Yesterday we went to St. Charles, MO, for our favorite winter event for the loved and loveless, Once Upon a Valentine. I really love this micro-festival…it’s much quieter than the sister events Legends & Lanterns and Christmas Traditions, but it still manages to retain their fun and historic charm!
It’s so nice to have an excuse to visit Historic Main Street at an otherwise dreary time of year!
It doesn’t seem possible, but Christmas Eve and Day have come and gone already!
Our celebration started on Christmas Eve morning, with Christmas Crunch:
I made time early in the day to deliver gifts to all of my neighbors on Gloriana, and also chased Roald around my island for a bit, trying to get the perfect picture (which I did).
Bunny had to work in the morning, but when she got home, she put the finishing touches on this year’s Advent Lego project, Rivendell:
And then we went to my second-favorite service of the entire church year, Christmas Eve candlelight:
Candlelight being a relative term, as it was still fairly light out when the service was over. We didn’t stop by the city of St. Louis Christmas tree downtown this year, so it was pretty bright for our drive through the Way of Lights!
When we got home, I made wassail, which was a bit of a change for us…I think it may become a new tradition!
And we enjoyed a gingerbread layer cake with gingerbread mousse filling and molasses cream cheese frosting, and topped with sugared cranberries for dessert.
We also played our new Christmas Eve board game, Ticket to Ride Northern Lights. I lost spectacularly, but not as spectacularly as Ladybug won!
We watched the San Francisco Ballet Nutcracker and Rick Steves’ European Christmas, and then I filled the stockings and escorted Mary and Joseph to the stable. I hope there’s never a day when we don’t want to put up the Little People nativity, even though we no longer have any little people living in our home1
On Christmas Day morning, we enjoyed our favorite coffee cake:
And then we went back to church, nice and early so I could get some pictures in front of the beautiful church Christmas tree:
Our church is always beautiful, but there’s something extra special about it at Christmastime!
The family picture we took after the service is probably one of the nicest ones we’ve ever taken!
We opened presents when we got home, and then I got started on dinner, the best dinner of the year, the famed “Pick Out Dinner!”
Setting the table is pretty low-key compared to Thanksgiving, but I still like to make it look nice, including napkins folded like Christmas trees. I added a few small Christmas trees to our traditional centerpiece of the Advent wreath…they balanced out the additional candles I often add quite nicely!
We had quite the spread this year!
We spent the afternoon and evening watching Christmas movies, playing games, and building Lego sets. The weather was far too warm for Christmas (it felt, smelled, and sounded like Easter!), but thankfully the weather isn’t what makes for a good Christmas, and we had a lovely day. And luckily for us, Christmas lasts for 12 days, so we still have our “fancy” (although dialed back a bit this year thanks to rising grocery costs) dinner and more cookie baking to look forward to…and maybe even some colder weather! Merry Christmas!!!
Yesterday was one of my favorite days of the year…we drove west to St. Charles, MO, for Christmas Traditions!
This year was extra special, because our favorite Christmas legend, Jack Frost, is celebrating his 20th anniversary at the event. Coincidentally, that’s just about the same number of years we’ve been attending! I was really glad we got to be there for him at this momentous occasion!
Yes, Jack is the star of the festival to us. But there were still plenty of other things going on, starting with the Santa parade:
It was COLD (thanks Jack…I’m guessing the coldest it’s ever been when we’ve attended!), but no matter the temperature, historic Main Street is beautiful and full of Christmas cheer!
We saw plenty of other Christmas Legends while we were there:
And of course we visited with my personal favorite, the first legend I remember encountering at our very first visit all those years ago, the Lord of Misrule and Abbott of Unreason himself, the Master of Revels!
We also encountered a new musical group, The Confectionettes, who represent Edwardian candy makers, and also a new (to us at least…I know we’ve never met him before, but I’m not certain he’s new to the event this year) Santa, Viejito Pascuero from Chile:
This is truly one of my favorite events of the whole year, and I really cherish each time all five of the children are able to attend together!
The second day of our Combo Breaker trip was one of my favorite days of the whole year, because we took the Metra into Chicago!
Bunny’s first objective is always to find the pigeons and feed them, and it was a successful mission!
We walked close to 10 miles…down to Buckingham Fountain, up the Magnificent Mile, and everywhere in between!
It was a chilly, rainy day, but that didn’t (if you’ll pardon the pun) dampen our spirits!
It was nice to take a break indoors at Water Tower Place, though, and we stopped in a few of our favorite shops while we dried off and warmed up.
We visited the Starbucks Reserve Roastery again this year, and this time, we actually figured out the menu and ordered some drinks…I got a lavender matcha malt (shocking, I know), and it was absolutely amazing…I’m going to try to recreate it at home!
