December Days

I decided that I should do a post on December before it is over! Having been so busy, the very last day of December will have to do. This is just a highlight of all the beautiful things I've seen in this month.

All these snowy pictures are from earlier in the month! 

The sunset I took a little while ago. It was so pretty, and I couldn't pass up the opportunity.

This was about 90 minutes after the above picture. 20 minutes later, it was dark.

I so love beauty, and to take pictures of it is an amazing privilege!

Have a Happy New Year! I look forward to posting more in 2019.

Our Family Christmas Day!!

We normally do our family day on New Years, but we have friends (!!!!) coming over New Years Eve/Day. So we did it on Christmas Eve.
Here are some pictures from opening gifts:

Victoria (as you can see from the shirt :))

Me (Alicia)

Moriah

Cassia

Ellia

Joel

We each drew names and had to buy a present for that person we drew. Victoria got Ellia; I got Moriah; Moriah got Cassia; Cassia got Joel; Ellia got Victoria and  Joel got me!

Here's what each of us got (Victoria's gifts to Joel's gifts or oldest-youngest):

Victoria gave Ellia a lego set, something she really wanted

I gave Moriah a doodle pad, chocolate with her middle name first letter on (since there wasn't an M), and a pencil case

Moriah gave Cassia a book of patterns to color, and candy (Lifesavers)

Cassia gave Joel a Lego Star Wars set and a Penguin chocolate

Ellia gave Victoria a can of beans (LOL), a notepad, pens, and something else that I don't remember

Joel (so sweetly) gave me a dress (!!!!) and M&Ms. I have been wearing a lot of dresses (never pants!) lately and Joel wanted to get me one! Mom said that at Value Village (we went there first) he was picking out dresses that I would never be allowed to wear! And then she helped him at Walmart to get one!! I love the dress though!!!

I came up with the idea to get Mom her favorite chocolates, Lindts (or Lindors actually), Cassia thought it was a great idea, so we both paid half! Mom ate them all between Dec. 24-25. She loves that type of chocolate!

We had fun on Christmas Eve morning! Then we ate snacky food the rest of the day, not junk food, though! We watched Lark Rise to Candleford, a new TV series that we've been watching on DVD, well, it's actually new to us, not on the TV. 

 On Christmas Day, while we had supper (in the basement), we watched Santa Claus Is Comin' to Town, and then Dad told us to turn on Lark Rise to Candleford (BBC drama), since the cartoon was lame, to him though, I thought it kinda silly. Even though Dad doesn't exactly like Lark Rise to Candleford, he makes fun of it, which can get kinda annoying.

Although, he does like it better than When Calls the Hearts, which he made up his own title for that, and least, I think he does!

Have a great holiday season!!!!!!

Merry Christmas & Happy New Year!!!!

Alicia Marentette

Feast of the Nobility

Just under a week ago, on Thursday, December 13, I attended on of the coolest parties ever, my Omnibus Class's "Feast of the Nobility." I attend a class on Wednesdays called Omnibus. It has been going for 5 years and is taught by our pastor. It focuses on a lot of things, but especially the Christian worldview. It is a lot of fun, and I have learned so much from it!

This semester (my first) we learned about medieval history and the Crusades, so to celebrate that we held a Feast of the Nobility, complete with an archery tournament, a feast, a fighting tournament, and dancing to commemorate.(Courtesy of Dad for the pictures)

All Thursday afternoon I cooked and my feet were so sore! But it was all worth it! Around 6:30, the guests started coming. All of us got changed into our medieval garb. The girls had beautiful dresses and the guys had cool medieval clothing as well. Then we sat down and introduced ourselves. (We all had to have fake medieval names. It was actually kind of a flop because we never used them, using our own names out of habit! ;))

Our picture. Our class is 16 people, but those are the guests included.

I'm right behind the monk!

Sitting down and introducing ourselves.

After that, we headed outside for the girls archery tournament. In the cold. And dark!

Some pictures of us freezing!

Eating. The table was so far apart we were passing our plates to the left and right to get food. That also meant that a lot of people were reaching! This food was all cooked by us, by the way.

Dancing later. The dancing was amazing!!! It was so cool.

Me watching!

Class picture

All us ladies!

Cleaning up after

It was a wonderful evening. Dad and I were home by 11, and after talking with Mom we collapsed in bed! It was so great to organize this all. I love going to Omnibus! Come to think of it, we're having our Christmas party soon.....maybe I'll bring my camera along! Until next time, Merry Christmas!

Happy Birthday To Me!!!

Yes, you heard right. It's my birthday today! As of 10:52 tonight I will be fourteen years old. I really wish that I had fourteen pictures to share with you of all of my years, but I don't. So instead I thought I'd publish a small little post of only writing. Endure with me!
In my short life I have lived in 4 houses, had 6 siblings, and completed 9 years of school. (I'm in grade 10).
A few notable things about me are:
I've written a play
I've gone to Atlanta
My favorite things to do are read, write, and spend time with my cousins and siblings.
I am the oldest of 6 children, 17 grandchildren, and 41 great-grandchildren.
So there we go. A few things that maybe you did know about me, and maybe you didn't. One last thing, though....
Since I am working now, I am not home. So tonight our whole family (all 8 of us) and Pake and Beppe (our grandparents) are going out for supper to a pizza place called Quo Vadis. It is going to be so yummy! I haven't been out for supper in ages!
But, I'd better get back to work.
Have a great day!
And I will upload some pictures soon, promise!

Long Point with our Friends

Ever since 2017, we have gone camping with our friends who live in Grimsby. We only see each other about twice a year, sometimes more. So, it's always special and very fun when we see each other.

Grounders or Sandman were our 2 most played games. On that small little playset with a really annoying telescope-type-thing that you keep hitting yourself on, I know from past experience. 😉

Ellia and Marike on the teeter-totter

Moriah

We tried playing hot potato with a bean bag, Dad used his phone for music.

We walked along the beach, maybe 1 mile one way, playing that we had all the deadly diseases and the worst possible things. That's how we walked so far!

Oh, we also pretended there were sharks in the water.

Us older children played a game & the younger kids blew bubbles and we all ate watermelon

Waiting

We had so much fun!! And we did this year too. The water is always behind our campsites.

-Alicia

Thanksgiving Camping

We went camping on Oct. 5-8, Thanksgiving weekend. It was booked and we learnt that when you go to a new campground, arrive when there's daylight. We drove past our campsite (maybe) 3 times. 😒

Cassia, Ellia & Joel loved climbing the at-least-50 ft. tall tree

Talking around the fire and watching the younger children

A gate on the Carolinian Trail at the Pinery

Dad made us get wet by shaking almost every tree he found along the trail

Victoria, Mom, and me in our plaid shirts

Jumping off the log

Climbing up the hill

Mom took a picture of all of us on the staircase

Once we got back to our campsite, Dad made pizza pockets in the rain, and I took pictures between running backing and forth with the pizza pockets.

After lunch, we would have a nap-of-sorts in our trailer

We love taking weird pictures ;)

Tree climbing

At the beach

Back at the campsite

Sunday @ the beach

Moriah & I threw rocks in the water

I thought this was pretty cool. The top is our trailer cozy (Christmas) lights, and the bottom is the fire

Last campfire

We had a great time, and are planning on doing it again. It rained a bit, but otherwise, no big puddles. That was the final 3 days of our 2018 camping adventures.

Looking forward to when it's warmer!!!!