MORE December!

And December just never let up!

Bentley was flying home, arriving at the Richmond airport around midnight, so we decided to do a later temple session

and then a VERY late dinner at Maggiano's (which we'd been meaning to do since our anniversary back in August)!  It was a lovely evening and the food was so good, but unfortunately we spent the entire time stressing out and tracking Bentley's progress because he had a very tight connection to make in Baltimore.  By the time we knew that he'd caught his last flight and could breathe a sigh of relief, our meal was over and we needed to get to the airport to actually pick him up!  Ah, well.  The food was still amazing!

We got Bentley without any trouble and then needed to find him some food, since he definitely hadn't had time to eat in Baltimore!  The only thing still open was Taco Bell, and when we went through the drive through, the worker kept trying to give Bentley sauce for his Luxe Box, and it was the funniest thing ever (also, we were up very late and a bit punch drunk; but I think that guy must have been high as a kite!).  And then it took them forever to give him his food-- they gave us free cinnamon twists to make up for how slow they were being!-- and then he finally got his box, opened it up, and discovered two things of sauce in there!  I guess the worker knew best?

With all of that, we didn't get to bed until after two in the morning, which would be rough any time, but was especially crazy because the next day was my choir's two Christmas concerts!  So I had a LOT of standing to do, on very little sleep.  But I survived it, and both concerts were lovely.  (And I had fun getting dinner with my co-singer Leah, in between the concerts!)

Making sure my hair looked okay for the concert

If you look really closely, you can see half my face right above the cellist!

I love singing with the Oratorio Society, but honestly, the Christmas concerts are a LOT-- I was quite relieved to have them over!  

But I couldn't relax yet, because the next day was our ward Christmas program, for which I'd been asked (for the first time in my life!) to conduct a ward choir.  Now, this was a really fun thing to get to try and then realize that I have NO IDEA how to lead a choir!  I really can't seem to make my hands do different things at the same time!  And I spent the first several practices confusing where the men and women were sitting, since it was now mirrored from what I was used to!  Add to that the joy of trying to get people to even show up for practice at 8:20am, and then we had to cancel for Stake Conference and then had (yet another) snow day with no church, and...  it just was not going to be the best performance you've ever heard.

But having said all that, I was actually very pleased with how the song went.  LOTS of people came very early to our last practice before church.  Kendra played her French horn along with us and did a great job.  I managed to do different things with my hands enough to cue the choir for all but one of the times I meant to...  Honestly, it could have been so much worse.  I was really proud of how well everyone did.

And once that was done, I felt like I could really truly relax and enjoy the Christmas season!  The next day we took everyone to Busch Gardens, which was super fun, but not something I find relaxing!!!  (In fact, this is the sort of thing that makes my very slight case of child-induced agoraphobia flare up.  I have to remind myself that everything will be fine and the fact that I'm stressed out and slightly ill is not a problem and will go away once we're there.  And it always does!)  We hadn't gone in four years, though, so it was good for me to step out of my comfort zone again.  Right?  The thing that was stressing me out was the weather-- it was actually a pretty nice day (for December), but it was going to get pretty cold at night, so I couldn't figure if it was better to drag my huge coat around all day, or just be really cold at night, or leave my coat in the car and have to trek back to get it once the sun went down?  These are the things that keep me from sleeping well the night before such an adventure.  

Anyway, the park didn't even open until 2pm, so we got to sleep in, and pack lunches to eat in the car.  We'd invited Topher to come along, so that was extra fun (that might sound sarcastic, but it seriously was-- Topher is delightful, and we're all on better behavior when we have a guest with us, so it makes for a way more pleasant day)!  We arrived at the park and made a mad dash for whatever roller coasters were open.  Camille desperately wanted to ride the bumper cars, but Craig told her we needed to hit the longest lines first and could do those later.

Waiting in line (you can see Bentley, Topher looking away, Kendra, and Colton)

Uff, that sun is bright!

