keeping up with the Christensen's

2011 in a quick glance

2012-01-10T13:32:00.000-08:00

January

Ringing in another year with my wonderful husband

And Best Friend

Took the kids to 5 guys for the first time

They LOVED it

February

Ty turned 5 and had a Transformer birthday at home

So many friends.... so many gifts..... so much excitment

Family Day bowling game

Candice and Kyle get married in Calgary

Greg and Don Cherry at the heritage classic

Greg and jamie at the game wearing the hats I made them

March

Tammy's shower for Domanic

Ty rollerblading at Morgan's school family skate night

Look at her go

St Patty's Day menu : green pancakes, green milk and cookies

so cute

Morgan ready for her first flames game

April

Welcome to the Christensen clan Domanic

Famly +Cole day at the zoo

Easter in Banff with the Christensen clan

SQUISH YUMMMMMMY

Right after our 3 out of 4th be quiet warning

Morgan at Banff springs easter brunch

Kipper had 2 cancer lumps taken out

May...... the start of CAMPING

Morgan Birthday
June

Welcome baby Kaira

Godparents Kim and Pat

Ty graduated from Preschool
July

Took the kids to the Calgary Stampead parade

We saw Kate.... really we did

Christy's Staget at Belaros

Aug

Christy and Trevor get married

Ty, Cole, Mike and Greg go to Monday night raw

September

BACK TO SCHOOL

Grade 3

Kindergarten

Trip to B.C to see Nana and Papa C at there trailer

Ty is a beaver

October

welcome Cash to the family

November

Allisons birthday scavanger hunt

December

Christensen family Christmas party

Morgan all ready for her winter ball

My birthday party at the wink and owl

I got a SLR camera from Greg and the kids

Ty at the school christmas concert

Morgan was a dancing snowflake

Christmas morning

Greg and his dad after breakfast

In Olds for Christmas

Mom and dads tree, it was amazing

NYE, mexican dinner

Ocupy

My wonderful husband

Adult only camping weekend

2011-09-23T10:23:00.000-07:00

Milo and Bella in the back of the truck heading out to the campground

Shannon and Jay and the kids joined us for a ton of camping this year.

Mike trying out the minute to win it game

this is the only way to cook when you are camping

Grossy went for a 4 hour nap so we thought we should go and wake him up

This is how Greg helps wake up mike ;)

hey look it is Allison :)

We had such a good time at the adult only weekend except getting in trouble Sat morning for the boys Friday night sing-a-long. The campground hosts told us that we can only come back if we bring our kids lol. They are such great people and made our summer of camping wonderful.

Mike's Birthday

2011-09-23T09:41:00.000-07:00

So we all went to Bolero's for Mike's birthday dinner. So yummy if you have never been go like right now :)
http://www.bolerocalgary.com/

The birthday boy

Shannon and Jay, I love the face Jay is making :)

wow that is all I can say

Nicky and half of Jamie

So I am always trying to get a pic of our friend and Mike's wife Allison but she hates to have her pic taken..... so the next few pics are of Allison well bits of her ;)

This was one of the meat boys..... they are so much fun and play along well with everyone

There is nothing better than going out with friends for a nice dinner

Meet the new member to the Christensen family

2011-07-27T13:46:00.000-07:00

Gregs cousin Kyle and his beautiful wife Candice finally blessed our family with another girl :) She is the first one born in 8 years and only the 4th in 26 years.

Kaira Anne Hua Christensen was born on June 7th at 11:45. She was 7.2 lbs and 19' long
We got to finally meet her at her dedication at the church.

They picked Kim and Pat as the Godparents. Very good choice as they are amazing people

Candice's parents came in from Tiwani for 6 weeks to help the new mom and dad with the baby, and to get in some quality time with her before they went back

You could not have asked for a sweater little girl to join the family. Congrats to Kyle and Candice we just love her to death

Mr. Domanic is the newest little man to the Christensen clan and he is so darn cute I just love his little hat :)

A tribute to the kipper dog

2011-05-03T11:16:00.000-07:00

As a lot of you know our poor lab Kipper has cancer :( We had 2 of the tumors taken out but was sad to find out yesterday that there are 2 more and one is the size of a soft ball :( It breaks our heart but we are going to have to put him down before it gets so bad that he is in a lot of pain.
I wanted to do this blog to share some of my fav memories of our puppy.

