Center Parcs December Christmas Challenge

Tots100 and Center Parcs have challenged bloggers and their families to share their twelve favourite things about the festive season.  See this webpage for more details, where Center Parcs Winter Wonderland expert, Nick Oot has shared his top tips.  I am most inspired by Nick’s tip number 4 which says
Meeting the man himself – what better way for you to get in the Christmas mood than by visiting Santa and his little helpers in Santa’s Woodland Workshop?

I thought about doing this as the 12 Days of Christmas, but decided that would be too cheesy. So here are my 12 favourites in no particular order as follows…

1. As per Nick’s tip, a visit to Santa’s grotto for my boys.  This year they did very well on grotto visits with son1 visiting 2 grottos and son2 visiting 3.

2. Watching the school nativity.  I booked a day’s leave off work this year so that I could go to son2’s nativity.  It is the not the same watching it by video if you can’t be there.

Son2 as a shepherd

3. Attending a crib service on Christmas Eve.  This is an unmissable event in our Christmas calendar, although we do vary which church we attend.

4. Seeing the boys happy excited faces as they open their presents on Christmas morning.  We start off with their stockings in our bedroom, then go downstairs for the larger presents in their sacks.

5. Enjoying eating Christmas dinner with all the trimmings, after all the preparation effort.

6. Excited boys who can’t get to sleep, watching their messages from Father Christmas via Portable North Pole on Christmas Eve.

7. Decorating the tree which I blogged about here.

Putting up the tree

8. Watching Christmas movies, with festive nibbles to munch on.

9. Helping the boys to make cookies and sweets for their grandparents and to decorate boxes to put them in.

10. Enjoying my first mince pie of the season with a glass of mulled wine.

11. Excited boys on Christmas Eve, as we do the rituals of the mince pie and glass of milk for Father Christmas and carrot for Rudolph and sprinkle reindeer food all over the garden and putting out their stockings and sacks.

12. Singing along to Christmas carols and songs. And I have a Christmas songs CD permanently in the car during December.

This is my entry to the Center Parcs and Tots 100 December challenge. If I’m chosen, I would like to visit Longleat Forest.