Train Town

One of the fun things we went to do over Christmas break was to check out a place downtown called Train Town with Karen, Wyatt, Logan, & Micah. After seeing it I'm kind of surprised we never went before it was really cool. It had lots of trains and buttons the kids could push to make things happen. Like turn on lights or make the train go.

The Christmas village and train.


It also had lots of cool old train related signs and memorabilia all over the walls.

Titus climbs on a bench out of an old train station. Would love to have that.

Grace loved the purple train.
Titus pulls the train whistle.

Jeremy and I were just talking the other day about how we love to go downtown to go out to eat or walk and window shop or go the coffee shop. It kind of feels like you've left Hannibal and are on "vacation" without going anywhere. We were pondering why we don't do it more often. But I guess then maybe it wouldn't feel like vacation. Its definitely fun to be a tourist in your own town every once in awhile, thats part of the charm of living in Hannibal.

Christmas Tea

One of the fun Christmas activities we enjoyed was a Christmas Tea with our extended family. Our "China cousins" were back for Christmas so we took full advantage. The girls were VERY excited they had been counting down the days till they saw them again. My Aunt Di planned a gorgeous tea party.

The girls opened their gifts. A silverware set that included chopsticks. Very cute.




The kids enjoyed lots of different treats.
Wish I actually had some pictures of us ladies and not just the kiddos. We will have to work on that for our next tea. It was a lovely party. Now I just need to send the package to China with their Christmas gifts that I forgot to bring to the tea. Hoping the excitement of getting a package will make up for my forgetfulness.

More Christmas...we really packed it in!

Our Christmas Day schedule was packed FULL. After Christmas morning at our house and church we headed to my Grandma Holst's house for more presents and family time.

Grace & Felicity (My cousin Sarah's daughter)
Then that evening we went back to my parent's house for Christmas with my siblings.

Grace was very excited to receive her Leapster since Faith got one for her birthday.
Saying thank you.

After opening gifts we ate all the yummy leftover appetizers, visited, and watched a movie. It was a perfect evening. That night I got the flu. I was so thankful it held off till after Christmas day. The next day we headed home and spent several days on the couch recuperating! (I seriously hate the flu at the holidays, but was so thankful our kids stayed healthy.)