A Christmas surprise

We got tickets to Holiday out with Thomas and decided it would be fun to keep it a secret from the boys. We had our Christmas party last night so we had everything packed in the car beforehand.

We went to the party and headed up to Santa Cruz afterwards. We stayed at a hotel right across the street from the boardwalk.
We got there about 1:30 am. They slept the whole way up so when we got there the boys were all Huh? and Wha?  Of course once inside the room they were all "lets play"  Dad and I  not so much.    They were raring to go at 6:30 (oh jeez,someone shoot me) so I got up and we watched some cartoons for a while.  This is the view from our window.

We headed over after a quick pick me up in the hotel lobby.  Coffee, coffee where for the love of God is the coffee?  The boys only thought we were going to the Boardwalk to ride the rides.  While Dad was parking the car we waited and Logan noticed a sign.....

I quickly Shhhhhhhh'd him and he did not spill the beans to Ronan.

While we were waiting at will call for the tickets Ronan said "they are playing Thomas music".  Then cue Thomas, he rolled up right after that.  I picked Ronan up and said look here comes a train.  He saw Thomas and was practically vibrating with excitement.

We went inside, the whole boardwalk was closed except for the Thomas activities.  We were on the 2nd run so we had time to check everything out before the mobs of other kids arrived.  It was WAY less crowded than at Roaring Camp.

With the tickets came 4 tickets for the merry go round and 4 rounds of mini golf, laser tag or 48 tokens for the arcade.  We hit the merry go round.  Ronan and Logan were the only riders.  The attendant gave Ronan  a brass ring to try and throw in the clowns mouth.  (After 4 tries he actually hit the clown but no where near his mouth)

There was ornament making...

and a Thomas made of Legos.

This was the car we got to ride on.  Car # 2.

Daddy and Logan

The inside was decorated and there were elves and even Santa!

They even made it snow!

The ride was short and quite loud but pretty comfy.  It was a beautiful day and there were lots of people to wave at.

Santa handed out candy canes.  Neither one wanted to have their picture taken with him.

The one and only Thomas

and of course they had to pose with the Santa Cruz sign

They had some fun in the bounce house but the problem with bounce houses is you can't always control your bounce and there are sometimes noggin knocks.  Another little boy bounced right into Ronan with his head.

He's got quite the mouse.  It must have really hurt as it took him a good 5 minutes to stop crying and another 10 before he was ready to go back in.

All in all it was a fun day and a good holiday surprise. We had our photo taken with Thomas and they made us this little holiday keepsake.  (sorry its a photo of a photo)