Broke down and paid the lap rental fee....

and then some.....

We headed over to see Santa today after having lunch at the Ram on the waterfront.  The line was enormous and somewhere tucked way back in my Mommy brain was a remembrance of years back when if you joined the Kids Club through the mall you would get priority service for Santa, as in, you would get to go to the front of the line.  I let the kids tootle in Claire's with Daddy while i scurried down to the customer service kiosk to spend the best $5 of the day.  Then i rushed back, gathered my family and went to the FRONT of the line.  Oh yes, the lovely families who had already lost their Christmas spirit because they'd been waiting in line for two hours had really lost it by then when they saw our sweet little family cut in front of them.  And can you believe those Mommies were blessing me out under their breath and for an instant i felt a little bad but once i saw Santa waving us over the feeling of guilt quickly diminished and i was very, very happy that my Mommy brain was still in working order.  Instead of a two hour wait to see Santa, it only took 15 minutes.  Can i get a whoo-hoo!?!?

Now for the funny part.....
Jeff and i went to a surprise party for our next door neighbor Herb last night and we had one of our wonderful sitters come take care of our angels.  For those who've had the pleasure of babysitting our Lily, you know what an effort it is to get her to bed at night.  So, i instructed Rachael, if Lily was to give her a hard time tonight that she needed to leave a note for Santa to let him know that Lily was disobedient.  It was very sad to find that note when we returned home from our party.  Daddy got Lily up out of bed at 10:30 to apologize to the sitter, have her sit in time out for 20 minutes and then put her note in her stocking for Santa.
Guess what Lily did today when she saw Santa?  She confessed!!!  Like she was Catholic and in confessional with her priest.  ( i am not knocking Catholicism in anyway here)  Asked for another chance to be on the nice list.  Santa said he forgave her, really, how cute is that and said that she had a week to straighten up.  So i think a date night is in order to get a sitter over here to see if Lily can redeem herself before Christmas.  Any takers?

As you can see, the girls LOVE Santa and Santa seems to love them too!

P.S.  Today at Costco, yes, we went there too!  I had a lady who was probably in her early 50's ask me if she could take a photo of my girls to send to her Mom.  She said she was the oldest of 4 girls and her grandmother made them matching outfits all the time and she did not appreciate them until she saw my girlies today. (She has two boys)  What made the story especially sweet were the tears in her eyes as she was telling me the story. 

Isn't he one of the jolliest Santas ever?

After the millionth child..he still seems truly interested
in what she has to say.

Do my girls have great hair or what? 
Thanks to Kristine at Wild Child.

Chocolate ice cream at the Ram.
Yup, bringing the girls down with me during the holiday season.




This is the 3rd occasion the girls have worn these tights in public.
Each time i get stopped and asked if they are wearing 'Hanna' tights.
You should see the look on their faces when i tell them they are from
Wal-Mart.  What?  $22 vs. $4?  Who is the smart shopper here?

 

And the sweet sitter who threw Lily under the bus with the Santa note! :-)
We love you Rachael!