Magic

This weekend was, for lack of any better words...incredible.  Sometimes it seemed as if I was living the life of my imagination years ago, where we would sit on the living room and play Uno, and sit in front of the fire and just cuddle, and bundle up and play in the new fallen snow, and bake Christmas cookies while listening to Christmas music.... because we did ALL of these.  It was beautiful.

But the Queen-Mother of the weekend, was when we took a ride on the "North Pole Express".  It's a train in a town south of us that is used for all sorts of different events, but at Christmas, they turn it into a re-creation of "The Polar Express". 

The inside of the train was even decorated with garland and lights, and on the speakers in the train played the story of "The Polar Express".  The train "drove" to the North Pole (I found out it actually went around in some circles, the windows were covered with a clear contact paper so you couldn't see clearly out of them), and then finally arrived (at a large warehouse where the train was parked inside).  It was then when it got even more awesome...

There was hot chocolate and cookies for everyone, and Santa had his own traincar.  It was just, magical. 

The boys each got to sit on Santa's lap, which was a miracle in itself.  We have not been able to get Tyler within a mile of any Santa his entire life.  He has been terrified of him since he was a baby.  Connor loved it, was ready to pose, and then actually turned into Ralphie from "A Christmas Story" when Santa asked him what he wanted for Christmas.  He got all embarrassed, and needed a little coaching.  I could just see him with the thoughts in his head like Ralphie did... "What did I want?  Why can't I remember?  A football, yes, a football.."

Again, I was totally amazed when Tyler sat on Santa's lap.  For the first couple of seconds he did look like he was going to have a brief anxiety attack, and then calmed down and was actually able to tell Santa what he wanted. 

The boys had a great time.  They ate lots of cookies, drank lots of hot chocolate, played with trains, Connor made a craft (Tyler wanted to play more with the real train sets they had there), and then we boarded the train again for them to take us "back to Iowa".  It was just amazing watching the boys faces to see how they took everything in. 

Then Sunday brought another cold, cold day, so we found things in the house to keep us busy.  We made Christmas cookies in the afternoon, which was fun, and even more special was watching to see how the boys decorated them.

The snowman below was one of the better looking guys of the bunch.  Tyler made him all by himself.  Pretty cute, if I must say...

And then the boys ate many of the cookies they were decorating.  You can tell what happens to Connor when he eats too much sugar.  Yes, it's like a crack addict when that kid gets into it.  He had only had a couple cookies in this picture.  It got MUCH much crazier as the afternoon went on...

Tyler wanted me to take a picture of the bell that Santa gave him.  Again, it was so neat.  Just like the movie.  He will be talking about this for years, and has already give us instructions (multiple times) about cleaning out the fireplace the night before Christmas, and we even have an ornament on our tree that is a "key" for Santa, in case he can't fit down the chimney, he sends an elf down to get it and bring it up to unlock the door.  (Tyler made that story up himself.) 

Tyler then went over and placed it on the small Christmas tree we have in the kitchen (yes, we have two trees - I would have more if I could!).  It was just an incredible weekend, and every year when others are just wishing it would hurry up and get over with, I am trying to suck every last minute out of Christmas that I can.  Every song, every tree, every decoration, and every special moment that is a memory that we will keep with us forever.