We were blacked out from Disneyland on our limited annual passes for the entire holiday weekend, but Mr. W found another option: Knott’s Berry Farm! Turns out that we could get in free until January, so after Allie’s nap, we announced that we had a “surprise” for her.
She’d been wanting to go on trains and buses every time she saw them pass by, and Knott’s, which is presently decked out for the holidays and is calling themselves “Knott’s Merry Farm,” has lots of trains. That’s the first ride we went on.

And the next ride was Snoopy’s bus, which went around like a super-fast Ferris wheel.

Allie was excited to go on this ride, but afterwards, decided she didn’t like it. “It’s too scary,” she said.
Soon we found the Knott’s version of Disneyland’s Teacup ride: spinning Mexican hot chocolate! It was WAY faster than teacups. Mr. W got a little green.

I don’t know why, but from the beginning, Mr. W was convinced Allie would be able to go on the “log ride” with us. This is a roller coaster with a steep wet drop at the end, so I was sure there would be a minimum height requirement. Turns out, we were both right, because at age 2, Allie meets the 36-inch requirement.

We did buy the original print, but I snapped this photo of the displayed image, as well.
Then, more trains! This is the Calico Mines train ride. It had started to get dark, and Knott’s was lighting up.

Knott’s had a real train from the early 19th century shipped in from out-of-state. Two cowboy-like robbers, kerchiefs over their faces, even walked through with revolvers demanding money at one point of the train ride. One man demanded of a young passenger sitting with his girlfriend, “Do you have money?” The guy replied, “No, I don’t have any money.” The robber nodded toward the girlfriend, “Does SHE have all your money?” The guy said, “Yeah, she does!” The robber said to his partner, “Come on, none of these men have their own money here,” and moved on to the next train car. Allie said that was “funny.”

In addition to historic trains, Knott’s has historic buildings transplanted from other states that people can wander into, too. In the Old West section of the amusement park, we found this old 19th Century schoolhouse, complete with the original desks and an actress-teacher.

Allie was so happy that “I went to school!”, having only heard about “school” in the context of where her big sister goes in the day.
Then, we stumbled upon Santa! Allie got to have her photo taken with Santa for the second day in a row, the second time she’s met him! I noted that I’ve never taken a photo with Santa (since I’m an Asian immigrant), so Mr. W had all 3 of us go in on this photo. It’s at home somewhere, waiting to be scanned. This Santa is much nicer. Genuine smiles at the kids, and he went out of his way to chat with them, asking Allie her name, what she wants for Christmas (she just stared at him uncomprehendingly cuz really, is there anything she’s lacking?), and even jovially asked us what we wanted for Christmas. I said I wanted Allie to eat more vegetables. Mr. W asked for retirement. Santa didn’t make us any promises.

We did, however, get a free elf hat for purchasing a photo with Santa. Allie fit right into the Wild Wild West theme of this section of Knott’s with her elf hat, as you can see.

We wrapped up the night with dinner at Mimi’s Cafe, Allie’s choice. “Nooo, not Coco’s! I want Mimi’s Restaurant!”

Incidentally, Mimi’s Cafe (altho not this particular one) is the first restaurant Mr. W and I went to when we started dating 8 years ago…not that he remembers that.