Breeakfast with Santa

We had Breakfast with Santa - (kind of!).

Each year Mike's company has a year end "breakfast with Santa". Its a great family event. There is a ton of food - as adults, Mike and I really look forward to the food (we don't get out much, so a free meal where we don't have to cook and no mess to clean up is always great!)

Not only is there a nice breakfast buffet (muffins, doughnuts, bagels, scrambled eggs, fried potatoes, sausage, bacon, french toast sticks, and fresh fruit, plus juices and coffee and other beverages), but they also have carrollers come and sing, and Santa brings every kid a gift!

After we eat, we enjoy the carollers (they sing in the lobby as everyone enters, and then sings on stage once everyone is busy with breakfast). The kids go up and get to sing a long on stage. I can never get Stephen up there. He is shy and doesn't want to be up on stage. Ryan gets up there, but usually forgets to sing, and then there is Trevor who kinda freaks out at all the noise and people if we get close to the stage. This year however, I got up by the corner of the stage and got Trevor to sit with me so we could join in the festivities. (This is great considering his Sensory issues!)

Then, Santa enters and comes around and shakes hands and such. After much hand shaking, the gift giving starts. The company is great - they have the parents go out and buy their kids a gift up to 30.00 worth. The parent wraps it and brings it to work a couple of days before the event. It is stored and then brought to the banquet hall to be given out at the event. The best part is the company reimburses the worker for up to 30.00 (when you bring in a receipt).

So, the boys love the gift getting! The employess are called to go pick up the presents santa brought for their kids and the wrapping paper explosion begins. My boys got some great things. Ryan was a little worried that Santa would not bring him a gift as he thought he'd been bad (he has been having a tough time at school lately). But Santa brought him a MP3 player - one for his age that is indestructable. Stephen got a mini remote control helicopter and Trevor got a Elmo learning laptop toy. The boys seemed to be happy with their gifts.

Next, we get to have the boys take their picture with Santa. Of course Trevor wasn't too keen on this, but we did get one picture before the crying started in earnest.

So Sunday was a nice family day and will help get us warmed up for the real thing coming in a couple of weeks