When everyone else went on a wooden rollercoaster, Camille and I opted for the whiplash ride-- it's actually one of my favorites!  (I should have taken her on the bumper cars, but the line was soooooo long...)

And then we wandered through the gift shops and took silly pictures with this bear!

We loved the bald eagle sanctuary!

AND the clydesdales!!!  How are those horses so big???

(Have you noticed that Colton is doing this fun thing where he either doesn't look at the camera or pulls this weird confused face for all pictures?  Can I say how much I LOVE that?  😑)

Around here was where it finally started to get cold and everyone was hungry.  So Craig and the kids all got in line for food, and I trekked back to the van to get my big coat, as well as Camille's and Bentley's coats, as well as Bentley and Topher's meds, because they were both fighting colds.  (And I just barely remembered to grab my keys before I headed out there!)  For reasons I will never understand, there was no transportation to the parking lot, so once I'd finally gotten outside of the park, I still had to walk over a quarter of a mile to get to our car!  I was feeling pretty annoyed about this until a woman walked by me dragging her oxygen tank behind her, and I decided I had it okay after all.  And as much as that walk seemed to take me forever, when I caught back up with Craig, he had just gotten to the front of the line at the restaurant to order everyone's food.  So our timing was pretty great, actually.  (And honestly, I'd rather be walking than standing around any day, so I got the better deal!) (Somewhere in here we realized that Colton hadn't brought a coat at all, so once I had mine, I gave him the giant sweatshirt I'd been wearing to put over his lightweight jacket, and Craig gave him his hat.  I think he was still pretty cold, but it was a little better at least?)

We found a table we could all sit around and really enjoyed our overpriced burgers.  And then, with warm coats and full tummies, we dashed into the nearby theater and caught their production of A Christmas Carol which was actually really good!  And then we got into the (very long) line for the SkyRide.  

Craig and I decided to enjoy a car to ourselves!

Shoot, this got out of order.  All the boys went on this while the girls were still gazing at the horses.  This is NOT the kind of ride that I enjoy!  But you can pick out Topher there in his orange shirt, and the rest of the crew is all there with him!

The SkyRide dropped us off where there was an ice skating show about to start, and even though we didn't get to see Elvis Stojko like last time, it was still a super fun show!  This time around, there were pairs skaters who did some very impressive lifts, including that thing where the guy swings the girl around by her skates and you're so scared that he's going to bash her head against the ice?  That thing.  It was wild!  (And totally freaked the boys out, which I sort of loved!)

After the ice skating, we got funnel cake, and then rode the train that takes you all around the park to look at the Christmas lights.  And then we suddenly realized that the park would be closing soon and we had never gotten around to doing the bumper cars, the ONLY thing that Camille had been asking to do!  We hurried across the park, nervous that we might have missed our chance, but when we arrived they were still running AND there was no one in line to ride them!  So we had a great time messing with each other on the cars, and then decided, What the heck, let's just get back in line and do it again!  At this point, the guy running it told us we could just stay in the cars, and he pushed away any that weren't being used so we could maneuver better, and we rode them probably four times in a row?  Maybe we were just punch-drunk by then, but it was so fun!  We were all laughing and having a great time, it was the perfect way to end our day!

Cool Camille got her wish!

As we headed out, we tried to take some pictures.  Craig lined them up beautifully and got awesome shots, and then he swapped with Topher and Topher did not catch Craig's vision for what these photos were supposed to look like.  Oh, well!  😂

We got the lovely "Peace on Earth" sign in the background!

All the pretty lights on the bridge (and Colton looking lost...)!

Remember last time when we went to Busch Gardens and Craig managed to get a great picture of us with this really pretty tree?  This time, the tree defeated Craig and did such a weird thing to my face!!!!

Oh, well.  It's pretty funny, actually!

Busch Gardens was a lot of fun, I'm so glad we got to spend a great day there!