So London is known for going all out for the Christmas and New Year's holidays. Something about the cold, rainy weather all fall means that people really get decked out with decorations - and there are just a million things do to around town. Our first year here, we had a brand new baby and barely left the house for the holidays. But our second year, the baby was now a year old and we wanted to see everything. Both of our mothers came to town, so we hit the sights.
Carnaby Street
First- Carnaby Street is a smallish street in the middle of the downtown area that gets super decorated every year. This year's theme was the Oceans, so all of the decorations were made of reclaimed plastic. It was so cool that we took my mom, and then went back a few weeks later with my mother in law.
Birthday and Decorations
I guess this will forever be a problem with having a December birthday - but we celebrated the baby's first birthday and then decorated the tree. We will have to find ways to separate the events and avoid his birthday just being consumed by the ever-expanding holiday season. He didn't seem to notice this year though.
School Stuff
So if you've seen Love Actually, you know that there is a British tradition of doing the nativity play at primary schools and everyone gets a part. We are constantly surprised by the amount of religion included in the public school system and must always remind ourselves that there is no separation of church and state here. We were hoping he would get the part of the 2nd lobster- and were surprised to find out he had chosen the part of the bad guy, Caesar. (Caesar is bad because he required the census- which we explained isn't actually a bad idea, but the point was lost on him.) Anyway- he did great - he had one of the few speaking roles but commanded stage with authority! Later, I got roped into helping out at the school's Christmas Fair. We've also come to learn that meeting Santa in advance of the holiday is a thing they do here - but you don't sit on his lap. No mall Santas here. Instead, he sits in something called a "Grotto", and the kids take turns awkwardly standing nearby to tell him what presents they want. It makes for weird pictures.
Other Downtown Lights
The rest of the city downtown is also lit up - not nearly as cool as Carnaby, but still nice. We wandered around a bit- because it's more spread out, it isn't nearly as crowded as Carnaby - so I didn't have to carry the big kid around on my shoulders the whole time.
Drinks at Somerset House
After wandering town to see the lights - we stopped at Somerset House for a drink. This is one of the many old, historic, probably once a royal residence, grand homes in the London area. It had an outdoor skating rink and bar area that was decked out like a wintery lodge. It was a lovely place to just sit and watch the skaters - I believe both kids fell asleep.
Gingerbread City
After drinks, we headed to a new event called the Gingerbread City. Someone ran a competition between architecture firms and students to create houses out of gingerbread - and then created a huge display of them inside. It was amazing - everything made out of sugar- some parts were mechanized to move. Trains were moving through the whole thing. We could've stayed for hours - but everyone was getting pretty tired and cranky at this point and ready to head home.
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