Getting in to the Christmas Spirit

Every little thing we do that is related to Christmas the kids think is great.  Here is a light park we went to:

This was before Tommy's birthday so he was pretty excited to see a cake for him.  I was really glad we came here because they had a manger scene & somehow we forgot to explain to Tommy the real reason for Christmas so it was a good teaching experience (and humbling for us!).

 We also went to a little Christmas party at one of the colleges near here.  When it was Tommy's turn to go see Santa he frantically started digging in our diaper bag & dug out a train.  Then when Santa asked what he wanted he shoved the train in his face & didn't want to say a word.  Finally I coaxed him to say "train please".

They also had donuts & crafts for the kids.

The last thing they had was a bounce house that the kids could have spent all day on.  I was surprised how well Whitney did with all the big kids going nuts everywhere.  That boy behind her took her in as his own baby & watched out for her. It was cute.

Last weekend was our ward party and it was "A night in Bethlehem" where they had the gym lined with shops & asked everyone to dress up as well.  We shopped the shops for food & toys, ate dinner on a blanket, & watched a play about the birth of Jesus.

I was surprised that everyone dressed up.  

Here is our family dressed up (my mom was here for the weekend)

 My mom wanted us to open the gifts from her while she was here.  The kids thought that was pretty great, especially Whitney since she had to see Tommy opening all of his birthday gifts.  Now the last 4 days Whitney keeps grabbing presents from under the tree & trying to pass them out so we can open them!

One of the churches in our town does a live nativity & it was pretty amazing.  It had 14 immaculate scenes starting with Adam & Eve, then an angel visiting Mary & Joseph, Jesus's life, Resurrection, etc.  Tommy loved the live animals.

Here we are about to enter through the gates of Bethlehem. 

 The kids liked being able to pet the animals.

 ...and pretend to shop in Bethlehem.

 My mom was overly impressed with the camels & kept excitedly wondering where all the animals came from.

 We also went to a light show to music last night & the kids once again didn't want to leave.  I am continually amazed how much Whitney loves everything, is excited for Santa, & keeps saying "ho,ho,ho" every time she sees a Santa.
I was really hoping to add some snow pictures into this post, but the weather man keeps predicting wrong :/  I really thought it might tonight as we had big wet flakes, but once again it turned into rain.