One final Christmas Party

Towards the end of 2009, we started Nathan in OT (Occupational Therapy). His OT group hosts a BIG Christmas party every year where Santa makes an appearance. Because of the snow storm from mid-December (blizzard 1 of 3), the party was postponed until the night before we left for Texas. It was also Andrew's Band Concert night so we were going to go as a family for a while, then one adult was going to take Andrew to Band Concert while the other stayed with the little two.

Unfortunately, Andrew started throwing up that morning and was unable to go to the concert that night. Sean stayed home with him to try to finish up work stuff and I took the little two to the party.

The theme this year was "Candy land" and they had it done up so cute!


This was Mr. Plumpy's Plum Toss. You tossed purple beanbags (with velcro on them) at the felt tree. Too cute!!!


Remember Grandma's Nut House? Here's the game--search in the styrofoam peanuts for the paper peanuts. Find them all (or a few) and you win a sucker.

For the Kisses game (check out the many paper kisses somebody made to line the path), you rode in a bucket strapped to a couple scooter boards. They pushed you to the table where you got a Hershey's Kiss and then pushed you back. My kids did this one several times.

We got in line for Santa and got our picture with him. Rebekah wanted to go over and over but I swayed her away from that. She did go up at the end and told Santa she loved him. He was getting ready to leave and when he picked her up to talk to her, she laid her head on his shoulder and said, "Santa, I love you." Oh my goodness, it was priceless!

Our OT, Heather, had told me that Santa gives each child a gift. I'm expecting a pinwheel, small yo-yo, paddle board and ball--you know, dime store stuff. Nope, Nathan got a set of 2 Star Wars figurines and Rebekah got a Disney Princess Hair Set. It has a princess brush, hair clips, butterfly clips and pony tail holders. These were super nice gifts--for EVERY child that came, not just the kid who gets OT. And did I mention this party is free? It's their gift back to their patients.

They had pizza, juice or water and cookies for dinner. And you could go back as often as you wanted. We all had one piece at the beginning of the night and another piece before we left. They also had popcorn/pretzel/M&M mix to munch on.


One of the stations was making a Snowman cookie. It's a frosted oreo and you use mini-chocolate chips, M&M's and a piece of licorice to make the eyes, mouth and earmuffs. The nose was a Christmas Candy Corn. It was too cute!


One of the gals worked with Rebekah (since I wasn't allowed to help her) to make her cookie.

At the cookie decorating station, there were sugar cookies, frosting and all kinds of sprinkles. Rebekah at first wouldn't decorate a cookie, she just stood and blew the sprinkles across the table. Then she saw the pink frosting and decided to take a turn.

They all had a great night and the Rehab Group did an excellent job. It was great to meet the therapists' families that we've worked with or see each week. We all had fun and the kids came away with great memories. Not sure what the theme will be next year, but we're looking forward to it already!