Church Christmas Pageant

 Always a highlight around Christmas is the children's Christmas pageant.  This is a wonderful way to tell the story of Jesus' birth and creating memories for the younger members of the family.

Before the service, the children greeted the congregation. 

 The older children lead the service by reading the scriptures intermixed with songs such as Away in the Manger.

 This year Micah was Joseph, Victoria was an angel, and Izzy was one of the three Kings.

Annual Christmas Party

It's become a tradition to throw a Christmas Party complete with a visit from Santa. This year was a bit tamer than past parties making for less stress in the preparations.  The kids also willingly helped out when needed.  Micah and Victoria cleaned up the outside doorway to make room for coats and shoes while Izzy vacuumed.  A few days before the party Izzy helped me create these Christmas tree cupcakes. 

John's pizza Christmas tree was a hit with the younger guests. 

 Santa was accompanied this year by a photographer from the Boston Globe who was doing a piece on his December activities.  We are awaiting to see what is all included in the article.

 

 The older kids are in that awkward age.... to believe or not to believe.... or more importantly... do I sit on Santa's lap alone or not?  They eventually decided they were going to talk to Santa as a group.  Safety in numbers!

 Regardless of their age, Santa is a pro can could engage them for a decent amount of time.

 The three younger boys had their doubts about whether or not Santa was real.  They tested him by asking to pull on his beard and went to look where his sleigh was parked.  Santa's quick wittedness was perfect as he explained to the boys that the sleigh only comes out on Christmas Eve.

 Adults love Santa too.  I'm sure our wish list is dramatically different that than of the grown men!

 Besides Santa, we set up a cookie decorating station for entertainment.  Oma's sugar cookie recipe is a good as it was when I was younger.

John created a private tween spot in the basement so they could "get away" from the younger kids.  This may be a more common occurrence over time!

The Music Man

 This year's 7th & 8th grade play was The Music Man. The producer asked for a handful of 5th & 6th graders that played an instrument to create the band that performs at the end of the play.  Izzy was able to be a part of this band and practiced Minuet in G for a few weeks in preparation.  This was such a talented group of actors and will be hard to fill their shoes when they move on to high school.  For my theater loving Izzy, she thrives in all of these experiences.

 Though they had a short cameo, being a part of the finale was special.  Those who comprised the band were allowed to sit and watch the play up through intermission at which point they needed to leave to change into their band uniforms.  We could make out Minuet in G but it was not good.  That was what the producer was going for and pointed out they played better in rehearsals.  He asked them to sound worse for sake for the play's story line.

Nantucket Stroll

Scattered amongst many internet activities throughout the day, I sometimes enjoy MSN.com's lists such as the top restaurants in every state or the top 25 toys for Christmas.  Recently MSN had a list of the top placed to bring in the Christmas cheer.  Listed included places like London and Rockefeller Plaza in NYC.  What caught my eye was the Nantucket Stroll.  I had never heard of such a thing which led me to investigate further.  The Nantucket Stroll began 49 years ago as a means to keep holiday shoppers on the island to patronize local shops.  It has now morphed into a 3 day weekends (the 1st weekend in December) filled with numerous Christmas sights, an ugly sweater contest, cookie decorating, and plenty of restaurants and shopping.  If you want to go, you better plan early.  There was not a single hotel room available.  Airbnb and vbro were nearly full.  I was not about to pay over $2000 for a room.  We lucked out and found a guest room at an Airbnb for one night and therefore headed to Nantucket for a novel experience.  If you are a people watcher, this is a place to be!

 Everywhere you turned there was something going on outside.  No one seemed to noticed that is was a bit chilly.  I'm pretty sure many were "warmed up" by some adult beverages.  John absolutely loved finding a soda fountain still with a working pharmacy.  That was truly a blast from the past to walk into.

This was one of my favorites... the ugly sweater contest.  John and I almost thought about entering when we saw it on the list of activities.  I'm glad we didn't because we didn't get the memo that this was much more than just an ugly sweater.  These people came up with songs and actions to their group theme.

 All throughout Nantucket were dressed up trees.  We even discovered there were prized for these tress and found 1st (see the ribbon on the one with the Nantucket Stroll sign) and 3rd places.  Here were a few of my favorites.

 A most wonderful educational experience was the Whaling Museum.  There were times I had to swallow a sallow feeling when learning about what we did to these creates in the 1800s and first half of the 1900s.  Nantucket was the whaling capitol of the world at one point.  This was our third Fresnel lens we have seen this past year.  They aren't common anymore but still beautiful every time we've gazed at them.

The museum is attached to the restored 1847 spermaceti candle factory which includes the two-story lever press—the only original whale-oil lever press still in place in the world. 

 That evening we headed to the theatre to watch A Nantucket Christmas Carol.  Five actors played all the characters - impressive and done with humor throughout.  This was John's favorite experience on Nantucket.

One last stop before heading home was to Nantuckets Cisco brewery where we sipped beer flights and listened to a pretty decent cover band.