Surprise Visitors!

The original plan was for Tim, who spent Christmas in New Brunswick, to take a bus back to Ottawa just before he takes the plane back to South Korea. As the weather was looking nice after Christmas, Nanny and Pappy Zinck decided to drive him to Ottawa and thus stay with us for a few days! What a nice surprise!

They arrived just before supper on Boxing Day and we had a nice dinner of left over Turkey with all the fixings! This was one time that nobody complained about leftovers!

Happiness is a nice meal!


Although the visit was short (only 2 nights) we had lots of fun. Poppy helped Matthew and Tom build a Crystal Radio from a kit. Pappy also helped Anna put together her "Polly Pocket" toy.

Here is Pappa and Anna working hard on the Polly Pocket toy (note the instruction sheet on the floor ;-)


Here is a picture of Nanny and Pappa with their favorite grand kids (and a bear)!


As Tim's first flight on his long trip back to Korea departed the Ottawa airport at 6:15am, Tom drove Tim to the airport, leaving the house at about 3:45am.. Yawn! Nanny and Pappy left Kanata at about 7am and hoped to get home before the next snowstorm hit.

It was a very nice visit and we were very happy to see everyone. We now have a few days of relative peace and quiet to get ready for New Years Eve!

Merry Christmas!

We would like to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas!

So they hurried off and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby, who was lying in the manger. When they had seen him, they spread the word concerning what had been told them about this child, and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds said to them. But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart. The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told. Luke 2: 16-20


Here is our family in front of our Christmas tree on Christmas Eve. (gheesh.. the tree looks little behind me! ;-)



So far, we have had a great Christmas day! Matthew was awake well before 5am, but we were able to keep everyone upstairs until about 7am.. amazing!

Here is a picture of the kids just after they opened their stockings:


Santa brought Anna a "Littlest Petshop" set and Matthew received a large Transformer toy. For the family Santa gave us a Monopoly Junior game and the DVD Ratatouille.

The big surprise for all this year was that we bought the family a Nintendo Wii! For all that know, these are amazing video game machines that are in very high demand and almost impossible to find.! Ebay says the day again!

As usual, we received way to many gifts and were spoiled rotten by our family. Many thanks for all the great gifts! We all love the games, books, toys and all the clothes!

We were done opening our presents by about 8:30am and then had breakfast and a short rest afterwards. We called my parents, my grandparents and then Alana called her family.

The kids opened many of the gifts and started getting right into them. Here is a picture of Anna painting the jewelry box craft that Uncle Ken gave her. What a perfect gift!


After getting dressed and cleaning up the house a bit Auntie Leah and Uncle Ron were over for a visit. We showed all of our gifts and then settled to the basement for a few games on the Wii! I think that the tennis and boxing games were the biggest hits. This video game system uses wireless, motion sensing controls for the game action. In order to play the games you need to stand up and swing the controller like you would a tennis racket, etc.

Here is a picture of Alana "boxing" against Matthew. Leah is on the side giving moral support ;-)


Here is a short video of Matthew and Anna "boxing" with the Wii.




After Leah and Ron headed home Dad took the turkey out of the oven and started the veggies for Christmas Dinner. It will be a quiet dinner as we have no guests (first time in a long time!), but that is fine.. more leftovers for tomorrow!!!

That is all for now.. we will post more pictures later this evening.

Merry Christmas!

Working on Dec 24th!

Tom had to go into work today for several meetings. As Matthew was off of school today, and he had all of his Christmas shopping done, he decided to go to work with his Dad.

As you can see from the picture below, Matthew fit in rather well and was on the computer and taking part in conference calls like a pro!


Matthew also helped out in a presentation. Here you can see him talking about the finer points of the application server installation in the Testing Area of the Operations Zone :


Future civil servant? You decide!

Matthew and his dad quit a bit early today and finished up some shopping on the way home. For some reason Matthew had a great day and is looking forward to going back to work again.

Rain !

The temperature has warmed up today and we are getting lots of rain. Check out our Family Weather Blog for all the details!

Tom

Kids Christmas Party!

Today Alana took Anna and Matthew to the HomeDepot kids Christmas party. It was held in a meeting/party room at one of the local groceries stores. They had a "Cooking class" theme in which the kids baked and decorated sugar cookies! What fun!

Here is a picture of Matthew and Anna with their "bakers hats" on:



They also made and decorated Christmas ornaments. Here is Anna and Alana showing off their handiwork:



And of course, what Christmas party would be complete without Santa!


Ho Ho Ho! Only a few days to go!!!

Blizzard!

We are having a BIG snowstorm today. Check out our Weather Blog for details and pictures.

Tom

Uncle Tim's Visit

Tom's little brother Tim flew in from Korea Tuesday evening for a 3 week visit to Canada. After a voyage of nearly 30 hours he was quite happy to arrive safe and sound. Due to last minute flight changes his luggage did not arrive until 2 days later, but that is the risk with international travel.

Tim's plan was to spend about 1 week in Ottawa visiting here and then he is off to NB to visit Mom and Dad for Christmas. He will be returning to Ottawa just after Christmas and they flying back to Korea before New Years day.

It took Tim a few days to get used to the 12 hour time differnce and I think it took him a LOT longer to get used to the cold. He arrived during a winter storm and the daytime temperature has been around -10 since he got here. Brrr.. welcome to Canada!

It was great to have Tim here for a few days! The kids really enjoyed the company and fought for his attention every day. Anna loved doing anything at all with Tim, while Matthew really enjoyed having someone to play Nintendo games with.

Here is a picture of Tim and Matthew during a quick break between games of Lego Star Wars:


and here is a picture of Tim, Matthew and Ann just before bed time.



It was great having Tim in Ottawa and we are sure going to miss him when he heads home!

Family Day

Alana had the day off today so we decided to make it a "Family Fun Day". We all slept in a bit and then headed out for breakfast to our favorite spot here in Kanata: Rockin' Johnny's Diner.

After a great breakfast, and one to many coffees, we jumped in the van and headed downtown to visit the Canadian Museum of Nature.

This was the first time I had been to what the kids call "The dinosaur museum" since they completed the fist phase of a massive renovation/renewal project and I was very anxious to check it out.

We started on Floor 1: Fossil Gallery. It was full of amazing fossils, re-creations and amazing diaramic displays. Very impressive!


Here is the family standing in front of the fossil remains of a massive fish. Anna was very impressed with the fish's big mouth ;-)


Here is Anna standing next to one of the "not so scary" exibitions.


It was a very impressive exposition with plenty of fossils that one could touch and examine up close.

Next we went up to Floor Three: Mammals! It was very interesting as well.

I loved the moose display. These things are HUGH!!

Here is an example of a splendid display in which kids could pretend to be "seals" that the Polar Bears were looking to eat. Matthew is a master at impersonating a seal. ;-)



After finishing up with the Mammals we then moved up the 4th Floor and the Bird exhibits. It was arranged in various ways such as size/shape of the birds and then by habitat. We really enjoyed it but for some reason did not taken any pictures. Go figure!

On the way out we check out the gift shop in the basement. I picked up a couple of books. One one Wolves and another which is a field-guide to Eastern Ontario animal tracks. I also picked up a CD with animal and bird sounds. Very cool! Matthew and Anna bought small mineral samples to add to their rock collections.

Well, that is all for now. We are looking forward to returning to this Museum once the renovations are complete and the additional exhibits are open.

Tom