Of Carousels and Ferris Wheels

Friday we celebrated a day without rain by going downtown to enjoy the holiday lights. We both worked that day and met at home to pick up Sophia and bundle up before heading downtown. We walked around Westlake Park and marveled at the long line waiting to ride the Christmas Carousel. Sponsored by Qwest, proceeds benefit Northwest Center, serving children with delays and developmental disabilities. You can see the spinning blur of the carousel in the photo above. We walked around for an hour and listened to excitied comments and lots of finger pointing in Sophia's direction (you'll see why in the photo below) and enjoyed an evening without rain.

The evening before Thanksgiving Day we went down to Pacific Place to see the new 007 James Bond movie, Casino Roylae. We haven't been to the theater in months! We got there early enough to have dinner at Thai Ginger and to walk across to Nordstrom (the building in the top photo with the big star on it). Nordstrom had a lot of interesting holiday decor out and I had to take a picture. This is a ferris wheel filled with traditional-looking Santas from what appeared to be many countries. Very expensive Santas.

Now perhaps you can see why Sophia was getting so much attention. It was her downtown debut in her Santa coat, complete with hood with white pom on it. You'll be seeing more pictures of her in it, trust me! We stopped to look into Nordstrom's Santa window, complete with long line of tired kids waiting to get their pictures taken (this is at 8 pm! poor little kids). While Santa was between photo sessions he and his elves/helpers noticed Sophia through the glass standing out on the sidewalk and she got a smile out of a very tired St. Nick!