Leading up to Monday January 4, 2016!

We have been playing lots of Ludo with our 4-1 game board from Ikea. Fina has won every single Ludo game she has played. It is kind of freaky!!!

On the 31st, we had a calm day at home. She kept saying to everyone (in person, or on Facetime with extended family) "see you next year!" and having a blast with it.

On January 1, she went outside to play with her good friend K and they were out from about 6 til 8pm. They had so much fun playing outside in the snow in the dark. With sand toys, shovels, digging, singing, etc.

Here she is building a snow castle with her sand toy.

On the 2nd, we went to play in the forest with our good friends. The morning was lovely and sunny, but we went in the afternoon when it was cloudy, but still lovely and not too cold.

Here she is sledding with Acorn the chipmunk (wearing his loom knitted scarf we made last year),

as we waited for our friends to arrive.

On Sunday January 3, we finally got to go out for sushi after church. Fina has been begging for a long time to go for sushi.  One of our favourite places in Winnipeg is SushiJet, they have an all-you-can-eat type of deal, where you order off the menu (not buffet).  Yes, she did actually choke on an avocado roll (actually choke as in that I had to stick my fingers in her mouth and pull out the offending seaweed strip that covers the roll right out of her), but she still had fun!

Oh yes, that is Acorn enjoying some miso soup.

We also swung by our mall to make a return, and Fina got to spend a little bit of a time in front of her favourite huge fireplace with real flames. (It was nice (!) to see the mall still had their Christmas decorations up - though they started with them in November - in this seemingly take-everything-down-on-January-1st protestant world. Christmas isn't over yet, people! It is funny how Christmas has taken over advent and then people just give up.)

On Monday January 4, we headed out to the forest with our friends J and J. It was a beautiful, sunny day. Fina's disposition was less than sunny (!), but still it was a lovely time out.

On our way, we stopped at our town's nativity scene. Fina loves it.

Then, after her first day back to school after the Christmas break, we had our friend K over for a "party" that she and Fina planned out. There was lots of dancing, fancy costumes, a fancy dinner menu planned out by Fina and lots of fun to be had. Then we went out in the 50km winds and got in some more outdoor play time, in the dark, with their matching reflective vests.