French Lick: Part 2--The Polar Express

After we played at the water park in the hotel we got the kids all cleaned up and put their pajamas on.  We had tickets to the late train so we had dinner (in our pajamas, of course) and hung out for a while until we went to the village.  It was sooooo cold that night (shocker considering that is how the whole winter was) so we did our best to keep the kids warm and entertained before the train arrived.

 Most of our group once we entered the village. 

The village area had tents where kids could write notes to Santa, do activities, visit Mrs. Claus, etc.

Pat fish...love it!!!

Right before the train arrived the kids found a newspaper and the front page read, "Boy comes back on Polar Express and out Santa is real!"  The excitement was too much!

 

And after a really long day it was finally our turn to ride the Polar Express!

Think they are excited?!

The conductor came down the aisle and punched our tickets.  Everything was just like the book and the train actually had a narrator on the speaker reading the book.  Sometimes the conductor would walk the aisles showing the pages of the book. It was hilarious because Kate said she saw wolves in the forest right after he walked by her with the page with wolves on it.

Next up, hot chocolate!  Cheers!

 

The elves brought us our hot chocolate and then the kids danced in the aisles to the song from the movie.  "Hot, hot, hot.  Yeah, we got it."

Before too long the train was headed into a tunnel.  We were singing "You Better Watch Out" and when we exited the tunnel we arrived at the North Pole!  Santa and some of his elves were waving to us.  It was awesome!  Although judging from the picture below you can tell that Kate was a little freaked out and was trying to figure everything out.

 

 

The conductor telling the kids that Santa might be coming on the train!

Santa came and we all got some pictures with him.

Santa didn't stay long because he had to get back to the North Pole. :)  We sang more songs and danced in the aisles until we were back in French Lick.  The girls passed out immediately in the car.  It was an exhausting (and cold!) weekend, but it was incredible.  The Polar Express ride is expensive for the whole family, but oh so worth it.  It was magical!  It is so awesome to experience something magical like that through your child's eyes.  Now I have to convince Jeremy to take us all to Disney.  Ha!  We went on the trip right around Thanksgiving and it definitely got us all in the Christmas spirit!

French Lick: Part 1

So I am attempting to go backwards and continue posting pictures from months ago and try to catch up.  We shall see.

In November we went with a bunch of members from Jeremy's family to French Lick for the Polar Express.  It was awesome!  We stayed at the Big Splash Adventure Water Park hotel.  On Saturday evening we celebrated Tyson's birthday (Jeremy's cousin's son) and ordered pizza in the hotel room. On Sunday we played all day at the water park.  It was so much fun!  Pics below from the water park fun.ri

The kids loved sharing a room together and playing on the bunk beds.

 

I created a monster taking Addie down the big slides!  She kept wanting to go over and over.

 

Well...hi...

Hello blog world, it's me, Laura.  Remember me?  Ha!  Considering the last time I posted it was about Halloween I would say that I am a wee bit behind on blogging.  Christmas was so busy, Jan.-April my work was insane leaving me to work most nights when the girls went to bed and some weekends, Google Picasa (which I use a lot to blog) was giving me some error every time I tried to post and our internet has been AWFUL for a while now.  Oh, and there is this little thing called LIFE. :)  So blogging was the last thing I wanted to tackle, especially since it was so hard to do it.  The good news is we just got AT&T U-Verse and our internet is awesome so I can finally upload pictures quickly!  Woo hoo! 

So now I am faced with the decision of what to do now.  Play catch up or just fast forward 6 months?  I love to have this blog to look back on things, the girls like seeing it and I know I enjoy seeing other blogs so here's hoping I can get back on board. 

Below is a blog post I started in January that I never finished.  It is from two birthday parties in November.  The first was our niece Abigail's 3rd birthday party...Cinderella theme.  The second is our pseudo niece's 1st birthday.  Or as Addie likes to call little RLT her "kinda cousin".  Enjoy!

 

The birthday girl and Kylie.

 

  

Everyone got their hair spray painted.  Let's just say it took weeks to get out of Kate's hair!

Poor Clayton was dressed up like a princess.  He actually didn't mind it too much.

Cinderella even came to the party.  Did you know she arrives on a tractor on haystacks when she comes to the country? Ha!

A tea party...

After the princess party and tea party was over the rest of the family came over for soup, hayrides and s'mores.

I am not for sure what this says about our future.  Rockstar!  Too bad it is blurry because this might make the wedding video one day.  Ha!

I

New day.  New party.  Very different atmosphere. :)

Birthday girl waving.

Notice the pink hair?  She totally looked like Cyndi Lauper.  This is after probably about 3-4 washes the night before.

So cute!

 

Fun with bubbles after cake and presents.

P.S.  Hi Sue G.  Look I blogged!  I'll do more.  Promise. :)