Holiday Parade in Downtown Flagstaff

To top off our trip to Flagstaff, we decided to watch the parade in historic downtown Flagstaff. This of course meant getting there early enough to get a good spot for the girls to see everything, so what better way to get downtown early than to have dinner at The Lumberyard! YUM!

After dinner, we walked a couple blocks to the parade route, and were just in time to see the parade! What fun! And boy oh boy what candy! Everyone was passing out candy and toys! The girls really loved this part!

 Madelyn and Scout

 There were fancy old cars, and firetrucks all decked with lights! It was really pretty cool 

(literally, the temperature during the parade was 31 degrees).

 But the temperature was nothing a little more hot chocolate back at the hotel couldn't cure!

While the kids enjoyed their drinks, Krista and I had a Millionaire Coffee (or two).

Delicious!

Family Photo Op

A Day at Wing Mountain

We were excited to get some extra time in Flagstaff, but we were especially excited that there was snow! We packed all our snow gear, and headed up to Wing Mountain for a morning of fun in the glorious white powder!

DISCLAIMER: No children were harmed in the making of this video.

The girls had SO much fun!

So much fun that they were pooped by the time we pulled out of the parking lot!

Breakfast with Santa

What better way to top off our trip to the North Pole 

than to have breakfast with Santa!?!

 After breakfast we let the girls spend some time in the hotel room (we had adjoining rooms). 

Disney Headbands

Christmas stories and candy canes!

North Pole Experience

This year, we decided to take a new route to see Santa. For the last five years, we've ridden the Polar Express to the North Pole, but we wanted to take a ride on the Candy Cane Express from Flagstaff for a change of scenery!

We checked in at the Little America Hotel where they are gracious enough to allow the North Pole visitors to stay while awaiting their travels.

When you ride on the Candy Cane Express, you have to cover your eyes and ears, and plug your nose to make the trolley go fast enough through the magic tunnel! Madelyn took this very seriously!

The dads were excited to see Santa, too!

 Our elf brought us to the extra large door where we 

would soon get to tour Santa's workshop!

 Madelyn insisted we take a picture of these old-school 

Raggedy Ann and Andy dolls for Grammy!

We got to see the compass where the needle never stops, 

which we all know means you really ARE at the North Pole!

 The girls got to help build toys in Santa's workshop. First they got to dress a teddy bear!

 Madelyn made a cheerleader!

 Then they got to assemble some Nerf guns. And just 

to be sure they worked okay, they got to shoot them at their parents!

 I REALLY want a wrapping room like Santa's! 

Oh my! All the ribbons and paper you could dream of!

 The elves and Mrs. Clause had the kids play a game. 

They had to keep all the toys in the bins as they were tossed down the slides!

 Time for cookies and snowman soup (hot chocolate)!

Then it was off to EU (Elf University)!

 Here the kids learned everything you needed to know about being a good elf:

Then we went to the mail room where the girls wrote a letter to Santa.

After the letters were written, it was time to say hello to Mrs. Clause.

And then of course, we got to see Santa!

After the girls told Santa what they wanted for Christmas, we headed outside by the bon fire. Some of the kids even had a snowball fight with one of the elves!

 One of the highlights of our trip to the North Pole was getting to meet Gizmo, 

a distant relative to Mrs. Musselman! Madelyn could hardly believe it!

 This super duper special TV allowed kids to hold their golden tickets up to

the screen to see a special image. Each ticket had a different image.

Although there were hundreds of thousands of lights, this tree was our very favorite!

Madelyn would have been more than happy to play outside ALL NIGHT long!

Terrific Madelyn!

This week Madelyn was chosen for the Terrific Student of the Week!

Mrs. Musselman has a pirate them in her classroom!

She was so excited! She has been waiting (and waiting, and waiting) for this to happen because being the Terrific Student of the Week meant she got to bring Terrific Teddy home for the weekend! YAY!

We put together a special video about our weekend with Terrific Teddy:

Madelyn was so sad when Tuesday came, the day she had to bring Terrific Teddy back to school. Oh the tears! But she did it. She brought him back. And then, interestingly enough, Terrific Teddy ended up coming home again on Wednesday! She somehow convinced her teacher that he needed a bath before the next student got him. Boy oh boy, she really knows how to work the system!