Mr kipper hanging out in the backyard

Kipper and Mika out camping

Having a big shake after a swim in B.C

Kipper with one of his many chew toys, he loved to chew everything including my down duvet and many many stuffed animals. The kids learned quickly not to leave toys outside because he turned them into chew toys as well

This was when we first got him 4 years ago

He loves to lay on the trampoline, the picnic table and the fire pit cover

Jumping on the trampoline with Morgan

They had to stop and have a cuddle

I took this the night after his surgery to take out the first two tumors. He was so funny that night he kept bumping into the walls and our bed

Kipper and Bella enjoying the sun. She is sure going to miss him

Such a pretty boy

Kipper my love you have given us 4 wonderful years and we are so sad that we are going to have to say goodbye to you. We love you so much and we will never forget the love you have brought into this family.

Sarah, Greg, Morgan, Ty and Bella

Banff part 2-- the funnier side of the family

2011-04-26T10:47:00.000-07:00

you know how you take 30 million photos and there are the few that are funny but not blod worthy well here they are.
ENJOY

A weekend in Banff with the Christensen's

2011-04-26T10:33:00.000-07:00

Greg's wonderful grandparents sprung for a weekend in Banff for the whole family.

We headed out early Friday morning after droping the dog off at our friends house.

After 20 min of driving around to find parking we were able to hit some shops on the main street. The kids and I loved the sunglasses

Next was dinner at Squish

Sandwich shop hopes to bring something new to Banff

Curiosities about the sandwiches at Banff Avenue's newest sub shop are mounting — how do they taste, what do they look like — but they are soon to be squashed, because Squish is tentatively preparing to open its doors on Saturday, Jan. 15. However, in the meantime, owner and sandwich aficionado Greg Piwnicki has all the answers, but really, what it all boils down to, is there is just one thing everyone needs to know.

"We're going to rock your world," Piwnicki laughs.
But, when The Crag sampled the super-secret-recipe Squish specialty, the Montreal smoked-meat sandwich last week, it was no joke.
After having to cut the sandwich in half (twice) it was still a mouthful, and a tasty mouthful at that. And Piwnicki takes his pride and joy sandwich very seriously.
"If you don't do it properly, it's a joke, and it won't go over well," he said. "We don't claim to have invented this, we just present it, but we won't serve anything that isn't perfect."
His definition of perfect includes "being able to see your meat and cheese in your sandwich" and "value for money."
Serving up chicken club, roast beef, Ruben, salmon bagel, tuna, veggie, and jumbo prawn sandwiches, with sides of chips, pickles, coleslaw, soups and salads, along with Danish pastries, croissants, New York cheesecake, along with old-fashioned milkshakes, pop, hot chocolate, and coffee, Piwnicki is creating a sandwich empire, all in the $10 a meal price range.
"The idea is for people to come and have fun, and enjoy themselves. I want people to feel comfortable, to leave happy, and to not break their bank," he said.
A Bow Valley resident of 15 years, and full-time carpenter for 37 years, Piwnicki has decided to switch gears.
"I want to have fun, and meet new people," he said.
Sandwiches aren't anything new to him though; he knows his favourite deli in any given state — Jerry's Famous Deli in Studio City, Cali., is the top shop — next to Squish, of course. With ketchup, mustard, and relish colours as the main palette in the sandwich cellar, as well as a busy city street mural against the main wall, Squish is a cozy place to sit down and share lunch with a friend. Not to mention, have a sandwich too.

"The sandwich is so huge, you have to squish it to get it in your mouth," Piwnicki said.

This is a post I found about squish. It was that amazing, Greg and I shared a Ruben and the kids shared a Nathan hot dog the total bill was 21.00 not bad for banff. If you are ever in Banff please try this place you will not be disapointed.

This is half the sandwhich minus a few bites

Greg thought it was so good

My son is going through this really wierd bad smiling phase. It drives me CRAZY

So after lunch we went for a drive to see if we could find some wild life, we were driving around and Morgan said I saw one so we turned around and found this wonderful elk. Great eye miss Morgan. We were able to get so close we could have touched it, we didn't because I am a giant chicken but I was able to get this amazing phot

After that we headed to the hotel/condo where we were all staying. We yet again stayed at Douglas Fur and again it was great.
http://www.douglasfir.com/u/specials.phtml

The kids in the condo with there new sticker book from Brian and Alex

Sat we all headed into Banff to do somemore sightseeing and lunch. We went to Tommys bc we had heard it was so good..... it was not but we had a great time and the server was really good since 20 of us showed up at once

Wayne and his "glass" of rum

After the trip into Banff we came back had a sleep went one the water slides then the pool, dinner and then it was off for more visiting. Pat was telling some jokes and making us laugh so hard that we ended up getting three notices to be quiet, after the 4th and final "be quiet or we will ask you to leave" we helped to "old" people to bed and headed up to the "party room"

Wayne came up to party with us young kids

My husband..... nothing but class ;)

After a late night we got up early for the great easter egg hunt

As I was loading my photos I realized that I have no photos of Morgan hunting eggs, she is just to darn fast for me

After that we headed to Banff Springs for brunch

These choc bunnies were amazing.

