Before all of the running around on Christmas, I wanted to do something new and relaxing before the busy holiday. I thought that the perfect solution would be to go to the Wonderland Express at the Chicago Botanic Garden. From what I saw on their website, it was perfect!

Once I got there I realized that what I saw on the website was just a small part of all of the holiday activities that they had going on. My favorite part was the Wonderland Express train that ran on tracks for days. The display was huge! I couldn’t believe it! They had mountains and trees that the train ran through, and they looked so real! There were also cute little houses and villages that were in the display.

Since it gets dark out so early, we were there to see the Christmas lights that the garden put up. They were beautiful! All of the decorations were festive and really wonderful to look at.

When I was at the garden, Mrs. Claus was there and you could visit with her and have hot chocolate. Later that night, there was supper with Santa that people could go to. They even had a festive dinner and festival of lights that was put on for people who celebrated Hanukkah.

One thing that I did not do but I wish I did was the ice skating and snow shoeing that the garden had new for this year. They do not rent out the skates, but if you bring your own they have a big rink and it’s surrounded by all of the lit up trees. This is something that I definitely want to do the next time I go. The Chicago Botanic Garden Wonderland Express is running until January 3rd, so it is great for people with family in town looking for something to do.

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If you want traditional holiday charm, there is no need to go any further than Long Grove at Christmas time! You’ll find fantastic shopping and activities for the whole family. It is an opportunity to SLOW DOWN and enjoy the season.


And don’t think that because it is December 22nd, the festivities are over…not so! Activities continue through the end of the year.


I walked around the village on the 13th and really began to get in the spirit of Christmas. I was excited to see that there were carolers right outside the Long Grove Apple Haus. They were dressed in full “Dickens” garb. I grabbed a cup of hot cider and sat down to listen. It was really fun to see people of all ages stop and begin singing along.


I moved from one thing that warmed my heart to another. I just love a horse-drawn carriage ride. My husband and I were married in Long Grove and took a ride on our wedding night. The memories came flooding back as we sauntered around the shops. It was quite cozy under that warm blanket!


After warming up with hot cider, Christmas carols and a carriage ride under a warm blanket, I was ready to shop! But where should I begin??? There are so many unique shops all around town. I try to make time for as many as I can!


I love the homemade chocolate candies as well as the chocolate dipped strawberries. After walking out of there, I could have died a happy woman!


The next stop was The Olive Tap. It is a must-see for me when I get to Long Grove. Where else can you enjoy a Tasting Emporium AND Gourmet Market! It is always hard to choose which olive oil and balsamic vinegar I MUST take home!


There were quite a few little “home” type gifts on my list to buy this year so I ran into Mangels and found everything I needed! The selection is amazing; from Mark Robert Fairies to home accessories, to the most beautiful Christmas tree decorations you’ll find. I wish I could buy complete rooms and just “install” them in my home. Love it!


Seasons of Long Grove has had quite a few activities for young and old alike. The Nutcracker Tea runs through the 27th. You may bring your own hat or borrow one from their collection. The Santa’s Breakfast ran through the 20th and all children received a special gift (whether they were naughty or nice). And finally, this past weekend was the Dickens Dinner, with Victorian Buffet and live music from their Christmas Carolers.

Check out the Long Grove website www.longgroveonline.com. You’ll see all of the scheduled events through the end of the year AND you can check out the festivals that go on throughout the year. I can’t wait until they have their 2010 dates. I need to mark my calendar early!

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Once again time seems to have flown by and the Holiday season is upon us. To help get in the Holiday mood my family and I decided to escape the shopping mall madness by taking a trip to the hometown atmosphere of Downtown Antioch. Our first stop was “Santa’s Enchanted Castle” located on Toft Ave.

For $5 dollars we had our picture taken with Santa Claus and received a nice goodie bag that contained treats for the kids along with several coupons for local merchants. One of coupons was for a free cup of hot chocolate which was a nice since the weather was pretty cold that day. Upon leaving the castle the next door building has a huge tank on display which our boys thought was really cool. I truly had them convinced that it was there to protect their present’s lol.


Next we took a stroll down Main Street to do some Holiday shopping. The kid’s kept busy counting snowmen in the store front displays for the “Find Frosty Contest”.We did find the special snowman for the Baskin Robbins treat, but I won’t ruin it by mentioning the location. After turning in our contest entry form we took a “Horse- Drawn Carriage Ride”.

