Special Visitor

It's a good thing we had the cookies decorated and ready to go, since Santa made an advance stop at our house tonight! He and his elf just showed up on our doorstep with presents for the boys.
Zachary was still feeling a bit skeptical, but did enjoy the visit.
Santa brought them the perfect gift. Pillow Pets!

Crafty

Alex made this at school. Aside from being a great project, I really like how well he is writing his name!

The boys helped decorate cookies. Everything looks good so far, but shortly after this picture, Alex dumped 1/2 a bottle of sugar onto one cookie. And then we switched to the safer process of putting the decorations on a plate.

Alex made avant garde owl decorations. Zachary was very precise in his placement and followed the picture exactly.

School Program

Tonight was Alex's school Christmas program. Because of our goofy schedule, he is in the M/W/F class and the T/TH class, so he had a chance to sing a lot of songs. He did a great job with the hand motions and singing, all while wearing an awesome snowflake head band.
Before the program started, Zachary and Fiona were keeping each other occupied and doing a great job of staying out of trouble.
After the songs, there was a potluck dinner and a visit from Santa. Santa sure does get around. Tonight Santa was delivering books, and the boys were excited to read their new books. Alex's book has magnets that you add to the story.

Zoo Lights

We bundled up and headed out to zoo lights. This might be the closest thing we have to a holiday tradition. And now we are experts, arrive a bit early, hit the train first and then explore the zoo.
Of course, the rides are at the entrance to the train station. I tried really hard to get Zachary onto the car ride. "Here's your ticket Zachary. Give it to the girl Zachary. Here, right here." But she caught us and made us measure him. Again "Stand up straight Zachary. No straight." Total fail. And this time Zachary knew he was missing out. I told him to ride the carousel with Daddy, and right then, the carousel started up. Zachary started to cry "but it's already going!" We all caught the next ride though.

Sitting with snakes, while giraffes look on.

Alex really liked this tree.

Street Car

Gma and Grandpa were in town for about a week, and once again, I did a very poor job of photo documenting this. For the most part, they stayed home with the boys while Phil and I (or just me!) went out and about. However, we did go to the City to ride the street car. Our plan was to ride the street car up the hill, transfer and ride to Ghirardelli Square, get some chocolate/lunch and reverse course. The ride up the hill went great, but the transfer was a total fiasco. Finally we decided to ride back down to the waterfront and take the trolley to Ghirardelli. Our day passes allowed us unlimited rides on all forms of public transit, so it worked out nicely. After a lunch and chocolate treat, we hopped on board the street car and at least got our return trip as planned. Grandpa wanted to ride outside (but didn't hang off like in the movies) but the boys were a little sleepy and wanted to stay inside. I did get them to sit outside at the end of the line for a quick (and only) picture. And since I was standing in traffic to get it, I had to give up on getting everyone to look at me and smile! Gma and Grandpa did a good job of it though.

Science!

Phil and Zachary went to the Chabot Space and Science Center for toddler science class. Zachary learned about seeds and how they grow and brought home to projects. One got really moldy really quickly, but the other actually sprouted and I am waiting for my chick pea harvest! Zachary was pretty excited about the class, and they'll probably go again.

Train of Lights

The Holiday Train of Lights offered free tickets at Phil's work. We chose our travel night based on the weather forecast, and it turned out to be the perfect night! Since it was a weeknight, not very many people came out (which was great for us, maybe not so much for the train company). When we arrived, the engineer asked Alex and Zachary if they would like to see where he drove the train, so we got to check out the engine. It was very loud in there, so we didn't stay long, but it was really cool.
Since it wasn't crowded, we were able to walk up and down the length of the train and go between cars. Each car was from a different era of rail travel and beautifully decorated.

There was an open air car, which would have been a very chilly way to ride, but provided a great opportunity to see the lights on both trains as they passed. The boys also enjoyed watching the scenery go by.

The train route was an out and back journey, so we passed the other train twice, and had to wait at the switch to get back on track. The second time we passed, a special guest transferred trains.I've left this photo un-cropped, so that Zachary and his skepticism could be included.

We changed into jammies before heading home, expecting the boys to be exhausted. Alex fell asleep fairly quickly, but Zachary was a chatter-bug for most of the way home. We are now fielding constant requests to "do that train light thing" again.