A new Christmas tradition started last year here in Peoria and that’s the Christmas Village at The Peoria Riverfront Museum.

Last year’s was a lot of fun but it was really crowded on Saturday, so I thought I’d break tradition here on the blog and go out on a Friday night!

Here we are at the Peoria Riverfront Museum in downtown Peoria and it’s all lit up and very festive down here!

Check out the tree, it’s fabulous! Let’s climb this lit-up stairway and check out this year’s Christmas Village.

The place is sparkly and there’s lots of vendors selling holiday goodies up here.

There’s another view of that spectacular and sparkly tree and there’s Santa himself waving at us!

Merry Christmas, Santa Claus!

There’s even more vendors over here and as you can see, there’s quite a crowd here on the opening night.

I love that sparkly sculpture and the lit-up reindeer on display on the grounds.

What a wonderful display of Christmas lights and cheer.

All this walking around has given me an appetite and luckily there’s a whole row of food trucks over here!

I decided to get a personal pizza at Rubi’s Brickoven Pizza truck.

Michele took my order and flashed a beautiful smile for the MBIP Camera!

I got a pepperoni personal pizza and it was absolutely delicious. It really hit the spot and helped warm me up on this chilly night out in downtown Peoria!

After I devoured that delicious pizza, I saw the Tripple Dipple’s truck and went over and said hi to Herreld the owner of Triple Dipple’s.

Always wonderful to see Herreld, he’s one of the friendliest fellows I’ve ever met!

I got an order of Red Velvet Cheesecake and it was a sweet and delicious treat!

After dinner I ran into Dr. Tim Cundiff and had a nice conversation with him. Tim’s a local Optometrist, and if you need some eyecare, check him out by clicking right here.

While we were talking, Bill Conger, the Chief Curator for the museum and his wife Michelle came over and said hello and posed for the MBIP Camera with Tim. Great to see and chat with all of them!