Miss Morgan fav thing

The easter bunny came to brunch as well

Kyle and Hale --both of them got sick over the weekend :(

Kyle Candice and the newest (still cooking) girl to join the family

Greg and I took the kids for a walk after brunch, they had to stop and have a little rest as they were so full

We had an amazing weekend with an amazing family.

Thank you again Grandma and Grandpa

Stay tuned for Banff part two

A day at the zoo

2011-04-24T14:52:00.000-07:00

We took the kids and Cole to the zoo on a warm Sunday

Cole eating lunch. he was so hungry he ate all his sandwhich and half of mine

My beautiful baby girl

My little ham

Greg with his mouth full of juice, can i time a picture or what :)

After lunch we headed to look at all the kids fav animals

Mommy's fav animal. The baby was so cute

Morgan wanted to see the hipos and we lucked out because they were outside

Ty wanted to see the Lions, as usual they were just laying there

Greg loves the monkeys. The baby was so active that day and put on a great show for us
Poor cole wanted to see the tigers but by the time we finished playing at the park they were to tired to walk over to where they were. We promised next time we would go to the tigers first

One last shot of the very tired children. Cole was a sleep before we got out of the parking lot. The kids had such a great time

color me green

2011-03-17T15:07:00.000-07:00

St. Patties day use to mean green beer and time with friends. After you have children it is all about green food and fun times with the kids.

I wanted to make shamrock cookies for the kids so I went on the hunt for a cookie cutter.... guess what no one has any st. patty day stuff :( So even after she passed away Aunty Jean came to the rescue when Deb found a shamrock cookie cutter in her collection :) So Last night I made the cookie dough and then first thing in the morning I rolled them out and made them for the kids. After a lunch of green pancakes and green milk we decorated our cookies. After that the kids went outside in the +6 weather.
It was a great way to spend st. pattys day

He is such a cutie

Mama we love green pancakes and green milk

and decorating cookies

Happy St. Patricks Day everyone from the Christensens

I found my new love

2011-03-07T12:13:00.000-08:00

On Tys birthday we went to our very first auction ( well I have been to auctions before but cows are not something I am interested in). We were going to go with some friends of ours but a mix up happened and we ended up on our own. It took us half and hour to get there and it was cold, but we got our number and headed into the auction barn. Little did we know that there would be three auctioners going at once and for newbies it was very confusing. But we found an older man to help us and we sat down to just watch. I was very scared to bid on anything b/c I did not want to do it wrong...... but then they had an outdoor hockey rink that started at 100.00 and kept going down down down then when it was at 5.00 I though ok here is my chance to get my feet wet and put in a bid, so I held me card high in the air and made my bid. Well guess what i won!!!!!! It was a 250.00 skating rink that I got for $5. Well then I was bit by the bug and wanted to bid on more things. I did not win anything elce but Greg did bid on what he thought was a humidafier and got it for 25.00, well it turned out to be an air purifier and we were thinking we over paid for this thing that we did not even want :( So after that I bid and won some cookies and we went and paid and headed home with our new skating rink and air purifier. As soon as I got home I went on line to see how much we could get for this air purifier and low and behold it was a 199.99 so score :) we tried it out and thought ya we really like this we will keep it.
So now that I have found my new love of auctions I want to go all the time, I told Greg I need a second job to pay for all the wonderful things that I want to buy.

Its all about the family

2011-02-22T11:42:00.001-08:00

So it was family day here in Alberta so we decided to go bowling with the kids and some very close, almost family, friends. After bowling we went back to Jamie and Nickys for a bbq and some play time for the children. I wish every monday was family day :)

Morgan kicking some butt... she did better than mommy

Ty's best friend Cole taking his turn

Ty did very very well he also bowled better than his mommy

Watching all the pins fall down (don't you love Gregs shoes?)