The ride took us for about a 10 minute loop around the downtown area. Our boy’s really liked “Nell” (the horse pulling the carriage) and it was a perfect way to end our visit. Happy Holidays!!!

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I think our family has found a new Christmas tradition! Last year, we took our "then" two year old to Zion’s Festival of Lights, a light show and walk through Kringle’s Kingdom. We loved it – so we decided to go back again this year. At the end of the evening, Mark asked if we could make this an annual family event with Maggie!

The event takes place in Shiloh Park, off of Sheridan. There are several activities during the festival; you have to leave yourself enough time to see it all.


A walk through Kringle’s Kingdom included over 450 lit Christmas trees, some small and some very tall. They were beautiful!! In and amongst the Christmas trees, individuals, groups and business decorated dioramas filled with all different Christmas themed scenes. Every scene was different, some simple and some elaborate, some were animated and some had music; however all were very creative! I giggled when I saw the Subway scene; snowmen selling “Snoway” sandwiches! What a great play on words.



The walk through the trees was actually placed in the Zion park district’s pool area. Picture a tall, winding slide lit with Christmas lights and HUGE wrapped presents coming down! AND, at the bottom of the slide, you see some sort of a runway, lit with green and red lights, only to realize it is Santa’s sleigh’s runway and the lights directing his arrival.

We turned the last corner and what did we see? Santa’s home! Now let’s just say that in the past, meeting Santa has been much more fun to talk about than actually do, for Maggie. Well she saw him sitting inside in his chair and she ran up the stairs, opened the door and gave him the biggest hug! She told him that she wanted princess gifts and I had to pick my jaw up off the floor. Never once has she been comfortable enough to sit on his lap. This time, she tackled Santa – it was awesome!

As we exited Kringle’s Kingdom, we heard the trolley bell ringing. We boarded it for a fun ride around the neighborhood. We passed the “Shiloh House” and were given the opportunity to run in and take a look around the museum! I swear there was a fireplace in every room!

The trolley took you on a tour of the Festival of Lights too! We drove through dinosaurs and dragons, under an archway of jumping reindeer, a frog jumping into the pond, snowmen playing baseball and so many more light displays. It was just beautiful!

Before we knew it, our ride came to an end and so did our time in Zion for one more year, but like I said in the beginning, we will be back next year! Visit the Festival of Lights website http://www.cityofzion.com/fol/index.html. They have listed all of the activities and taken photos to get you excited about going! The site says that you won’t find a collection of holiday events like it anywhere in northeast Illinois – THEY ARE ABSOLUTELY RIGHT!! The event runs through December 30th and activities generally begin around 7:00 p.m. although the drive-thru display opens at sundown.

This is a must-see!

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I still can’t believe that Thanksgiving has come and passed and we are nearing Christmas, where does the time go? We always start putting out our Christmas decorations and light up our house the day after Thanksgiving. For some reason we were dragging our feet this year so we decided we needed some inspiration. We packed the kids up after dinner and headed over to the outdoor Winter Wonderland Holiday Light Show.

This light show is located on the grounds of the Cuneo Museum in Vernon Hills. It opens at 6pm every night. The drive through the light show takes about 20 to 25 minutes and they have you tune into a radio station that is playing fun Christmas music. You enter through huge lit up arches that start out the 12 Days of Christmas (there is a countdown). There is also a challenge given at the beginning of the show – to count how many snowmen you see throughout the ride. I can say we were way off (we missed a lot of them apparently)! It was so great this year to see the light show through our daughter Reese’s eyes. She was so excited about everything she saw which made it that much more fun for my husband and I.

One of our favorite parts as we drove through were all of the Disney characters. Those are a big deal in our house these days so seeing Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Cinderella, The Little Mermaid, The Hunchback of Notre Dame and all of the other characters from the movies we love was very exciting. Every tree is lit up and there are shapes of animals, elves, presents and candy canes everywhere. There were some really creative things too, like a horse drawn carriage with lights that made it look like it was moving and a ferris wheel. Another spot we loved was Santa’s workshop set-up with Santa and the Elves all around it as well as the reindeer.

Well I can definitely say that if inspiration for the lights on our house is what we were looking for, we got what we came for. We had a great time and it truly put us into the holiday spirit. While our house doesn’t look anywhere close to what we saw, we did get in the spirit and got all of our decorations and lights out.

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