Letters to Santa

By Kamerine I know it's still November but I've been thinking about Christmas. I'm thinking of great gift ideas for friends and family, and making a wish list of my own.

The kids are thinking about Christmas too - as soon as they saw snow falling, they started asking about Christmas. Is it Christmas yet? It's going to be a long month.

A fun tradition is writing a letter to Santa, one that I may start this year with my kids. We've done Christmas lists, where we sit down and ask the kids what they would like for Christmas. We get a mix of things they do actually want, and things that they see when they look around.

But back to letters... I'm happy to tell you that Canada Post has a deal with Santa. Write up your letter to Santa and drop it in any red mailbox around the city, no stamp required. Santa's elves will get your letter to the North Pole.

Use the address below, include your return address, and keep the Christmas spirit alive! To get a response in time, make sure to mail your letter by December 17th.

SANTA CLAUS

NORTH POLE H0H 0H0

CANADA

The Santa letter-writing program is an employee-led volunteer program where current and past employees volunteer their time. It encourages children to read and write letters, and helps teach them about the postal system. For more information visit the Canada Post website or contact Media Relations at 613 734-8888 or email medias@canadapost.ca.

What's Your Take on Halloween Candy

Every year, my kids go out trick-or-treating and get bucket-loads of candy. I think that half the time, it's not even about dressing up and having fun. It's about how much loot they can score. And that means Halloween is a bit of a dilemma.

After going out and getting all this candy, how much should I really let them eat (and not feel like a horrible mom)? On one hand, it's their candy and they should be allowed some treats; but on the other hand, do I really want them eating a treat every single day until June? I'm pretty sure I don't.

When my girls were little, the Halloween Fairy (or "Switch Witch") used to visit about a week after Halloween and trade the leftover candy for a small gift. That worked pretty well but now that they're older - not so much.

How do you navigate the Halloween conundrum with your kids? Do you take away their candy after some time has passed? Dole it out piece by piece? Or do you eat it all yourself? (like I have to try very hard not to do!)

This mama needs some new ideas.

Send Us Your Halloween Pictures!

Halloween is coming and there's nothing cuter than kids dressed up as monsters, ghouls, princesses, pirates and minions. We'd love to see pictures of your little monsters as they get ready to trick or treat. Send your photos to kidsinthecapital@gmail.com and we'll post them here!

Stay tunes for some cuteness.....

No Carve Pumpkin Decorating Ideas

My favorite season of the year is fall. I love the changing leaves, the cooler temperatures and the need for funky looking blazers. And, of course, fall means Halloween. I love carving pumpkins and roasting the seeds. It’s a tradition we've had in our house for a long time. But when my girls were small, carving pumpkins was a tricky and scary ordeal. So, we came up with some other alternatives that our girls could help with that didn't involve sharp knives.

Candy Pumpkins

Instead of carving faces in this Jack-o-Lantern, we would use candy instead and glue or pin it to the pumpkins. It’s a great way for kids to be able to decorate the pumpkins themselves - and a sweet way to do it. From experience, hot glue guns don’t work so well - it melts the candy but craft glue or push pins will do the trick.

Potato Head Pumpkin

If your toy box was anything like mine, the Mr. Potato Head pieces are always floating around. Using the pieces to create fun and goofy faces is always a fun job for the whole family. The pieces go in fairly easily by twisting back and forth.

Foam Pumpkin

You can get those packages of sticky foam pieces at any craft or dollar store. You can get them in all different shapes and sizes to decorate your pumpkin. Even the littlest fingers will have fun helping with this.

Painted Pumpkin

Paint, glitter glue, puff paint and even glow-in-the-dark paint can all be used to decorate After you’ve painted, you can spray glitter paint to make the whole thing sparkle.

Do you have any other ideas? We’d love to hear them.

Back to School Traditions

I love the idea of establishing a few special back to school traditions to start things off on a positive note. No matter how old your kids are, going back (or starting) school can be a bit overwhelming. I’ve had the chance to look online and I found a couple of cute traditions that are pretty neat:

• Take the traditional "back to school" portrait up a notch by pairing it with a list of likes and favorites. How fun to compare from year to year! Here's a cute way to do it!
• Drawing a kiss or special note on your child’s hand so they can take a look at it throughout the day.
• Back to school breakfast in bed. Anything goes.
• Special notes in your child’s lunch box. This one can go past the first day.
• Make a yearly time capsule by getting a few favorite items, recent photos, current likes, etc. and put them in a container to hide away until the next year. Each night before the first day, pull it out to see how much everything's changed. Then make a new one.
• Hang a sheet in the back yard and have a night-before-school backyard movie night. Here’s how to turn your iPhone into a movie projector.
• First Day Back dinner extravaganza. At the meal, each kids gets to talk about their day then as a family setting some goals for the year, discussing things to look forward to and other things of that sort.

I love all these ideas and will likely pick a few to make this year’s back to school a memorable one for all.

What will you do to celebrate back-to-school?