Gaylord Hotel Field Trip Part 2 ICE

If you are in the Texas area you really must try and get to the Gaylord Hotel in Grapevine, Texas during the holiday season! They have a spectacular ICE show that changes theme each year where people carve GIANT blocks of ice into forms. This is the 3rd year we have gone and we love it.

They transform one of their ballrooms into a winter wonderland. It is like a SUPER COLD 9 degrees in there so they give you these giant puffy coats that make everyone look like the stay puff marshmallow man. This year the theme was the Nutcracker and it did not disappoint!

There were so many wonderful creations in the Nutcracker area of the display. 

Then they had a whole section about Christmas in New York! Remember these are all HUGE sculptures completely carved of ice! 

They also had this amazing ice slide room where you could slide down a big block of ice! 

And lastly, the had a beautiful Nativity scene. I love how they kept it without color to convey the purity of the ice and the purity of Christ. 

It was all so wonderful and the kids absolutely adore going! Also, a little tip if you are able to go the first week it is open (usually the week before Thanksgiving) they usually offer half price tickets! We always enjoy our holiday trip to see the ICE show! 

Wordless Wednesday - Christmas Cookies

Gaylord Hotel Field Trip Part 1 - Gingy's!

Every year we head up to the Gaylord hotel during Christmas time to visit family in the Dallas area and also to see the ICE show they have there (it will be in part 2 you don't want to miss it!)

Well, this year as I was going to purchase our tickets online I noticed they also had a build your own gingerbread house with Gingy (from Shreck) and I thought - how perfect! We will have just been doing our Gingerbread Baby study so this will be able to tie in at just the right time.

But first, let me just say that the Gaylord Texan Hotel in itself is a wondrous site to see during the holidays. They spare nothing to make sure it is transformed into holiday central!

It is simply breathtaking especially at night when you can actually see the thousands of lights they have hung! But now, on to Gingy's!

The girls were so excited to get to decorate. You had an option to choose a house, a tree, or a gingerbread family and since my girls are still young and not always the best at sharing I decided something easy to break up would be best so we went with the family!

Of course their favorite part was getting to meet Gingy himself!! We didn't think the cookies would make it safely back to San Antonio in the car so we chomped them up right then and there. You could almost hear Gingy saying "Not my gum drop buttons!". The kids loved it and it only cost us $30 for everyone to decorate including the meet and greet and pictures (you can take your own or of course pay more for a professional photo).

Don't miss the second half of our field trip next week when we check out the ICE sculptures!

Our Gingerbread Unit Study

Last week we did a fun study of the book Gingerbread Baby. 

We read the book each day Monday through Thursday and the girls had a blast doing a multitude of gingerbread themed activities. 

We found these cute foam gingerbread houses at Target and the girls loved decorating them. 

The girls had fun with these great printables we got over at Homeschool Creations. 

To help Big E with her spelling we transformed this pre k puzzle into a Gingerbread Hangman game. When you don't guess the right letters a piece of gingy goes into the oven!! Uh oh! This one was close!! ;) 

Then of course the two big girls and I had to make some gingerbread cookie men! 

And Baby E made her own gingerbread play doh men! 

We had so much fun! Stay tuned for our Field Trip friday blog hop this Friday when you can see where we made gingerbread men with Gingy from Shrek at the Texan Gaylord hotel in Grapevine, Texas! 

Printable Elf Placemat

Today is the first day that "Elsie" the Elf comes to visit in our home. To mark the occasion she brought the girls these Naughty or Nice placemats to remind them at meal and/or playtime that she is always watching! You can print one out and laminate it too - and be sure to check back each Sunday for what our elf has been up to all week! Does your elf have something fun planned this year?