Happy Birthday Mom!

Yesterday was my mom's 60th birthday - Happy Birthday Mom!  To celebrate, my dad, siblings and I planned a surprise birthday weekend in Virginia.  I asked my parents to come for the weekend under the pretense of babysitting, but in reality Debby, Joe, Pete and Meg were driving down on Friday night to surprise Mom.  My siblings arrived around midnight, much to my mom's surprise!  On Saturday, we had lunch reservations at McMormick & Schmick's at the National Harbor with 2 pm tickets for the ICE show at the Gaylord National Resort & Conference Center.  This year's ICE theme was 'Twas the Night Before Christmas.  Thankfully, the boys behaved well at lunch and then we headed over to the conference center for the ice show.  Tyler was hamming it up while we waited in line.

Here is the crew decked out in the stylish parkas that they give you to keep warm for the ICE exhibit.

I'm going to share a bunch of pictures from the ice show.  Pretty much everything you are looking at is made from ice.

You were asked not to touch or lick the ice, but there was one room in the middle of the exhibit with ice slides that you could ride down.  Tyler's parka wasn't long enough to cover hit tush, so he took his parka off to use as a "sled" so he could zoom down.  He loved the slide and went down it a dozen (or more) times!  Brennan also loved the slides, but went down the bigger ones with Uncle Pete for the most part and I didn't get a picture.  The room with the slides was colder than the rest of the exhibit - freezing air was blowing directly on you.  I'm guessing it was because you could touch the ice here and they needed to keep it from melting.  The kids could have kept sliding, but the rest of us were freezing and ready to move on!

They had a Christmas in NY room that included the Statue of Liberty, a big apple, Times Square, ice skating beneath the tree  in Rockefeller Center and a taxi that you could take pictures in.

Last but not least, the exhibit recognized the real reason for the season with a sculpture of the nativity scene and a voice over telling the story of the birth of Christ.  We really enjoyed the exhibit and spent about an hour there.  It was definitely worth the trip!

We left the exhibit cold, and ready to get home and relax.  The funny thing is that after being inside the exhibit for an hour, the "freezing" temps outside felt warm and humid!  We headed back home for a little down time before dinner and cake.  Brennan was happy to help Nana blow out her candles.

We had a great weekend and really enjoyed Saturday together.  Unfortunately, snow started falling on Sunday and my family had quite a slow drive back to NY.  After 10 hours on the road, my parents made it back to Jamesport.  But, at least everyone was  back safe and sound.  Happy Birthday, Mom.  And, thank you all for coming to Virginia to celebrate!  Love you guys!