Dicken's Village

Daddy and Shae inside of their tunnel fort. Belén just couldn't figure out how to get inside.

Anywho...

We heard from multiple friends that Dicken's Village is a must while living in Ithaca. There is a cute little town called Skaneateles about an hour away from us that turns into an adorable Christmas village with everything Dickens themed, even people walking around in character, including Father Christmas. From the moment I heard about this, I could not stop thinking about how badly I wanted to go. Darin was SO busy those first few weeks of December with finals and papers and what not. He turned in his last paper the morning of the 15th, we were leaving the next day for VA, but I HAD to see Dicken's Village, so the afternoon of the 15th we went. I was so excited! Until we arrived and realized that all of the Dicken's characters/activities only took place on the weekends! Sad! I apparently missed that memo somewhere on the website... We still had a fun time walking around the town (which really is so so cute) and went and saw Father Chirstmas' chair. We snuck a little candy cane on the chair and told Shae that he left it there for him since he was expecting to see him.

We checked out the Sherwood Inn where there were little Christmas scenes to see, as well as a nice big Christmas tree.

Outside, there was a little Christmas tree at the end of the dock so we ran out there, chasing all the seagulls away and hopping around their droppings all over the end of the dock. (Shae was pretty disturbed by it and was so worried about it getting on his feet).

We didn't stay outside too long since it was chilly right by the lake. We found the library and hung out there for a bit and then got some hot chocolate and biscotti and left. 

We had actually been in search of a copy of episode III of Star Wars to watch that evening but our local libraries did not have it. We checked in Skaneateles and they didn't have it. We passed a library in a little town called Moravia on the drive home and stopped there (while the kids snoozed in the car) just to check, and sure enough, they had it! So the trip wasn't a total waste after all (not that it would have been if we hadn't found Star Wars, we just felt that our trip was more justified after finding it).

Good thing we'll be here for a few more years. We'll make sure to check the days/times extra carefully next year :).