White Christmas Celebrations-

 Canadian Style

Monday afternoon:  After our trip up the mountain for snowboarding lessons we headed back down to the house for a music soiree with some lovely neighbours, Naroumi (Concert violinist) & John (guitarist).  

Neale playing with Mya

We sang our way through the afternoon as well as being entertained by their gorgeous children Aya (3) and Mya (10mths).  Aya also plays violin but chose not to play on this particular day.  For those who are musical- her violin is 1/16!  For the rest of us- her violin is itsy bitsy-teeny weeny!  

Crown of thorns in the manger

In the evening we went to one of the local churches, Vernon Alliance Church, for their Christmas Eve service.  It was just like sipping an ice cool drink on a hot day- refreshing; refreshing to be with God's people (yes, we found some young people in Vernon at last),  hear God's Word in a fresh & visual way by their Scottish Pastor, enjoy watching an Artist worship God through painting and laugh at the corny but well done skit about Christmas needing to be simple.  It put us all in the right frame of mind for Christmas Day.

Tuesday:  Merry Christmas!  

Bob carving his 1st turkey

(Or as Aidan prefers to say) Happy Jesus' Birthday!

What a great day- reading the Christmas story in bed with the kids, opening presents, hot breakfast ('Wife Saver' made by Darlene, our head chef), setting up the Kobos/ eReaders for the kids & Darlene (Hay read a full length book in 4 1/2 hrs!), organising and devouring our yummy, traditional Christmas dinner and relaxing, watching Christmas television shows including Dr Who and lots of Christmas Friends episodes.  

Meredith family Christmas dinner

Wednesday:  Neale & Aidan went up the mountain to ski.  They had the best father/son time.  Aidan came home beaming and Neale says he will treasure that day forever. 

Bob stayed home to have a break from all the festivities and Darlene and I took Hayley shopping!  I was a little apprehensive about going to my 1st Boxing Day sale.  Not a fan of crowds or consumerism (especially the day after Christmas).  But I did need to exchange a gift and Darlene wanted Hayley to choose her own Christmas outfit.  It ended up not being too busy and we enjoyed watching Hayley touch and feel and enjoy her shopping experience.

Thursday:  We're up the mountain today.  I've got my usual place in the lunch room, hot drink in hand, looking out over the mountain watching the little kids skiing on the training slope.  They are so cute.  The waitresses come over occasionally to chat while it's quiet; most of them are Australian. 

I've been checking emails and have found out that my work was broken into while I've been away.  Mixed emotions over about that.  Sad it happened and that it inconvenienced my boss.  Happy I was on holidays at the time.  I'm actually starting to miss all our regular patients.  Neale is so relaxed and definitely not thinking about work.  We are all looking forward to the next stage of our holiday experience as we head to the US on Sunday.