It's December!

Ah, Thursday, the first day of December. How did that happen?

It was another early release day, which means all I do is drive to/from school and I feel like no one is actually AT school. Anyway, Jason came home with this whole bucket of Christmas goodies from his friend Gianna. He was quite pleased.

Tyler came home with this math book that his friend Sammie had made for him. That boy does love learning. He was quite excited to do extra math. Ha, ha.

Being that it was the first day of December, the boys broke into their advent calendars. This is the first year I had purchased them, but Trader Joe's had them for $1 each, so I figured why not.


Afterwards my mom watched Ty so I could bring Jason to his PT that he normally goes to in the morning. Afterwards I picked up Ty so he could go to a "reading rumpus" at the library.

On Friday before school Tyler helped me get our Spirit of the Holidays gift wrapped up so I could drop it off to Jeanne.

Then it was off to take my mom to PT and run some errands. That day was yet again ANOTHER half day, so the boys killed some time playing pirate outside.

That evening we went to Bob's house and helped him decorate his tree.



Afterwards we went over to Maple Shade's holiday festival thing. They had a parade (small one, but a parade is a parade and the boys are fans), tree lighting, music, hot chocolate and candy cane shaped pretzels, ice carving, story reading, a petting zoo, amongst other stuff. Tyler was tired or something and had a bit of an attitude, but they had fun. Jason LOVED the animals and Tyler was totally captivated by the ice carving for some reason.









We finished off the evening by driving around and looking at Christmas lights. I must say, Maple Shade has Medford Lakes beat in that department!

On Saturday morning we went over to Home Depot for their Kids Workshop. I used to do these fairly frequently with Tyler, but then I guess we sort of forgot about them. This was Jason's first ever one and he was so excited to get his little apron. They made and then painted snowman napkin holders. They also got hot chocolate (which burned even my tongue) AND Santa was there. I was shocked when Jason agreed to sit near Santa. It may have had something to do with the candy canes he was handing out. When Santa asked what he wanted Jason answered "balls" and Santa even understood him. Too funny!





We grabbed some quick lunch in the car before heading over to Garden State Discovery Museum to take advantage of their promotion (when you buy a year pass you get an extra 4 months for free). My mom gave me her credit card and she purchased that as a Christmas gift for the boys. Very cool! We got there literally just in time for a small performance from the Voorhees Ballet of a few scenes from The Nutcracker. Then of course we had some play time in the museum.








That evening we went over to Jeanne's to meet up with her and her boys to walk over to Trading Post Way where the girl scouts where supposed to be having an event with food and such. We found barely anything happening so instead we packed in my car and went to McDonald's to eat sundaes while we killed some time. When it was late enough we went back to Jeanne's and walked over to Oaks Hall for the annual Christmas Eve tree lighting. The evening starts off with cookies and hot chocolate before the Lions Club President (or maybe it's the mayor? I should know this. Hmm) gathers kids to sing Christmas carols, followed by the reading of Twas the Night Before Christmas. Then everyone bundles up to go outside to count down to the tree lighting of the tree on the lake. Meanwhile sirens start up as Santa makes his way down Stokes Road in a firetruck. Jason was in utter fascination and was waving to him. So cute. Afterwards they go back inside and stand in line to see Santa. After Tyler's turn Jason was willing to climb up there on Santa's lap with Tyler!