In our home, winter mornings are slow. After filling our bellies with warm oatmeal we snuggle together on the couch and slowly wake up to stories share aloud. Even as my children get older we still hold onto our winter morning ritual. Below are some of our favourite...
It's time to say farewell to November, and to autumn. Even though winter officially begins on December 21st, I always think of December 1st as the start of winter fun and festivities. Over the last month we've been gathering and organizing all our winter...
This winter we are trading in our nordic skis for alpine skis. Now that our children are a little older we are hitting the slopes to learn some new skills. My husband is very excited about alpine skiing this winter. He doesn't enjoy nordic skiing as much as I do, and...
Today is the epiphany, the last day of Christmas holidays. Our visitors have returned home and we are slowly rediscovering our daily rhythm. After all the excitement of the last couple weeks my children have become somewhat off-centered. For a few days our home was...
In the last week we have been blessed with lots of beautiful snow. Temperatures have stayed consistently close to or below freezing with little snow melt and long term predictions suggest colder weather for the coming weeks. It seems that the snow will stay, at least...
Big fluffy snowflakes have been drifting down from the sky slowly covering everything with a nice layer of fluffy, sticky snow. The perfect kind of snow for rolling into snow people. Even before I got out of bed my two older children, still in pajamas, were making a...
We awoke to a dusting of snow this morning, our first of the year. My children were thrilled and attempted to build a snowman and go sledding on our small hill. They soon discovered, however, that there wasn't quite enough snow for those activities. Regardless, it was...
Instead of grumbling about the cold dark winter days, which is far too tempting at times, we have been making an effort to embrace the things that make winter special for us. When I start listing these favourite things in my mind I must admit that there are actually...
Starting in November the Okanagan Valley becomes blanketed by low lying clouds, a phenomenon commonly known as the Okanagan Snake. As a result winter in these parts then to be a cloudy and mild affair. Sometimes I find the cloudiness suffocating, and I am...
The last couple days has brought one of the biggest snowfalls that I have seen since we moved here. Locals say it is the biggest they've seen in years. In the space of forty-eight hours we have shoveled at least 30 centimeters of snow off our driveways and apparently...
Late last week a cold arctic wind came blowing through the valley. We packed up our van while being pummeled by cold slanting rain and then made our way up into the mountains on snowy roads. Our friends organized a lovely weekend family singing retreat with...
This morning Teddy crawled into our bed for a snuggle. He snuggled for a bit then got up and looked out of our bedroom window. Immediately he took note of the white landscape and proclaimed in his very loud voice "ss-no! ss-no!". My two other bleary-eyed children...
My parents-in-law live in a cozy cabin on a lake away from town. It's a little oasis out here and the atmosphere is calm. Their front deck faces south and gets toasty warm when the sun shines, so warm that I wish I had packed a pair of shorts for lounging in. While...
I awoke this morning to find a great big blanket of snow covering our area. While some people are probably grumbling about this significant snowfall, I am relishing it. The valley tends to be very overcast in the winter and that can be a downer for sun loving people...
This morning we filled our van with snow gear, skis and children and drove up windy switchbacks to the cross country ski course. It was going to be my children's first lesson in skiing. They've been skiing before but my eldest has always been reluctant to...
Earlier this week our learning circle gathered to make felt lanterns for the winter solstice. It was an exciting and wet activity, next time I will remind everyone to bring an extra change of clothing. Our lanterns turned out a little misshapen with some thin spots,...