Dollar in the therapy jar

Well, Ethan and I thought it would be so fun to take Hannah Gray to the city to see Santa at the Macy's on 34th street. So we went down on a Thursday night and it was perfect timing as there wasn't a line to wait in. They had an incredible set up where you enter the train station and take you through a couple train cars so you feel as though you are really traveling to the North Pole. Hannah Gray was taking it all in but wasn't so sure about what was going on. Once you get out of the train, you are at the North Pole and there are tons of elves, bears, train sets, etc. She was fine at this point, although there was some freaky elves running around too. But who isn't a little leery of some freaky elves? The elves usher you into a couple rooms to take a couple different pictures and you can feel the anticipation building as you can tell you are getting closer to Santa. Then finally, you're met by several elves (one with a particularly high voice that made Ethan and I look at each other to ask "do you hear that?! and is that real?!") that prepare you to meet Santa. At this point I think Hannah Gray could "feel" the anticipation and started to get a little scared. We walked in and there he was in all the glory that you would expect. She freaked. Ethan was holding her and tried to walk closer to Santa. She violently shook her head so he handed her to me so he could take a picture. I think I probably still have bruises in the shape of tiny little fingers on the back of my arm as she squeezed so hard to stay attached to me. I couldn't have pried her off of me if my life depended on it. So I simply sat next to Santa and tried to smile as we waited for Daddy to take a picture as well as the elf. The horrible part was, Hannah Gray was literally chattering as she was screaming, "Dadadadada, then it went into a full out throaty yell from her gut that almost sounded like it hurt coming out, "DAAAADDDDDDDDYYYYYYY". I think this may have been the first time she has said "Daddy" too instead of "dada". I felt horrible for Ethan as he knew she was completely depending on him to save her. We felt so badly afterwards. She recovered just fine and doesn't appear to be having any nightmares, at least anymore. J/K. But come Christmas Eve, we vowed we wouldn't take her any closer to Santa than she was comfortable with.

After seeing Santa, we went to see the Rockefeller Tree which had just been put up the night before and we walked through Bryant Park which had a really cool set up of shops all over right next to the ice skating rink. We had a great night and Hannah Gray really did have a great time. She was such a trooper and stayed awake with no melt downs until probably close to 10!