This Is The Place Christmas

We had a fun night at This Is The Place recently. Many of the pioneer homes had a Christmas craft for the kids to do. One of our favorite places had a naughty or a nice list that you could sign, but if you signed the naughty list you got some pieces of chocolate coal that were really yummy. (They told us we had enough days left to still get on the good list.) Another favorite thing was the puppet show in the little theater. We weren't sure we even wanted to stay for it, but it was very well done.

One nice thing is that, with John home, we can leave early enough to get places just as it gets dark, so it's not so cold. We've got a good system down, where we take hot chocolate in a thermos and grab some Smiths donuts to enjoy at the place we're headed.

I wanted the reindeer in the background to be visible, so I lightened this picture, but I think I overdid it. Anyway, here are the live reindeer. Jonah was scared of them. He was too scared to sit on Father Christmas's lap as well.

We learned some very interesting things about Christmas traditions during pioneer times. For example, they wouldn't have their own Christmas tree usually, because they needed the wood, and there weren't that many trees available. They would sometimes decorate outdoor trees in public places. They also generally didn't get presents at Christmas, but sometimes they would on New Year's, if they had money.