Our Visit With Santa & The Festival of Lights

Every year for the last 3 years we have gone to The Cincinnati Zoo and Botanical Gardens to visit Santa Claus.  In my opinion he is the best one in Cincinnati and I won't waste my time in the mall Santa's line ever again.  Now Alex has only cried once with a Santa but never the one at the Zoo.  He is just simply magical and makes grown adults like myself believe again.

This year Alex told Santa he wants candy and pow-pows.  Santa replied, "I know we have plenty of candy in the North Pole, but I will have to see what I can do about those pow-pows."  Alex was waving to Santa the entire time we were in line and couldn't stand still when he was next in line.

 These will forever be some of my favorite photos of Alex.

After we finished our visit with Santa we went around the rest of the zoo and looked at the lights and Alex and Chris rode the train.  Since I am still non-weightbearing on my foot we borrowed a wheelchair from a family member Chris pushed me around in that without a word of complaint.  I truly have an amazing husband.

Aren't my boys so handsome?

Just checking on Santa's reindeer, making sure they are in tip top shape.

 He is so stinkin' cute!  And that hat on his head, we have had for the last 3 years, it still fits his head, and dare I say it might be a little big.

Every year Alex and I have taken a picture on this trail, The Twinkling Trail, at the zoo.  They are some of my favorite pictures of us together. 

Alex saw this Gingerbread Man and said, "Mommy, I want to take a picture with him and then I want to eat him!"

He had so much fun looking at all of the lights and riding the train.  He is the sweetest little boy and I am blessed to call him mine.

The Festival of Lights

Now that Christmas has come and gone and the tree is put away for another year, I figure it is time to recap on the festivities.  In this post I will recap our trip to the Festival of Lights at the Cincinnati Zoo with my brother and sister. 

We started Alex in his carseat attached to his stroller, but I just felt like he couldn't really see everything so then we switched him to his stroller and stowed the carseat in the back.  He also had two layers of clothes, and two snow suits and then his hat.  The outer snow suit was way to big so I put socks over the ends>  I really think the only cold thing on the boy as his nose.  But I think he thoroughly enjoyed himself.

I took his carseat cover and put it on the stroller and

He loved the lights.

On the twinkling trail.

The baby elephant.   I think he was born last year.

This truly is one of my favorite things to do each year.  I find the lights and decorations to be so pretty.  I just wish there had been more animals out, we really only got to see the manatees and the elephants.  Chris and I always try to go together but with our new schedules it has made things a little difficult.  So hopefully next year we will be able to all go as a family.