New to Ottawa and Snowed In!

Our little family moved to Ottawa from Calgary in October of last year. We thoroughly enjoyed the fall that we had, including the beautiful colours of the leaves that we do not experience in the West. Everyone warned us about the winters in Ottawa, about how much snow you get, and how the cold was “different”- the kind that chills you right to the bone. I chose not to believe them - really, how bad could it be? I teased my mother with pictures of our backyard in November, bragging to her that we still had not had any snow, while Calgary was covered in it. She responded back, “Oh, just you wait”. Being from Ottawa herself, she knew what was to come.

The snow came, and with it came the cold. It really is a different cold. The snow, oh the snow! There was a point in the winter that I looked out of my backyard window to see just white. The snow was so high I couldn’t even see the top rails of my deck!

But yet, it was one of the most fun winters I have experienced. I was nervous with a toddler about what we would do, but we made our own fun. My son experienced true “Canadian” snow for the first time. We built a maze in the snow, and the piles of snow were well past his head - he loved it! We made snow angels, and even had our own sugaring off party, just my son and I. We had picnics on the floor in our house when it was just too cold for even our snow-loving dog to venture outside. We went for winter walks … to the mailbox…. 50 meters away. And being a photographer we took pictures – lots and lots of pictures. We made memories.

I am ready for spring – but I am happy to say that I survived my first Ottawa winter, and actually quite enjoyed it! Here's to no more snow until December!

Alyssa lives with her husband,18 month old son, and excitable dog and is a photographer in the Ottawa area. She loves all types of ethnic food and is always up for an adventure! Check out her website and Facebook page!

Adding your child's art to your holiday cards

This post is from our friends at the Calgary based blog Kids in Cowtown. by Danielle

Do you find sometimes that your child's art would be perfect on a card but is just too big or too cumbersome to have them copy it 20+ times? I decided this year that I wanted our Christmas card to showcase some of my daughter's art. So I devised a way to do so.

I use Adobe Photoshop CS4 at home for photos so took advantage of the program to do my cards. There are several tutorials on the web if you google. I have kind of learned my way around the program in order to figure some things out. I am sure other programs work the same as well. I am also self-taught so there might be easier ways to do this.

Here's my list of supplies:

Cardstock paper (8.5X11 inches)

Blank cards & envelopes (I get mine from Michaels)

Eraser (optional for stamp)

Instructions (I have my full tutorial here):

Scan your child's art into the computer and create a layer so that you can draw over the image with a brush to copy it. Once you have that you can hide the original picture and resize the image to whichever size you wish and print it off on cardstock. Use a paper cutter to cut the sheet into a small image and glue or tape onto cards. Take an eraser and write a message such as "Art by (name)" and then with an X-acto knife cut around to make a stamp. Here's a great tutorial here. Use the stamp with ink pad and stamp message on back of cards for a personal touch!

Here's my finished product so if you're on my list this year please act surprised when you receive it!

Danielle is mom to a 3.5 year old daughter and 1.5 year old son and always looking for fun things to do with the kids. She blogs at Four Days Home.