Christmas Train Ride

About this time every year you start hearing people talk about the Live Nativity over in Burnet (very small town about 1 hour drive out of the city). Last year Mom was here in Austin about this time so we all jumped in the car and went and checked it out and I am glad we did! We all loved it and this year we repeated the adventure.... with a twist. This year we rode the train up there and I bet it won't be too hard for your to guess who the two most excited kids were!

This picture of Sy cracks me up...... isn't he a little young to be trying to pull a GQ pose?!

...of course, Santa was there.

The train ride was two hours each way and we had about 3 hours in Burnet as well. The temperatures have finally dropped below 70 around here(like low 40s that day) so it was even feeling a little bit like the holidays. After a quick meal in a local cafe we headed over to the live nativity.

Think of Plymouth (my family will get it from that one) and now picture that concept but in Bethlehem at the meridian of time.... that should at least give you an idea of what it was. Anyway, they (the local Church of Christ) created a mini-walled city that takes up the better part of a city block and it has just about everything inside. There are shops (lamps, blankets, etc..), tradesmen (basket weavers, blacksmith, etc..), a jail, a tavern, centurions, a tax collector, fires, animals (camels, birds, donkeys, etc..) and you mingle amongst and with them (they were expecting strangers like Mary, Joseph, and us because it was tax collection time!) Eventually you are filtered to a place set apart from the noise and there we quietly appreciated the humble nativity. I don't know why it is so hard for me to slow down and take time to focus on the things that matter most but I appreciate moments like that when the noise leaves and perspective settles in. I left grateful that our Father in Heaven sent his Son for us and was glad to have been there.....

Then, on the way out Soren tripped and skinned his hands on the gravel... so much for focus!!! The whole thing was essentially the exact same as last year (right down to the same lady selling the same birds in the same location) and I expect it will be the same next year.

I plan to be there again too.