Festival of Lights 2014

Friday morning, December 26th, my mom, sister, Tate and I  had a lazy morning.  My mom, Tate and I were heading down to Galveston for the Festival of Lights at Moody Gardens in what I hope will become a tradition with our two sets of family friends and their 5 year olds.  We all went together last year as well.

We got out of the house a little before 11 and made our way south.  I realized we were going to arrive quite early as check-in wasn't until 4pm.  So I decided to take Tate and my mom to Galveston's Pleasure Pier.  It was a tad more expensive than I wanted to be, but I went ahead and went for it :)
I rode most of the rides with Tate, his favorite being the rock n roll one that spun us forwards and backwards at speeds humans shouldn't be thrusted about.  But he LOVED it!  Thus we rode it twice.  Seriously nauseating.  His joy was worth every dry heave.

LOVE how happy he is!!!

We ate lunch at Bubba Gump's.  I forgot how much I loved that movie.  It was almost nostalgic being in the restaurant, not because of the restaurant, but because of the memories of the movie and that time in my life.  

We went ahead and went to the hotel about an hour early; thankfully they had our room ready.  Even better it was the kind of hotel that takes your car and helps you with your bags which made Tate happy :).  (So funny...when we checked into our hotel for the Polar Express Tate asked when we pulled up where the man was to take our car and luggage.  Believe me, small town Texas does not offer hotels that have valet service!).  But Moody Gardens most definitely does!

 We got settled into our room and headed over the the Iceland ice sculptures for their spongebob exhibit.  Tate has never seen spongebob, nor have I for that matter.  But I still know that show is in no way acceptable for children, but I thought the ice sculptures would be cool.  At 9 degrees it was cool for about 5 minutes.  And then it was just ass-cold.

We made our way back to the hotel and had a couple of s'mores outside courtesy of the hotel.  THEN we had dinner :).

Finally, our friends arrived!!  I took Tate upstairs to get him changed into his pjs as I anticipated him falling asleep during our walk through the lights.  Then the kids just ran around and had a blast.

Then we made our way to the Festival of Lights....it was wonderful to walk through with some wonderful friends, my mom and just enjoy the night.  Simply lovely.  

Love how these boys love each other!

 They did the story of the Nativity in lights...It was just beautiful!

Cold happy kiddos!

The Polar Express!

The bell still rings for all who believe! 

me and my mommy!

Tate fell asleep as I expected, and I finished the walk with our friends.  They went out to dinner, while my mom, Tate and I went on to the hotel room for an early night.

Tate slept well, me not so much.  He is still so prone to falling off beds that I worry constantly about him especially in new places.  As always he was up with the chickens, so I let him eat some breakfast in the room and play a bit, then we headed down to get breakfast for me and my mom AND to let Tate meet Sunny, the holiday penguin.

Our friends slept in...they usually don't rise until 9:30 or 10.  As an aside, it's really hard to 'travel' or vacation with people who are on such different schedules than you are.  We are early morning, on time type people.  I like to get to events etc when they first start to avoid crowds and not have to wait terribly long.  And they don't.   

Anyway, I got our stuff packed and opted to take Tate back to the Ice Sculptures so he could go with G.  I took the kiddos down to play in the playground while R and B got dressed, and my mom opted to stay in the room and wait for us and read her book.

Bestest friends!!

What a lovely way to cap off our Christmas season.