Ice and Other December Fun

We went to Ice at Gaylord a few years ago. It was a fun experience and we decided that we would try and go every few years, especially if there was a theme we liked. This year's theme was Peanuts! It seemed like a good time to return. And to make it even better, they had it on Groupon in November, so I picked a day and bought tickets for Friday, December 7th.

It was an early dismissal day and Thomas was off from work, but I still had to go in. When I got home, we had everyone load up with all their cold-weather gear. They were all very excited. The Gaylord is a beautiful hotel. It was well-decorated for Christmas. They had a very cool gingerbread display of famous buildings from around the world and lots and lots of Christmas trees.

Some of the gingerbread

We got there around 4:30 and it wasn't too crowded. The Ice sculptures were amazing! They had fewer displays than the last time we went, but they were really well done and we loved walking around. The kids all did the ice slide and that was definitely Luke's favorite part. Unfortunately, my phone (camera) did not like the cold and after a couple of minutes inside it shut down.

The only thing I didn't like was after we left they fed us into an area where they have more expensive activities to sell, like ice-skating and cookie decorating. We had spent $150 for the Ice tickets (and that was with the Groupon!), so it bugged me how overpriced everything was. Fortunately, the kids were all too tall for the carousel and train and the older kids understood that we didn't want to do the indoor ice skating, but Luke was pretty upset.

We debated eating at the Cadillac Ranch, but decided to find something a little easier/quicker. McDonald's it was! And, the McDonald's near National Harbor was really nice. The workers were friendly and helpful and the restaurant was clean. No one had any complaints. I was happy to have breakfast for dinner.

A nice employee brought out all of these smiley. They loved them!

Then, it was on to our next activity--Homestead Gardens near Annapolis. Some of Thomas' coworkers had recommended it, so we decided to try it out. It was really cool! It is a garden shop, but really big and with lots of fun Christmas stuff. They had a massive train exhibit and lots of other interesting things to look at, including a really great Christmas village with a complete scene from Christmas Vacation! Apparently, they also have animals, but not after dark, so next year we will have to go up in the daylight. It was dog pictures with Santa night, so there were tons of people with dogs, which made me miss Gus. My favorite thing was an area manned by the Rotary Club with trees decorated by local charities. They sold tickets for $1 and you put your ticket into a box by your favorite tree (or charity). We bought everyone a ticket and let them choose their favorite. It was really cute and it was nice to have the chance to talk with the kids about some of the different organizations. It was also a good reminder to me that we need to do more service.

Christmas Vacation!

Saturday, we watched Christmas Vacation. Then, I took Kara and Jack to Winterfest at Kings Dominion. It was super fun, but VERY crowded and cold. We considered ourselves scouts for the  family and tried to plan out what to do when the whole family goes back (hopefully on Friday, but the weather is not looking promising). The decorations were beautiful and we had a nice Christmas dinner. However, the shows did not compare to what they have at Busch Gardens Christmastown. Regardless, it was nice and I am really excited to go back.

Sunday, we watched more Christmas movies, including a new one on Netflix that was really cute--The Christmas Chronicles. It was a nice day to be home, with the snow falling outside. The kids went out and played. Thomas installed our new Nest thermostats (purchased on Cyber Monday). He had already installed our new Nest doorbell camera, which is super cool. I made cookies. It was a great, Christmas-filled weekend!