It was a very quite day. Grandpa didn't get home until after 7 that night and was exhausted. The pipes were still not fixed, and they couldn't get a whole crew to come out and help dig until the next day and then it was going to be iffy.
The kids had a great Christmas and were very excited to see the Ipods and DS that Santa left. The girls got clothes and games for the Wii, and Okaly got an XBox 360, not sure if it was really for Oakly or Tod they played it for 2 days straight, while the girls and I sang our hearts out on the Wii. It was so much FUN!! ;)
The rest of the week went off with out a hitch, with the exception of a few friends getting together to watch the UFC, we had a relaxing weekend. Monday came and Tod was off to work for 2 days, it was also our Anniversary. We were going to go out to Dinner and a Movie, but I had finished some painting and was not wanting to get ready to go out so Tod brought dinner and movies home. It was a great night. We had Shrimp, Escargot, Salmon, Baked French Onion soup. and for dessert Apple Pie with Ice Cream all compliments of M &M meat shop. YUM YUM YUM!!! I ate a little to much and was feeling it later. We watched MAMMA MIA, Tod and Oakly sat and watched the whole thing not their kind of movie, but the girls and I loved it. We then watched Step Brothers, not my kind of movie but I suffered through it.
Tuesday was a day to clean up the basement and the garage. We were all but done when Grandma phoned and told us to fill up the tub, sinks and as many buckets that we could find. Their was another water main break and Grandpa was sure it was somewhere on our road. Aspen and Oakly jumped in showers quickly and just made it out in time. Sure enough in less than a half hour we had no water. Later grandma came over to tell us that it could be up to 4 days until they get the water fixed. Not sure what we were going to do I said well at least we had heat and that was great. Later that night we decided to go to the movie, it was cheap night and we all needed to get out of the house so off we went to "Bedtime Stories", WOW it was great we all laughed even Avery and it had you form the beginning. One of the best family Movies I have seen in a long time. We arrived home just after 9 and G & G's garage was open so we phoned over to checkup and well their heater was on the fritz. Tod went over to help and I started to prep Aspen that she may have to sleep with Avery if G & G's furnace wouldn't work. They did get it working. Then the other shoe dropped, grandpa told us that we have a 15 minute window tomorrow morning to fill up the water buckets that we had used up and to shower. The crappy thing was that it was between 7 & 7:15am. Well that brings us to today right now. Tod and I woke to refill the tub and flush all the toilets and fill the containers in the kitchen and especially the jug for drinking. WOW what we take for granted daily. Tod was able to shower, shave and go back to sleep, but with the joys of my curly hair, their is no showering and sleeping on this mop of hair so it gives me some time to catch up on the blog. When we are all ready to go this morning we have a few returns to do at Walmart and then we are off to the Mall! We try to stay away from West Edmonton Mall, but the kids are getting to the stage that Walmart is just not cutting it any more. Aspen is to skinny to fit in to the Walmart pants and Oakly really hats Skulls so we are venturing out to exchange at one place and look for some new stomping grounds.
It is the 31st and if the weather stays okay we are going to the Barn for New Years Eve. Our friends have a party in their barn and they get 2-3 girls to watch the kids in the house, a few family's go together and supply fireworks for midnight and then we are all off. It is perfect and everybody has fun.
Happy New Year!!!
Tod, Mel, Oakly, Aspen, & Avery :)