I swear we have made a tradition out of seeing Santa multiple times. First was an early trip with the Schwartz family to their Santa display of choice at a local mall. I splurged and bought a package and the online print. So you can see it first hand right here below.

Much like Macy’s Santa trips of previous years we headed to Culver’s after for dinner with our friends. It is a little sad that Macy’s closed down but this Santa experience was excellent none the less.

Of course I took some before pictures. Not every day we get these 5 so nicely dressed. Gavin wore the blue shirt and Zander the cream. Enjoy!

Our other established (as in 3 years now) tradition is the YMCA Santa. They really do do an enjoyable evening with cookies and crafts and a bouncy house. Not to mention a movie in the activity center and the chance to see Santa and Mrs. Claus they gave out books this year!

This year we met up with our homeschool buddies. But since they wanted to see Santa and then eat we came early to play around. After all there was lots to do. Trinity and Echo both had their hands painted by Trinity’s drawing teacher Mr. Eddy.

The boys, who were not in the frilly wear were able to spend some time in the bouncy house. We also picked up some reindeer food and tried out the non paint related crafts.

In line

After Santa, who was amazing… as usual. A thanks to Aimee for taking a group picture for us… 

We went to Culver’s for dinner. All in all TWO great evenings seeing Santa with good friends!

Oh and here is the overflow of cute!

And a bonus Santa… Home Depot !!

Merry Christmas (belatedly) to you and yours! As usual I am behind on my reporting but I am making a real try to catch up… just you watch, November will spontaneously pop up one of these days! And then you will be in the know again!

Anyway… Christmas Day for the Reinsch-Johnson clan. It was a different one from our previous ones here in Minnesota. First off because we really did not have extended family beyond Nana and Baba here for the day or eve. In the previous years Christmas Eve was our time with Ken’s Uncle Moose, Aunt Colleen and their two kids. But this has been a rough year for Moose (Paul) and while he is on the mend they were really not able to come over for the traditional Ukrainian meal of potato soup and perogies. It was probably for the best as this December has been one of illness for the family. So many yucky colds! But thank goodness we were assured that he is better and home again.

Of course we DID enjoy our meal… and the company was wonderful as was.

That evening we did put out our cookies and milk for Santa. In our new pj’s.

Echo and Ken spread Reindeer Food out on the lawn since we went to bed without a speck of snow to be seen really.

Christmas Day was just the household and it was wonderful. We did not manage to Skype with Gammie as she was having issues on her end but we did text back and forth and take some pictures of the openings.

Amazingly enough with two countries and multiple states we did not have any duplicate gifts this year! Each and every one was well received and I can honestly say I have not seen the kids happier.

We had calls with both sets of grandparents… Alberta and South Carolina. As well as a lovely chat with My brother James and his wife Holly… well mostly Holly. Even a peek in on Cousin Jimmie.

Dinner was a delicious turkey and trimmings thanks to the hard work of Nana and Baba. But for the most part after the excitement of the great toy opening it was a nice, quiet and relaxed day.

Enjoy the overflow!!

NOTE THERE IS A PICTURE ENTRY THAT GOES WITH THIS ONE WITH THE REST OF THE PICTURES!

Has officially come and gone and was, I figure, a success… the kids are well toyed, family has been celebrated with by the end of the week we will be back to the Reinsch-Johnson normal!

Ready to party

Goofy excited kids

Let’s start with the Mandyke side of the family (Ken’s mom) and Christmas Eve… A rather traditional Ukrainian dinner with perogies, potato soup and gunk (no one seems to remember the “real” name for that one) oh and OUR traditional Chocolate Candy Cane cake only made into cupcakes and iced with cream cheese icing instead of cool whip.

The table

Sitting down to supper – with T.J.

Cupcakes

Ken’s uncle Paul, aunt Colleen and cousins Melissa and T.J. all came for supper and visiting… and presents for the kids! The twins each got their own ant farm, I am not sure who is more excited… them or Ken!!! Emanuel got a bowling set and Miss Trinity a drawing one with those dry erase crayons. When we first purchased that product over a year ago in Canada I was unimpressed… they were REALLY hard to erase… now over a year later they are much better. Though you do still need to work a little at the erasing.

Gavin and the bowling set

Echo got a bag full of BALLS! Which of course created the catalyst for a massive ball explosion. There was also a SILLY STRING WAR! Do you know, I have never seen silly string in person before? Just on tv… it is much less… wet than I expected. The guys went all out on that one… but I think Nana won with her sneak attack on T.J.

Silly string monster

There was lots of visiting and reminiscing. T.J. is in grade 8 and on the VARSITY wrestling team (I am told this is a big accomplishment), I do believe tentative plans were being made for some of the family to go see some of his competitions. I know our nephew Zachary has just started wrestling so I am sure he would enjoy and probably learn something from going to some of the events.

Wrestling

Trinity and Emanuel went out and spread their reindeer food before dinner. (Remember their making it HERE?)

Feeding the deer

After saying good bye to family it was time to get in the Christmas pj’s and get those Santa cookies and milk out and ready. Though I am kicking myself, I forgot all about setting up our Advent set (the Little People one)… When we were digging out the table decorations and such Nana found a special plate and mug for Santa so we had a great set up with all the stockings in a row. Of course we had our yearly complaining by Ken about how PLAIN his stocking is. I really need to sit down and find a suitable stocking pattern and get one done up for him as well!

Matching

Ready for Santa

With our Canadian Christmas set up in the basement – gifts mailed in from friends and family, the presents from Ken and myself to the kids and the Santa gifts WE had a hand in and of course the ones to each other we were rather good to go. There were packages from Canada, Texas AND South Carolina under there, quite the full and pretty tree!

Ready for the kids