It's beginning to feel a lot like Christmas...

December has arrived with a Ho, ho, ho!  Last weekend, we had an exhausting two full days of Kid's Christmas Parties.  Much bouncing on Castles, climbing, riding ponies and race cars and everything in between.  Plus the visit to Santa for a gift and a hug.  I live for December.  The magic of Christmas and Santa just makes me smile.

Of course it isn't always smiles and joy.  It's also summer.  So it's hot, and sticky and we still dress up and do the "Winter Wonderland" thing on occasion. So everyone is exhausted after an hour or so.  I've had one of those weekends.  One with Christmasy plans abound, but for a short time.  I wasn't at my best, but then neither were they.  A bit of guilt that with the fun, they'll also remember my angry face or worse the way I shout when I'm not best pleased.


Saturday we headed off on a bus to Auckland for our annual (4th year in a row) visit to Smith & Caughey's to see Santa and his enchanted forest.  S&M have a fantastic window display every year and so it's my #1 start of December activity.  

 

The bus trip to Auckland was not too bad.  Audra refused to sleep and things were a bit squashed.  I think next year I may drive to Manukau and then travel from there instead.  Would be a shorter trip on the bus for us then.  Once we got onto Queen Street it was a quick walk up to S&M.  The whole way there though I did need to keep reminding Leandra to stay with me.  No fear, that girl. 

Once we got to S&M, I knew the line was going to be long.  So we decided to just go and see the shop windows first.  They were amazing, as always and based on Grandma's Kiwi Christmas by Helen McKinlay and Craig Smith.  I read the story out loud for the girls as we visited each scene.  At one point I had stopped reading and Leandra turned back to me, saying "read it, read it".  It was nice to know she appreciated this part of the ritual and though she was flitting everywhere, the story was important to her.

After the story we joined the queue for the enchanted forest.  It was a long wait but Leandra and Audra made a few friends in the queue and they played fairly happily with each other.  Once we got up to see Santa, Leandra was so excited and she told Santa all about her soft toy dog and Audra too.  Audra was not quite sure about the bearded man and so unfortunately, many of her photos involved her in full cry.  Once her sister joined her for some photos, she was fine but there was not a smile in sight!

Later we were joined by my friend Bridget and we got to meet her baby.  Leandra is besotted with all babies, and so Sophie got some extra attention.  Even Audra was fascinated by the smaller human.  We had a great time wandering through Albert Park and back to the bus stop.  But by the end I was exhausted and looking forward to sitting on the bus.  Little did I know, it would be an hour and a half late.  When it arrived the air conditioning wasn't working and so I sat in the bus with two exhausted children sweating and uncomfortable and grizzling because of it.  Then as we came into town, the bus broke down.  The driver wasn't even sure he could open the door because the electrics had gone!

Thankfully the doors were opened, and we escaped to the cool night air.  Then and only then, I was finally able to laugh.  The sight of Doug and the car coming to the rescue made me smile broadly and then we looked to see if anyone else needed a lift.  We took a guy over to the Uni and he was so thankful as he thought he had an hour long hike to make before our offer.  It felt good to help.

We got home and ate dinner and the girls managed to get to bed just before 10pm.  Leandra was up with the birds on Sunday.  I couldn't believe it.  Audra was up not much later.  I was so thankful for the extra sleep that Doug let me have.  Later this afternoon, I took the girls into town for the Santa parade.  We set up along the road, for prime viewing.  Then Leandra started to play up.  I ended up putting her in a timeout and we lost our spot.



Wow! Wee!

It wasn't until the parade got to us, that I remembered the reasons we go to these things.  Leandra stood up on the stroller, and hugged into me excited to see each float.  Audra was in my arms and all I could hear was "Weee!" as the dancers twirled and "WOW!" as drums were beat and costumed sights astounded her.  A streamer cannon went off with a loud bang, which resulted in huge fat tears.  But she was quickly consoled and back into the fun of the parade.  I hope that they remember today and yesterday, for all the fun had.  I know I will forget the tantrums (both theirs and mine) until we are in it again next year. 

Funky Monkeys!