santa

i always said that i would never make my children sit on santa's lap if they didn't want to. no pictures of my children sitting on his lap screaming, crying, or looking even slightly nervous. nate didn't want to. he was freaked out by the guys in red. so no santa pictures for him . . . until this year!

he said he wanted to see santa. there was a santa at the mall in albuquerque, but they wanted simply too much money for that one lap. so i convinced him to visit the stand-in santa in los alamos. 

here's my secret. the santa at CBFox is someone that nate knows, sort of. he is super nice and the whole set up is very laid back. dave puts on the santa suit a couple of saturdays in december and just hangs out in the store. no big throne. no big to-do. you take your own pictures. no charge.

so here is nate's (and willow's) very first visit with Santa.

he's telling santa that he wants a take along pit crew truck. 

(santa got him nerf guns instead. but santa maintains that the nerf was on his list, so it was fair game--and much less expensive.)

willow was less impressed, but not freaked out. she was mostly just looking at nate the whole time.