It's Christmaaaaaasss!

I took Calista to ZooLights here in Calgary. We go to the zoo almost every week, and for months now, we've seen them putting more and more lights up in preparation, so I decided to let her see the finished product. It was just her and me. We bundled up: snow pants and long underwear, winter boots and scarves, the whole nine yards.

On the way to the zoo, the first time ever in the nighttime, she told me, "It's dark, but there will be lights so I can see." Calista also noticed the moon as we were driving, especially since she and I studied the letter M this week, and the moon just that morning. "Look Momma, the moon! He's following us! He wants to come to the zoo with us. He's nice."

Her excitement was off the charts. As we pulled into our parking space, she said in her squealiest voice, "I soOOooo excited!" And so was I, mostly to watch Calista looking at the lights.

Every moment was magical for her and left Calista in awe. Seeing the lights with a three-year-old reminds me to celebrate all the little beautiful things.

She got to visit with Santa. Calista has been talking about seeing Santa for a while now (where did that come from??), and when the time came, she happily rushed up to him, but didn't want to sit on his lap, so she didn't. No worries. She was still thrilled.

He didn't ask her want she wanted for Christmas, and she didn't volunteer - I definitely didn't mind. We did walk away with a couple candy canes - yum!

After Santa, we headed to the skating rink they had set up. She definitely wanted to go skating - "on a frozen lake," - so we went to grab a pair of skates for her. I decided to just stay in boots, since I'm not terribly steady and I wanted to make sure she didn't hurt herself. It was a good move, Calista did not want me to let go of her hands (both of them!) the whole time. I tried to convince her to hold on to the wall so I could get a quick picture, but no dice. She seriously loved it, though, in spite of her unsteadiness. We went all the way around their rink twice. At every exit, I asked her if she want to be done, but she said no - "This is so fun! I skating!" Once we got off the rink, she finally consented to a picture:

Pink ice skates and all.

Right outside the skating rink there was a voice-activated light-up tree. Calista went over to the microphone and started singing Jingle Bells and dancing. The the tree started singing Mariah Carey's "All I Want For Christmas is You," she paused and listened for a moments, then started singing "It's Christmas! It's Christmaaaaaasss!" and dancing. It was one of those moments when I thought my three-year-old was about the cutest thing in the whole world.

I am so glad that Calista and I were about to spend some time together, just the two of us. We played tag in an area of hay bales in the kid zone - oh, the giggles! - and we walked all around until Calista tried to sit down on the sidewalk and said, "I don't have power... I tired." So home and to bed we went.

But not before stopping and taking a picture with an orca... obviously.

Merry start of the Christmas season to all, and to all a good night (after zoolights).