Tilden Park Carousel

It's Christmas Eve! Can you believe it?

I feel like this whole month has just flown by and we haven't had a chance to do as much festive stuff as we had hoped - sick kids make it tricky to get out and about. The girls have been off school this past week so we managed to fit in a few days of Christmas fun - before the next kid sickness hit. It's been a bad month for sick kids in our home.

Wednesday night we jumped in a Zipcar and headed up into the Berkeley Hills to visit the Tilden Park Carousel. We've been to the carousel several time during the day but never before at night. In the lead up to Christmas each year the carousel is open in the evening for rides under the twinkling Christmas lights. A festive display of lights and inflatables surrounds the carousel building and on certain nights Santa even makes an appearance. It's a fun Berkeley Christmas institution that we haven't taken part in until now.

As soon as we arrived we hopped in line for the carousel. We took two turns on the carousel and the kids had a blast. On our first go we all got horses. Ava was super keen to ride the pig and was excited that it was free for our second turn.

After our rides on the carousel we grabbed a snack of ice cream and popcorn and checked out the fun display outside. It had been quite cool when we arrived at the carousel, but by the time we finished our rides the temperature had dropped substantially and it was really quite cold. Those puffer jackets I bought for our camping trip back in September really came in handy! Someone else who was dressed snuggly warm happened to be outside so we snapped a quick picture with him while the girls told him what they'd like for Christmas. On a side note, later in the evening Lola vomited everywhere and then spent the next two days in bed. I didn't notice it at the time, but looking back I can now see how unwell she looks here with Santa. This was about half an hour before she puked. Thankfully, she's much better today.

The lights and inflatable display was quite fun. The girls loved seeing the lights change colors and were happy to see some of their favorite characters such as Snoopy and Olaf. They had no idea who Chewbacca was though. I think it's time we educate the kids about Star Wars!

Our evening at the Tilden Park Carousel was quite magical and it's something I hope we can do every year from now on - minus Lola vomiting after we left, of course.

Have you been to the Tilden Park Carousel over Christmas? Is there a holiday carousel where you live? I'd love to hear! There's something magical about vintage carousels at any time of year, but even more so at Christmas.