Williamsburg Trip!!

The first weekend in December is the Grand Illumination weekend in Williamsburg.  I've been a few times, but never really seemed to care too much for the actual Grand Illumination festivities.  I just want to go to Busch Gardens to Christmas Town!  Lol  This year I really wanted John to be able to go with us because the last time we went he was out of town on business.  He ended up not having to go out of town for work this year, so he was able to go with us.  Yay!!

We took that Friday off, picked Jacob up early from school and left town around lunch time.  It was a beautiful day out, but it was pretty cold.  When we got down there we checked in to our room and then went to Hooters for dinner.  Yum!

The next morning we got up to .... RAIN. :(  Christmas Town doesn't open for business until the afternoon, so we went to breakfast and then stopped at the Christmas Mouse where I got our family's Christmas ornament for 2014.  :)

It's cute, no?  And, different than anything else we have in our collection.  John also spotted Advent calendars for the boys .... something I've been wanting to do with them for a few years now and I just never remember to look for them.  They really loved them, though I think they still missed the Christmas story because they were more interested in the daily morning candy.  Lol

After the Christmas Mouse we went to the giant Yankee Candle store!  I loooove that place!!

We browsed all the different sections, checked out the awesome decorations, listened to some carolers and the boys even got to write and MAIL letters to Santa.

So ... after the Yankee Candle store we decided to drive out to Busch Gardens and try it in the rain.  We got in, got parked and then ... it POURED.  Worse than it had all day.  We waited a few minutes to see if it would let up, but no such luck. :(  Time to call it ... we left and we never did get to go to Christmas Town this year.  Well, John and I didn't.  The boys and my parents went back down the weekend before Christmas, so at least SOMEONE got to go.  :-/

To kill some time we decided to check out the Ripley's Believe It or Not museum as none of us had ever been to that one.  I'm glad I can say I've been, but I don't think I'll be going back any time soon.  Lol  It was just .. ehh .. okay.

Jacob enjoyed the giant Iron Man and Transformer.  And, I personally thought the tallest man was pretty neat ... 

And, since I'm really intrigued by the Titanic, I liked seeing a piece of coal from the Titanic.

But, then there was some stuff I wish I could UNsee.  Like this double headed goat.  WTH?

There were some games that the boys enjoyed like this shooting game.  And, there was a "mission impossible" type game that *I* really enjoyed. Lol  You had to make it across and room and back without breaking any of the lasers.  I did pretty good even on the "hard" setting when my husband turned it up and didn't tell me.  Lol

Probably my favorite part was this 3D movie we got to see when it was over.  It felt almost like a motion simulator  yet the seats didn't move, so it was safe for the kids.  Henry, however, FREAKED OUT about halfway through and I had to hold him so he couldn't see the screen while he cried through the rest of the movie.  Thankfully it wasn't a very long movie!

That night we had dinner at Captain George's ... our consolation prize. Lol  After that we just went back to the hotel and hung out the rest of the night.  John and I had to get up early and leave to come home the next day, but the kids stayed and hung out with my parents.  They got home later that night in time for dinner.  We had fun quality family time, but I'm still bummed over not getting to go to Busch Gardens!  Lol