The Polar Express

My parents gifted the grandkids The Polar Express for their Christmas this year!

I have heard about this up in Williams for yearsssss.

Sounds cute and all, but never had the desire to go.

My kids have never really liked the book or the movie.

In fact, I don't think we have ever seen it all the way through.

 Way waste time and money on something they probably wouldn't appreciate?

They were excited to go, don't get me wrong.

But even I was skeptical it would be anything great.
Boy was I wrong!!

It ended up being so MAGICAL!!

Every single one of us were surprised at how much we enjoyed it!

We went the first weekend of December.
A perfect way to kick off the holidays.

We did the whole package.

Stayed in their hotel right next door where you got a buffet dinner and breakfast 
along with your train ticket.

That is the way to do it in my opinion.

The hotel was decorated  all Christmas-y.

They had a huge Christmas tree in the lobby and the train conductor 

was there hole punching tickets for the kids!

The rooms were newly remodeled and super nice.

We dumped our stuff in our rooms then walked over to eat dinner
before our train departure. 

All of the grandkids.

I couldn't help but cackle at the men talking seriously in their Christmas jammies.

All aboard!!

I have to hand it to these workers.
They made it what it was!

Always in character with singing and dancing and keeping the spirit alive.
They must be exhausted at the end of the night!

Hot cocoa dance

Madeline was cracking me up.

She apparently didn't appreciate the noise!

Even Lane had a smile on his face the whole time!

We made it to the North Pole where Santa joined us!
And passed out 100 bells that constantly were jingling:)

WE BELIEVE!!

So, so cute.

Afterwards we went swimming.

There was a game room down the hall.

Somehow these kids finagled money from grandma and grandpa and worked together

for everyone to win a stuffed animal in the claw machine! 

Pretty impressive!

Then we got a hankering for food.
Dinner at 4 was not about to hold us over all night.

Williams is a small place.
McDonalds was the only place around that was still open.

So yes, at 10pm we piled into Davids tiny Kia and ordered $188.11 worth of food.
We were laughing so hard.

David wasn't about to order so he pulled up so Marcie could.
Even better that she was doing it in a car seat!

We thought for sure the workers were going to hate us and possibly spit in our food.
They were actually the opposite!
Pretty fast at making it and wouldn't even accept our tip to them.

Thanks McDonalds workers!

Us with our spoils.
Cheeseburgers, nuggets, Big Macs, fries, shakes, apple pies, Mc Flurries. 
The kids came in and grabbed what they wanted and took back to their rooms 
while they hung out together. 

Slowly the hallways got more quiet as they dropped like flies.

Finally us adults decided we better go to bed ourselves. 

After our buffet breakfast most of everybody needed to head home for other things.
We only had our ward party to be home to, which we weren't going to be sad if

we ended up missing it.

We went to the deer farm with my parents and the Figs.

Don't let Lindi's smile fool you, most of the time she looked like the next picture.

Not so sure about them deer.

While Della was stroking and loving on each one!
She was reminding me of the pigeon lady on Home Alone!

A nice surprise to see Santa at the deer farm!

 

We ate at Fat Olives for lunch and

headed back home!