Swimming Fun in Lethbridge

Christmas Eve in Lethbridge was fun. Broc, Steph, Brad and I took the kids swimming, which was pretty fun. We had Chinese food for supper and then went to visit Grammy Plomp in the evening. Good day.











Even though it's blurry, this is one of my favourites. Such joy on their little faces.



And a picture of Gracie visiting with Wiley.

We're home!!!

Happy New Year to everyone. Hope you had a lovely holiday season.

I'm sitting here with a cup of hot lemon and honey (trying to soothe a sore throat) and my one millionth butter tart of the Christmas season (to make sure that this Christmas weight is good and hard to get rid of) looking at the photos we took.

I packed three cameras so that there was always one around to snap photos, but I just ended up with an odd variety pack when I downloaded them to the computer. There's lots, so stick around for a few days and I'll catch you up on what happened on our Across Alberta Christmas Road-trip.

I'm jumping ahead, but over our holidays, we had two new babies in the family, my brother and sister-in-law had a baby boy on Christmas Eve, William Reed Benedict.



And, five days later, on the 29th of December, my cousin Ange, and her hubby Dustin had another baby boy, Owen Sackett Helm.



These are the first great grandsons on the Sackett side of the family, three girls came before them.

Now, back to our trip. We started out with the usual five hour drive to Lethbridge. Gracie didn't sleep much, but she was happy for awhile and we got to stop at Grandma Sackett's for a visit, which helped.

Here's a glimpse of happy Gracie (no pictures were taken of grumpy gremlin... errrr, I mean Gracie)



Trying to get a picture of Kale and Gracie looking at each other (or even getting both of them to be still at the same time...)



Now, it's all ready a long post and I've hardly arrived at our first stop, so I'll take a break. More to follow.

Happy New Year!

Recaps of Christmas and holidays later, for now, a few layouts, just to keep things crafty.

A fun moment captured...



Gracie still loves 'helping' with the laundry.

This was actually a layout I started at Scrapbook, Eh! last spring. Just found some pictures that work perfect with it!

Santa Came Early!

Hmmm, what are all these things under the tree??



Wow! All of these gifts are for me?



Look at this!



And this!



Bailey even got to open his stocking.



Can you smile for the camera with your presents, Gracie?



That's not a smile, that's a fish face :)



Look at the camera, Gracie.



Wait, did you see these??



Or these?

Merry Christmas from the Malackos

Hope you're enjoying the holiday season. We're so close to ready, it's scary. Definitely, by tomorrow...... (yikes!)



Here's a little e-Christmas card. We're not photogenic, but we're festive and that's what counts, right? :)



And a picture of Gracie, who is beside herself with excitement and can not keep her hair in a ponytail for the life of her. I believe there's also gingerbread on her face in this shot.

I know everyone is heading out to visit family or for Christmas parties or other festivities, so be safe, enjoy, and we'll see you in the new year!

Decorating the Christmas Tree

We had fun decorating the Christmas tree with Gracie this year.











Gracie's favourite ornament is one with a recorded message from Grams and Papa.



The Malackos





Merry Christmas!

Kaisercraft Goodies

I love the direction Kaisercraft is heading in, lately. They have such beautiful papers and embellishments, it makes me drool a little every time I get near their displays in scrapbooking stores.

Here are a few projects I've done using a few of their newer lines.

Smitten is one of my favourite layouts I've done lately. I like the elegant look. It's a bit of a departure from my usual baby-themed layouts, but of course, it still uses up my enormous stash of Gracie photos.



I needed to balance the layout because the large, flower element was so eye-catching, so I rolled back the edges of the papers to get just a hint of red on the second page and made sure to add lots of bling there as well.

I enjoyed using these papers so much, I used the leftovers to make this little card. The big flowers on the back of the paper were so eye-catching, so I fussy-cut one out and altered it a little to make my own, 3-dimensional blossom. I added some glossy accents to look like dew as well. The petals were curled around a pencil to give them more dimension. Just fun!



In Sweet Relief, I made my own thick alphas using my cricut. I simply cut five copies of each letter and glued them together, to get the dimension I wanted, with the freedom to create the font I wanted and use the paper that coordinated.



Whoo Loves U, uses my favourite paper by Kaisercraft. Owls are so cute, and they're everywhere now. I love the look of banners, so I had to throw one in, and do a little distressing, too.



And this is a wall hanging using a few scraps from other projects and a cheap-o IKEA frame. Perfect for my scrap room.

Merry Christmas!!

A few pictures from a Christmas party. Gracie loves Santa! She waves at every Santa in the mall, every Santa decoration, even the Santa on my Christmas tea towel.

More pictures of the girls:

Having a Tea Party





Gracie all packed up and ready to head off to school (yikes! I'm not ready for that!)

Visitors

We had visitors this week, Brad's sister, Tara, and her little girl, Paige. What a nice week! The girls slept at different times, but they had fun while they were awake, and we had a good visit.

These are a few pics from a trip to the waterpark.





Little fish



Gracie showing Paige how the toys work.







Splashers!



Gracie needed a little nap part way through. "I'll just lay down here..."



Trying to keep Gracie warm, I put a swimsuit under her little splash suit.... perhaps I should've chose one without a skirt... it looks a little uncomfortable doesn't it??