Aly & Mom go to The Nutcracker

It was a weekend full of fun for Aly and me. Yes, I scored half price tickets to The Nutcracker Ballet too! Travelzoo sent me an email alerting me and I was thrilled. I have wanted to take Aly to the Nutcracker ever since she was three but wanted to wait until she was a little older. This year I was actually thinking about it but with tickets costing $75 a seat I just couldn't do it. Thanks to the half price seats we were able to go.

The funny thing is we took the girls to a movie about a week before and neither one could sit through it. It was the movie The Tales of Desperaux. So it got me really nervous that I had wasted my money on tickets to The Nutcracker. Hubby prepared me for the fact that I just might have to leave with Aly at half time. As hard as it was to realize it I was glad to be prepared for it so I wouldn't be dissapointed.

However, the opposite was true! Aly absolutely loved The Nutcracker! In fact she stayed the entire show which wasn't even over until 9:45 p.m. She sat on my lap most of the show so she could see. We actually had good seats at just 19 rows up and just slightly off center. She had two tall adults sitting in front of her so it was hard for her to see. She could only see inbetween their heads. So most of the show she could see better sitting on my lap. I was happy to cuddle with her too!

Her favorite part was with the Mouse King when he fights the Nutcracker. She really liked the dancing and the orchestra playing. In fact when I asked her if she liked the Dinosaur show or the Nutcracker better she surprised me by saying The Nutcracker!


Aly was thrilled to get her pictures taken with the Mouse King and the Nutcracker! She was also thrilled to dress up in a pretty dress.

Walking With Dinosaurs Our Family Experience

A few weeks back I was thrilled when I received an email from Travelzoo alerting me that tickets were on sale for 50% off for the Walking With Dinosaurs Live show. I immediately called hubby and asked him if he wanted to take the girls. He was thrilled and we chose to see the show on the day after Christmas. This would be a great Christmas gift for our whole family to enjoy!

KK was the most excited. She talked about it for days. We purchased tickets for the upper deck but were lucky enough to get the first row! KK thought it would be great to sit as high as the trees to see the dinosaurs. We thought it would be better for the girls to sit on the upper deck so they wouldn't be too afraid. Aly who is usually the cautious one was already a bit worried about the show. So I decided to go on YouTube and show her some videos from the show. I pointed out to her how she could tell the dinosuars were fake. I showed her how on the raptors she could see human legs in them. I showed her in the big dinosaurs how a platform was underneath them which was used to move them. This seemed to help her a lot.

On the night of the show we were taking any chances on being late. In fact we were actually down near the arena an hour early so we decided to drive around to find a bite to eat. Afterwards we headed for the show and got to our seats with 15 minutes to spare. Aly was scared of the big teeth on the stage so we showed her how they were really large balloons. This helped her.



Here is the stage the dinosaurs will come out on.



Here we are sitting in our seats. Aly sat on Daddy's lap the entire time and KK sat on Mommy's lap the entire time!



Here are some of the first dinosaurs they brought out. Both Aly and KK loved the long necks!



This was probably the best picture I was able to take with my camera. Unfortunately for me my camera was acting up and would only let me have a total of 19 pictures on my memory card! It was pretty frustrating. Plus we weren't allowed to take any flash photography so all of my pictures were taken without a flash.

I did take a video of the best part! I was able to get the T-Rex on video. Surprisingly the girls loved it. We were fully prepared to leave at this part but they both liked it a lot. Do you know that half way through the show KK was asking to move to the bottom to front row seats? By the end of the show Aly wanted to move to the botton but up high. We told them if we get to go to the show again we will try to sit in the lower seats maybe half way up.