St. Charles Christmas Traditions

I have to start by saying that I have never heard of this happening on Main Street in St. Charles, but apparently it has been going on for years. Dave and I saw an ad a couple of weeks ago about the Christmas Traditions in Old St. Charles and thought, "that might be something fun to do with the girls". I am so glad we decided to go. Everything was SO festive and just right for getting us all into the holiday spirit.We knew that there was going to be a parade of Christmas Characters on Main Street, but what we didn't know is that the characters were walking up and down main street "in character" giving the kids collectors cards. One of the Santa Claus even came up to Dave and totally wrapped him into a huge hug. For anyone who knows Dave, I, like you was not sure how he would react to this. He took it all in stride though and hugged back with a grin of embarrassment on his face. I loved it. In case, you didn't know, I am the outgoing one in our family. Don't laugh! Someone may not know that! Dave is VERY reserved. A lot of people that meet us say that he is SO quiet because I am SO not. But whatever, I enjoyed every minute of him being teased by this Santa. Too bad I didn't have my camera ready at that point.

After collecting cards for a while, we found a place to watch the parade of characters. Amy didn't like the spot that we chose for some reason, so she pouted for a while.

She finally gave up when we offered to let her take a few pictures with our camera. She loves to take pictures of crazy things. We had several of the license plate on the car we were sitting next to. But beyond being crooked, she did get a good one of Dave and I. After a late lunch/early dinner, we took the girls down to the riverfront where they had an outdoor skating rink set up. Amber and Amy have only been ice skating one other time and that was last year in Ohio. It started out a little rough, because they both wanted to skate with Dave. I don't blame them because #1, he is a better skater than I, and #2 he will hold them up, where I just cushion their falls. They both did really good. Amy was her usual kamikaze self...she really has no fear of getting hurt. And Amber was skating by herself, not fast, but on her own by the end.

We ended the evening with hot chocolate for the car ride home. It was a great time and something that we will definitely do again next year.