Ho Ho Ho!

What a busy holiday season! Between hosting and attending potlucks and housing guests, our schedule has been loaded!


A big house means lots of decorating! Fortunately, we know someone with a flare for this sort of thing... Mommé came to help us decorate our tree. And the price was right! ;) Thanks a million!
Quite a few presents under there already!

Jeff's brother, Scott, arrived from Calgary on December 20th. He has friends in Penticton and a new snowboard, so he has been spending his time back and forth between the two places. Unfortunately, he had a minor snowboarding injury to his tailbone (who knew that branch would be sticking out when he went over that log???), so he has been welcoming ice packs and Robaxacet.


Shi arrived on Christmas Eve after a fairly treacherous drive through the snowy mountains. We had a lovely dinner at Dad's, along with Kathy's kids. After dinner, the pool tournament began. We enjoyed Scott putting pressure on his brother/teammate and Jeff's slipper-flipping-jig-of-success! Dad and Shi stayed up until the wee hours of the morning to determine the ultimate champion. (Dad took the title again this year!)


We headed back up to Dad's first thing in the morning to open gifts. Scott was pleased to receive the goggles he had asked for (modeled here by Jeff):
As Scott made himself comfortable in Dad's chair, he decided to reveal his latest manly act. Here's the close-up:Yes, that is a snowman on his big toe. "It takes a real man to get that done." How ever you want to justify it, buddy!


Dad and Shi pause in gratitude for all the wonderful gifts. Thanks everybody!
We packed up our goodies before heading over to Mom's for Round Two. Her tree looked so lovely and we were all eager to see what Santa had brought!
We watched excitedly as Mom opened the gift Shi bought her with her winnings in Vegas.
Shi got one for me and for herself. For some odd reason, Mom seems to think hers is better!

Jeff was delighted to open this mini Frankenstein from the gift exchange we do on his side of the family. (Thanks, Uncle Gavin!) You may recognize this Van Halen replica (though smaller here) from our video shoot during the Long Way Across this summer.(http://dumash.blogspot.com/2009/07/thunder-creek-road-somewhere-in.html)


Shi and Mom enjoy the scrapbook pages from the albums we made with our new electronic scrapbooking software, Creative Memories. Thanks to Kristine for inviting us to the workshop! To all you scrapbookers out there, this program is awesome! We haven't spent too much time with it, but given our schedule, it sure beats measuring, cutting and gluing! I much prefer to drag and drop! There are some pre-made pages, but you can customize as much as you like! Here are a couple of examples of the pages we made:


After opening what seemed like neverending gifts, Jeff went to pick up Grandma and Grandpa while we got brunch ready. Delicious!
After polishing off his plate, Grandpa was ready to get at their gifts! Grandma looks great in the pashmina Shi picked up for her in Vegas.

We took our afternoon break back at our house. Here's Scott lounging uncomfortably on the couch as we opened gifts from him.
Doesn't Sporty Spice look smashing in his matching t-shirt and jacket ensemble?

Here are the two Dumass Elves in front of our tree. The hats are a tribute to you, Flo! And Jeff got his hippopotamus, not a crocodile, for Christmas. "... only a hippopotamus will do..."
As I was nursing a cold, I stayed home while Jeff, Shi, Mom, Grandma and Grandpa headed to Uncle Steve's. I had a good nap and was ready for yet another delicious meal, back at Mom's. What a day!
Jeff and I decided to host a gathering for family and friends on December 28th. Great food, great company and great leftovers! I told Auntie Leigh she has to convince Jeff to buy a house this big so we can have gatherings like this all the time!When it came time to go, Jack was not a happy camper. Running, crawling and hanging on to the door frame didn't work though... Daddy knows how to get this sack of potatoes out to the car!
We wish you all a wonderful holiday season and all the best in 2010! See you next year!

Last Week of School

Christmas is coming! Here are a couple of my helpers, decorating the tree that was donated to our class.

I made it through Grade 7 report cards!!! It was kinda tough to learn the process for the new curriculum, a new computer system, a new Principal... but I made it! I had a lot of help from Nikki, my teaching partner. We kept avoiding talking about the fact that my contract would be up at the end of December and that we wouldn't be working together anymore. So, we kept busy with a bowling field trip:

Here's Devin trying to get a strike, with a little help from his CEA, "Mrs. A"!

