Visiting Santa

We ended up with 2 Santa visits this year! The first was on accident. We went to Joe's school for a fun movie night where they where playing The Grinch That Stole Christmas on a big movie screen. And as a surprise for the kiddos, Santa made a special appearance. This was totally unexpected, and we were not prepared but the kids were very excited....well, two of our three kids were anyway. Lester was second in line and told Santa he wanted Legos for Christmas.

Then when the 3rd kid was sitting on Santa's lap I looked over at the girls to see what they thought of it all, I wasn't sure if they were going to like Santa this year or not. They were watching with pretty serious faces so I asked Valentina if she wanted to go see Santa. She replied, "YES!" and took off running up to Santa and leaned in and gave him a HUGE hug and snuggle (mind you this was while someone else was still sitting on his lap). It was pretty funny. So Joe went up and pulled her off of Santa and brought her to stand in the line so she could have a turn.
While sitting on his lap she leaned in for a BIG hug and snuggle again just like she did the first time! It was tooooooo cute, she was just the sweetest! She loved him!

As for Angelina, she stood from afar....watching. But when asked if she wanted to go see Santa, she replied, "No go see Santa. No Santa's lap." Lester even tried to be of assistance and offered to hold her hand and go up with her. Even with being the great big brother that he is, she would not budge. Then Daddy tried to assure her it would be ok! They looked and watched together.

She said she still did not want to go see him but Joe slowly got closer and inched his way next to Santa and we managed to get his picture!!!!

She doesn't look so happy about it but at least she is not crying!!!!!!!!!!

After everyone had a chance to see Santa there were still a few more things going on and Santa just kind of hung out in his chair. So I got Angelina to warm up a little bit more and she even went close enough to give Santa a high five at one point! Later that night when I was tucking the girls into bed, Valentina was giving me her babbling run down of the day and she ended with, "I LOVE Santa!!!!" It was so funny. Then I heard whispered from Angelina's side of the room, "I no like Santa." These girls just continue to be as different as night and day!

So 2 days before Christmas, Lester expressed concern to us that he never got to give his Christmas list to Santa the first time we saw him and that he thought we were still going to go see him at the mall like we do every year. So we being the nice parents that we are, all hoped in the van and went to the mall, 2 days before Christmas to wait in an extremely LONG line to see Santa......AGAIN!!!!!

Waiting patiently in line! It actually moved pretty fast and it was only about an hour and a half wait total, to see Santa and then wait in the picture line to get our photo!

Lester's note for Santa! Legos, legos, and more legos!

I am glad we went after all because the picture came out really cute! No crying babies this year, only because they were on our laps! Angelina still wanted nothing to do with sitting on Santa's lap!