ICE at the Gaylord!

This year we got into the Christmas spirit early (Nov. 19th to be exact) by going to a show called ICE at the Gaylord Texan resort/hotel.  SO FUN!  They have the inside of the hotel DECKED out with beautiful bright Christmas decor, and then you enter into a huge FREEZING room, kept at 9 degrees (yes, you read that right), so that their city of ice stays frozen!  We've never been before this year, but every year they have a different theme for the kids, and this year was MADAGASCAR Christmas!  Before you go into the ICE exhibit, they give you these huge blue parkas to put over your coats and hats.  BRRR!

 

Before we hit the ice, we warmed up by the fire in the lobby!

Decorations at the entrance!

 Almost ready to go in!

 Everything behind the kids in this picture is 100% ice!  SO cool!

 More ice!

 Madagascar characters made of colorful ice..

 The kids even went down an ICE SLIDE!

 We went with our sweet neighbors- this is their daughter with Lilly..

 Melman!

 So glad Me-Maw came with us!!  At this point our fingers were really about to freeze off!

 Marty the Zeebra!

 This was a beautiful Nativity scene made of ice at the end of the exhibit.  The picture really doesn't do it justice.. TOO cool.

 After the ice, we even got a balloon snow man and candy cane!  (Never again- they popped and we had MAJOR MELT DOWNS!!!!  But it was fun thes ONE time!) 

 Look at this neat life-size gingerbread house! 

I hope we can do this every year- the kids loved it and it was a fun way to start off the Christmas fun!

Halloween in Colorado!

At this rate I'll have Thanksgiving and Christmas pictures up by Mother's Day :-/  In my defense, I had so many problems uploading these pictures!  I had to redo several times!!!  AAAAHHHH!!

We had a great time visiting Colorado at the end of October for a WHOLE WEEK!  The kids did great in the car.  We broke up the trip again and that seems to do the trick.  We made it just in time to be at cousin Emily's 9th birthday party (YAY!)!

We also had fun carving pumpkins!

Poor Uncle Tom had to carve Lilly's very intricate beauty and the beast design- he was a trooper!

Here is the witch Daddy carved.. not bad!

 

The weather was great, so we decided to spend a day in Estes Park!  The kids enjoyed some huge ice cream cones..

 

We did a lot of fun playing in Me-Ma and Papa's backyard!

 

Miss Priss!

pics out of order- Rocky Mountain National Park in Estes..

 

Cousins eating popcorn and watching cartoons!

 

We spent Halloween Trick-or-Treating in Aunt Pam's neighborhood in Broomfield!  It was the best neighborhood for the best treats!  Tons of kiddos walking around with their families, and so many of the houses were decorated. It was so neat!

Our beautiful ballerina and super tough Batman!



About to set off on foot with all our cousins!

Papa got in on the action with his scary old man mask!

More playing in the backyard.  This was too cute of Nate and Matty!

We went to a fun fall carnival at Me-Maw and Papa's church!  The kids played games for tokens and got their faces painted!

 

and then they played in the beautiful fall leaves!

with sweet cousin Emily!

 

Ok- this marks the beginning of my PHONE PICS of the trip! :)

 

Here the kids are, so excited to play in a patch of snow leftover from a storm they had before we got there (the weather was actually perfect while we were there)!

Sweet pic of Me-Ma reading to the kids by the fire place..

Family photo in the pretty leaves!

Cousins hanging out!

My sweet boy in Estes park..

More Halloween!

What a wonderful trip we had!!  Can't wait to see everyone again in February for

UNCLE DANNY'S WEDDING!!