Of course we stopped by Marshall Field’s of Blessed Memory, where we admired some of the historical details of the building and bought an entirely too expensive (and small!) box of Frango mints.
But eventually we had to get back on the train to head back to the hotel…we always ride upstairs on the return trip.
Back at the hotel, we switched to Combo Breaker mode and got to work alphabetizing badges. Once that was done, it was time for another swim and more game time in the lobby.
Up next…a trip to Italy? And the real preparation for Combo Breaker begins!
Advent went by so quickly, and here we are at Christmas already! Let’s take a look at this year’s celebration, starting with a Christmas lights walk Moose and I took Christmas Eve Eve…we think this should be our neighborhood’s official Christmas tree
Christmas Eve always starts with the Captain:
Chickadee finished our Lego Advent project, and Turkey and Moose played the first game of chess:
The Christmas Eve church service is my second favorite of the year…I think it’s interesting that my two favorite services both involve candlelight.
After church, we stopped by the city of St. Louis Christmas tree. It was rainy, which is unfortunate (so much for my dreams of a white Christmas), but at least that kept it from being too bright out, because it was still pretty early and should have been pretty light.
And then we drove through the Way of Lights.
When we got home, it was picture time. It’s the second year we’ve had LED lights on our Christmas tree, but I’m still not used to them…I can’t help but feel that they make the pictures look like they were taken in an aquarium!
Bunny came up with the idea for this year’s cake (carrot with a gingerbread mousse filling and cream cheese frosting), and we made it together…it was so delicious!
Of course I had to play Animal Crossing and check in with all my neighbors (especially Roald!).
We played a couple of games of Ticket to Ride: Nordic Countries while watching our traditional Christmas Eve shows (the San Francisco Ballet Nutcracker and Rick Steves’ European Christmas)…I was the winner of the game I played with 152 points, and completed every route in my hand (11 in total, I believe), plus used every train car and every card I had. I think that’s the Ticket to Ride equivalent of a complete game?
I filled the stockings, tracked Santa with NORAD (I made sure he got to both St. Louis and Chicago) and set up the nativity before bed.
Christmas Day always begins with our favorite coffee cake:
Since I wasn’t entirely happy with my very blue photos from Christmas Eve, I took some more pictures at church:
Christmas morning is such a beautiful service!
We got a very nice family photo afterwards:
After we got home and opened presents, I got to work on dinner. I decided to do things a little bit different this year. Instead of making a fancy dinner, which we all enjoy, but isn’t the highlight of the holiday for us, I focused all of my energy on the best meal of the year, the Pick Out Dinner. Since that was our main Christmas dinner, I set the table with the china, folded napkins like Christmas trees, and discovered that a Stammtisch sign I’ve been wanting for a while magically appeared on the table while I was working on the dinner.
Our dinner was our usual favorites, including an extended cheese board, jalapeño popper and Rotel dips, a shrimp ring, several kinds of sandwiches, mozzarella sticks, and buffalo Chex mix.
I love making salame roses!
It’s our favorite meal of the whole year!
After dinner, we watched White Christmas, A Charlie Brown Christmas, and the Disney World Christmas parade. And then Ryan and I played Ticket to Ride: Nordic Countries (using the new anniversary train cars we got for Christmas!), to determine who the house’s Ticket to Ride: Christmas champion is. Spoilers…not me! I scored almost 100 points less than I did in yesterday’s game (only 54!!!) and Ryan is the undisputed champion.
And so another Christmas has come and gone…but the 12 Days of Christmas is just beginning, and we still have some more fun planned! Merry Christmas!
What can I say about the 50th anniversary of our favorite Christmas tradition?
We have been looking forward to this day since last year’s event. We knew it would be special to be part of so significant a milestone, and we weren’t disappointed. We were there in time for the parade:
We always enjoy hearing the Lewis & Clark Fife & Drum Corps play:
And then the hunt for the legends of Christmas. Let’s face it, Jack Frost is always our number one priority…(we even brought along our binder of character cards from past years, and had him and some of our other favorite characters sign it).
And the Master of Revels is a close second (he was actually the first character we saw, and the first to sign our binder!).
We found a good number of the other characters…by my count, we saw 25 out of the 33 characters/groups:
I especially enjoyed meeting the Christkind while wearing a dirndl!
The Evergreens are a fun group, and it was especially great to hear them sing “White Christmas” since they look like stepped right out of Wallace and Davis’ act!
There was a special display (hosted by none other than Father Time!) in the Tourism Center looking back at the history of the event, and collecting memories for a time capsule to be opened in another 50 years.
It was a beautiful day to be in St. Charles…I will never tire of the historic charm of the city!
