A Visit To Santa

Tonight Phil took Chloe and Abrianna to visit Santa...They're so cute!

More of Awesome Alishea!

Alishea did another round this week for the KX96 Contest...she did awesome!

Busy Kids

The girls have had a lot of fun things to report this week. On Thursday Alishea participated in a singing competition and did a great job. I wish I could have been there to cheer her on but Phil made sure to record it so I wouldn't totally miss out:





On Sunday both our wards had the annual Primary programs. As a CTR teacher I participated in the program in my ward while up in Bowmanville Chloe and Abrianna were in the program in Phil's ward. I'm so glad they're enjoying going to to church and hope they had a lot of fun singing in the program.

It's been hard missing out on all this stuff. I really wish I'd been able to be there to see Alishea sing and during church as I watched the primary kids sing and do their speaking parts all I could think about was how I should be in Canada watching our kids instead. Its so hard being part of a family but not being there to really BE a part of it. But the good news is that there's only 9 days till we'll all be together at James and Martha's for Thanksgiving and then I'll get to spend a few days in Canada. Its been too long apart this time...but just 9 more days...

Update...

Well, there's not a whole lot happening in the land of MacDonald these days...unfortunately we're in a 5 week stretch of not being together and Mrs. MacDoanld is not liking it very much.

Only on week 3 now. Last week was pretty dark and depressing for me. I really hate being away from Phil. But I've been trying to do a few things to make the time apart better for myself.

This week I put up my littls Christmas tree. Its still early, sure, but it makes me smile to see it there on my windowsill. I'll need to take a picture and post it up. Last weekend I started in on Christmas shopping as well and I've found it a lot of fun shopping to make my husbands Christmas special :) I'm quite excited for our first REAL Christmas together!

Lately I've been reading a lot and getting through a lot of books. That is something I've always enjoyed. I need to get inspired to get back to my own writing...someday I may even finish a book I've started writing!

Recently though, the writing I've done has been in my personal blog. Since I started this one for our family, my old Nannny Poppins blog has gone back to being just for me. Last week I must say my entries were probably nothing but depressing, but I've found it very theraputic to just throw my negative emotions out into the blog and somehow it lets me leave part of them behind and move on happier. Hopefully there'll be some more positive things there...I'll work on that.

I guess its the fall weather, but I've also really felt the need to get cooking again. This weekend I made beef stroganoff, garlic potatoes and parmesan asperagus...so yummy! I can't wait to be in Canada with Phil all the time so I can cook for more than just me. I really enjoy it but I enjoy it most when I can share the results with those I love.

Phil is doing well and working hard. This weekend I've been so impressed by how much more he's gotten done with getting the house in order. I can't wait to see it in a few more weeks.

One thing I'm really excited about is the Santa boxes this year! At Christmastime Phil's family helps deliver Santa boxes to families in need. I was so touched by this last year and this year I'll be lucky enough to be in Canada for one of the weekends they'll be participating in this! I can't wait to get to join in with them and make Christmas special for others!

Hopefully there will be more exciting things to report on soon...for now, lots of love to all our family and friends! XOXOXOX

Happy Birthday Chloe and Happy Halloween!

Two weekends ago I drove up to Canada and spent 4 days with my sweet husband. While I was there we celebrated Chloe's 5th birthday! I'm usually completely camera happy but for some reason I didn't take a single picture all weekend (what is wrong with me!?!?!) But Chloe's mom got some pics so hopefully I can snag some from her to post soon...

I made Chloe a rainbow colored birthday cake and we had a nice family dinner all together. We also stopped in for Chloe's friend party where she got a very special visit from Princess Cinderella! Good times for all little princesses in attendance!

The rest of the weekend we spent enjoying our time together, spending time with the girls and doing a few things with the ward. We went to a test run of the wards emergency preparedness plan and attended church on Sunday. On Saturday Phil took Alishea and I out to visit an alpaca farm...we may have our own alpaca's someday (although according to Alishea, as soon as she's married we must leave the whole alpaca farm to her and move away haha)

Had a great weekend together, but broke my heart to leave. We've been spoiled since the wedding and have been able to see each other every other weekend...not so anymore. Now we must wait a month to see each other again when I go up for Thanksgiving. *sigh* I'm really getting tired of this not together stuff. The immigration process is so slow. We haven't even been able to apply yet because just getting all the documentation and stuff we need takes months on its own. I wish there was an easier way, being apart is so hard. I keep reminding myself that our situation now is so much better than it was a year ago before we could be together at all. That helps...its definitely better now. I just wish so much we could have a normal life and be a normal newlywed couple instead of being stuck 500 miles away from each other. I know someday it will all be over and we'll look back on this from a much happier place and all will be well...but for now, its just hard.

Halloween is usually one of my favorite times of the year. I love it! I get all into watching scary movies, I go costume shopping really early, I drag friends to haunted houses and carve pumpkins and make great fall food...the whole thing.

This year, I didn't do any of it. I don't even know why exactly. I think its a combination of things. First, Halloween started right after the wedding which naturally exhausted me. Plus adjusting to being married but still being apart hasn't been fun and has me feeling pretty depressed a lot of the time. But even more than that...its like I didn't have the desire to get all into the holiday by myself. I wanted to do all the fun things I usually do, but I didn't want to do them without Phil. Hopefully next year we'll be together and it will be a lot more fun. I did end up getting a costume very last minute for the Halloween party my employers hosted (and I worked my tail off for)



But I also ended up catching strep throat from one of my nanny kids which made the working a big party thing not at all exciting. I spent Sunday in bed all day trying to recover...oh well, still not as bad as the year I had a kidney stone for Halloween! Hopefully next Halloween I'll be with my family and we'll have all sorts of fun together...until then, I'll just have to deal with the lonliness I guess.