A lovely group of girls taking a break to check their scores:
Here's "Evan" (yes, that's the secretary's son that you heard so much about!) posing in front of some of his keen, polite and helpful classmates.

We followed up the field trip with a movie in the afternoon and Craft Night in the evening. (We were in charge of cookie decorating. Hello chaos!!! Thank goodness Jeff came to help us!)

One morning while going through the inbox on my desk, I came across a letter one of the kids had handed in. I opened it, saw "Dear Parents... Mrs. Dumas'... surprise party..." and quickly closed it. I handed it back to the student and said "I don't think you're supposed to hand this in to me!" He was quite embarrassed and I had to let Nikki know. So, I was pleasantly "surprised" with a "going-away party" on the morning of December 18! The kids were so sweet and I received some lovely cards and gifts. Nikki's sister even baked and decorated these gorgeous and delicious cupcakes! Purple! The kids had a dance that morning and another movie that afternoon. This gave me some time to clean up the classroom so it would be ready for the teacher returning from her mat leave in January.

I felt bad about all the work Nikki had done to organize the surprise party because I found out in the second last week of school that there was another position opening up for me! While I am sad to say goodbye to (most of) the kids in my Grade 7 class, I am looking forward to staying at the same school and taking on a new age group! I am so fortunate that my Principal put my name in to cover Charmaine, the French Immersion Kindergarten teacher, while she is on leave for about six weeks! 11 students, no behaviour issues, no IEPs... her best class in 19 years!

The only con in the list is that it is a half-time position. I was quite worried about having to wait for substitute calls for the afternoons, getting Jeff to drive me there over the lunch hour... Fortunately, my Principal decided to create a position for me! "We'll find the funds somewhere!" she said. Excellent! So, I will be doing Learning Assistance in the afternoons. I've got two Grade 1 English reading groups and then Grade 2 French Immersion support! With almost no marking (just tracking progress), no supervision and prep time once a week, I should be able to leave school at a reasonable hour! Jeff is happy about that!

Depending on whether Charmaine is ready to come back after six weeks (she copied enough day plan pages for eight!), I will have three weeks as a substitute before March Break (which is TWO WEEKS here, by the way!). Depending on when Robyn, the Grade 1/2 French Immersion teacher, is ready to have her baby, I will hopefully get that contract for at least April to June. Things are looking up! Especially now that I am officially on PAID Christmas Break!

It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas!

Santa comes to the O'Connells!

Like Robyn doesn't have enough to do, she planned a Christmas party at her house for the families she has met since Presley was born (baby groups, etc.). Although Jeff and I aren't exactly part of that group, we still got to come, eat some delicious food and help document the event.

Presley's "Stranger Danger!" complex kicked in the second she was placed near Santa. It was quite entertaining, but it took her a while to come down from that freak out. Here she is, screaming "I love Santa!" (not!).

Robyn's sister, Kristine, brought her gang along and captured some very sweet shots with Santa. (Eric, Gracey, Wesston, Ty, Kristine)

After the kids had their turns, Jeff and I took advantage of the free lap and told Santa our wishes for this Christmas.

Setting up the Bryce's Tree!

How fun to be back in the same city as the Bryce Family and get to be around as they pull out their Christmas tree! The men did the physical labour (moved the TV and put the branches in the stand)...... but they weren't doing it fast enough for Vaughn and Avery, so I played the temporary tree and got decorated!
The kids dug through the boxes excitedly to find their favourite decorations.
So what if the lights aren't on yet? I want to hang this decoration NOW!!!Thanks for letting us take part in this fun event!

The Bjornson Girls Present Phat Betty

In order to say "Thank You" and "Merry Christmas" to their "Friday Night Girls", Mom, Auntie Leigh and Auntie Gaye ("The Bjornson Girls") decided to throw a party at the Yacht Club and invite a local singer, PHAT Betty to be the entertainment. (http://www.phatbetty.com/) (Apparently the acronym stands for "Pretty Hips And Thighs"!)

Jeff designed this amazing invitation:Here's Auntie Leigh taking the Food Bank donations at the front door:
The place was nicely decorated. How festive!Auntie Gaye, Mom and Uncle Steve enjoying their "Hpnotiq Martini".
We were surrounded by family...... and friends that are just as close as family!
There was a small stage for PHAT Betty and her band...
... and an even smaller dance floor for the crowd. Do you think that stopped them?!?! Not a chance!
Thanks for a great evening, Girls!