Our Christmas tradition:
I am so glad we starting attending this event around 20 years ago, and it’s pretty cool knowing we’ve been part of it for almost half of its run…here’s to making more memories for the future!
This was a weekend I’ve been looking forward to ever since the school year started…Parents & Family Weekend at Bunny’s college!
On the way, we took a little side trip to Santa Claus, IN, a place where it’s always Christmas! I could move right in!!!
We spent Saturday exploring the campus together. The grounds are beautiful, and even though it was hot, it was a very fun day!
We visited the Kentucky Museum, where I finally got to see the mid-century marvelous Duncan Hines exhibit:
There was also an exhibit of amazing quilts!
I’m always so happy to see Bunny!
We stopped at Starbucks, where on Bunny’s recommendation, I tried a matcha with pumpkin foam…it was so good!
And we went to a volleyball game…it was a bit tense, but they won in the end!
While we were in the area, we had our first trip to Buc-ee’s. It was a completely surreal experience!
I’m always happiest when we can all be together!
Now I’ll be counting down the days until Thanksgiving!
Even though we chose a wildly different route home (through Wisconsin and Illinois), we didn’t have much planned for the drive from the Twin Cities, but we did stop to see the Gaming Gen store in Eau Claire, WI, on the way…but we left so early, we were there hours before they opened!
We did stop in Madison, WI, and walked around their Capitol Building, which is in the lovely Beaux Arts style:
And since we were coming home through Illinois, we stopped at our favorite Portillo’s, where I had my favorite Italian beef!
And that marks the end of our trip north. I wish we could have stayed longer, because it was a beautiful place to visit, and I really enjoyed the cooler temperatures, but I’m glad we had the chance to see someplace new!
On the third day of our trip, we set out to see as many things as possible, beginning with the Cathedral of St. Paul in…well, St. Paul! The skyline of the Minnesota state capital is smaller than that of Minneapolis, but I still enjoyed seeing it, and there was something charming and cozy about the city that I really enjoyed!
The cathedral was absolutely stunning…it reminded me of the Cathedral Basilica of St. Louis in some ways, and was very different in others.
After we toured the whole cathedral, we drove by the Capitol Building:
And then made our way back to Minneapolis, where we found a good view of the skyline:
And a local landmark, the Witch’s Hat Water Tower:
I really wanted to see the Northwestern National Life Building, which is absolutely mid-century marvelous!
We drove around a bit more, and saw the flagship Target store and the Mary Tyler Moore statue, but it was so busy downtown we couldn’t find parking to get out anywhere. Then we stopped at the Basilica of St. Mary. It wasn’t open for tours, but we did walk all the way around it, and it too is a grand and beautiful building.
We stopped by Lyndale Park where we saw some lovely fountains and flowers:
And enjoyed a meal with friends at D-Spot. I had a burger with cheese curds on it, and there were wings with lavender…such brilliant and unexpected culinary offerings!
One more stop at Caribou:
And then a little excitement back at the hotel. Just as Ryan, Turkey, and Ladybug were ready to leave to see the Sonic Symphony at the Orpheum Theatre (the main reason we chose Minneapolis as the destination for our trip), the power went out, and then the fire alarm went off. There were rumors of flames, and I did smell smoke, but in the end, they allowed us to return to our rooms, and the power came back on not too long after. It was a weird time, with a wedding party in full dress and various motorcycle clubs standing around the parking lot (the two main groups staying at the hotel that weekend), and later on the balconies of the hotel, but there was a nice sense of community about the whole thing…I just wish our room hadn’t been on the 7th floor, because that was a lot of flights to climb down in the mostly dark (and then back up again…we didn’t trust the elevator while the power was out, even though it was operating!).
Anyway, they made it to their concert in the middle of the hotel chaos, and I’m told a good time was had by all.
Up next: An early start for a long drive home!
We actually managed to sleep in a bit on the second day of our trip, which is pretty much unheard of for us…but that just meant we were well-rested for our visit to the Mall of America!
My first priority was getting Caribou Coffee…I was not disappointed!
A big highlight of our trip to the mall was visiting the Lego Store:
We even got to see a “Space Brick,” built by the ESA from a meteorite:
The m&m’s store was also really cool…it ended up being one of my favorite stops in the mall!
There’s a whole Nickelodeon theme park in the center of the mall:
I think you can find a Dole Whip just about anywhere these days!
It was just so much fun to walk around a thriving retail space!
Before we left, we stopped for boba:
Five+ hours later, we finally made our way back to the car, and decided since the rain had held off, we would go visit the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden.
I loved the sculptures and the setting with views of the skyline in the distance!
Up next: A cathedral, a basilica, and a bunch more fun!