Morgans best friend Ashley rocked it out

I am thinking we will have to do this more often as it was so much fun. Maybe adult 10 will be next on the agenda

Gregs most amazing day

2011-02-21T09:57:00.000-08:00

Greg was lucky enough to go to the heritage classic with his friend Jamie

Greg got all bundled up to head off as it was a little cold that day. It was -11 and the sun was out but as the day went on it cold colder when the sun went down. He had on two pairs of long underwear two underarmer shirts and a sweater and his Heritage classic jursy, but the best was his matching hat that I made him to match the jursey ;)

ok I can not figure out how to rotate this darn picture oh well

So they headed to the bar for a few pregame drinks and then hoped into a cab down to the game. The boys hung outside for a bit before the game and 5 min after they went in they ran into no other than... wait for it...

DON CHERRY

Then it was off to find there seats and watch the game

Here come the snow birds

The flames played hard and kicked some Montreal butts, the final score was 4-0, Kipper is the only goaly to get a shut out in outdoor hockey history

Greg said beside the day he married me and the days his kids were born this was the best day of his life

Our baby turns 5!!!

2011-02-21T09:37:00.000-08:00

I can not believe it our baby boy has turned 5. I do not know where the last 5 years have gone..... here is a look back at our little man

He has grown up so much in the last year
This year we had a birthday party at the house for Ty with 10 of his little friends from school. They played with all the toys and ate cake and watched Ty open all his gifts. It was a great time.

Ty got a transformer cupcake cake. It was very good

More wrestlers from mommy and daddy. He now has 10 and 3 wrestling rings, I think he is set for a while :)

On Tys birthday we went to an auction and had a blast, more on that in another blog, them we took Ty to his favorite place.... MCDONALDS for his birthday dinner. Then after that it was off to meet baby Cruz Janelle and Illich's baby, he was so darn cute and Ty was so excited to see his friend Illich. After we were done loving up the new baby we came home and watched Marley and Me and headed to bed. All in all I think Ty had a wonderful family filled birthday.
Happy 5th birthday to the most wonderful little man in my life. Mommy loves you more everyday

Ty and Morgan had a sleepover

2011-01-16T14:37:00.000-08:00

Both the kids had a sleepover on Friday night. Morgan had her best friend Ashley over and Ty had his best buddy Cole. It was an early night for all of them as they were all very tired, they were all asleep by 8:30. They made up for it in the morning as they hit the floor running at 7:00. They we getting hungery so we made bacon and star wars pancakes, both went over very well. Ty and Cole both ate two pancakes each and the girls were very excited to pick which star wars charater they wanted. All in all it was a wonderful sleepover and the children were amazing. Morgan and Ty were invited to go for a play date and sleepover at Nana Debs house and had a wonderful time watching movies and playing their new board game that they got for Christmas. Morgan also got busy in the kitchen making brownies, she loves to bake :)
Greg and I had to take our yellow lab to the vet as he has an open sore behind his one ear, he had to have it cleaned out get a shot and is now on meds to help with the infection. He was a good boy when she was cleaning it out and is will to take the meds as long as it is in a peice of cheese.

We spent Sunday just hanging out at the house, cleaning and getting ready for the week a head.

good day to bake

2011-01-11T11:51:00.000-08:00

It is a cold day here in Calgary -27 with the wind chill. So I thought it would be a great day to bake. I started at 8:30 am and did not stop till I ran out of butter. I ended up making peanut butter cookies, as they are my husbands favorites, choc chip cookies and oatmeal choc chip cookies. I also made rasberry muffins. The house smells so good right now.

starting 2011 with the best man in the world

2011-01-06T13:30:00.000-08:00

Greg and I spent New Year at the community center with our friends. We enjoyed prime rib dinner and dancing to follow. I think the highlight was when my best friend was teaching everyone the triller. After we were done there we went back to our friends house to play a quick game of poker, which eneded at 5:00am, so not so quick.

The kids spent New Years in Olds with my parents where they ate lots of junk food and played with the noise makers.

We meet up with them on the January 1st and brought them back for their new years day party. They had such a wonderful time with their friends eating more junk food and playing games. It was a wonderful way to welcome in a new year.

I have decided to only make one new years resolution this year and that is to spend more time with friends and family.

Hope you all had a wonderful holiday season

first ever blog

2011-01-06T11:13:00.000-08:00

So as the new year has started I though maybe I should start a blog.

I knew it was coming as soon as we found out that our second child was a boy.... I have become a hockey mom :)
Ty started last night with the grassroots hockey club. Him and his best buddy Cole are on the same team and we very excited to play. They spent a lot of time on there backsides but as the practice went on they got better and better. Ty is now able to skate for more than 2 seconds with out falling and has mastered getting up on his own. We are all going out tonight to practice some more and then back next Wed. to play with his team again.
Tonight I am going to try and get some video of him skating as I was only able to get a very short one yesterday as the batteries were dead in the camer ( I know I should have taken extra).