'Tis The Season

I love the Christmas season and it's even better with kids around!  Nathan was so excited about Christmas this year and thanks to our advent calendar, we packed December with lots of festive activities.  We went ice skating with friends, went to a giant Christmas tree maze, went to a pantomime (a British holiday tradition), decorated gingerbread men, made and decorated Christmas ornaments, and, of course, decorated our Christmas tree.

And all the while, we were serenaded with Christmas music by Nathan.  He learned quite a few Christmas songs at school this year and he constantly walked around singing them.  In fact, he is still singing them and is showing no signs of stopping anytime soon :)  He sometimes even talks to us by putting his words to the tune of whatever Christmas song is currently in his head.

Nathan was a camel in his nursery school nativity play.

Ice skating at the Natural History Museum.  What a difference a year makes.  This year, the boys got real ice skates (not the kind that fit over their wellies) and made several attempts at skating on their own (well, with the penguins), rather than just being pushed around by the daddies.

Warming up with some hot chocolate after ice skating.  And, some biscuits - they all have their hands raised, because Chris just asked "Who wants a gingerbread man?" :)

No ice skating for these two, but they had fun watching their older brothers.

Decorating gingerbread men.

The finished product. 

Nathan had so much fun decorating the tree this year and he did a really good job.  He put up most of the ornaments and I didn't even have to move very many of them around :)

This was at the pantomime we saw--Cinderella.  These binoculars may have been his favorite part of the pantomime.  Although, he really liked the show too.  He even made it through all 2 1/2 hours of it!  And, afterward, he told me he wanted to go see all the other pantomimes!  I'm not sure what he liked best - being encouraged to yell and interact with the actors, the live ponies on stage, the fake snow pumped into the theatre, or the 3-D portion of the show.  Or, it might have been the popcorn and Christmas biscuits he munched on during the show :)

Ready for the 3-D portion of the show.

We also went to see Room on the Broom at the theatre.  He loved seeing one of his favorite books come to life.  And, we found this cute little reindeer in China Town on our way to lunch after the play.  He really loved all of the Christmas decorations all over the city this year.

We went to a giant Christmas tree maze this year. 

And, this is what we found when we made our way to the very middle of the maze.

Somehow we forgot to pick up the ornament that he made at school this year and he was very upset about it, so we made our own ornaments at home with cookie cutters and salt dough and then painted them and put them up on our tree.  That seemed to make up for the lost school ornament :)