You know how I was bummed that we had to miss our Callaway Gardens Fantasy in Lights weekend due to sickness?

The thing that was especially bum-ish, was that I wanted to do a lights thing last year, but I thought all of the stuff around here was too expensive for how young my kids were (since I wasn’t even sure they’d know what was happening…ha!)

So I booked that Callaway weekend in like…March.

That’s how much I really wanted to do it this year!

When I realized it wasn’t going to happen, I was bummed for a minute and then got over it.

And then I remembered my neighbor mentioning that Life University — a nearby college — had a lights event on their campus.

Their campus that is 20 minutes from our house.

And on weekdays, it costs $5 for a car.

I thought, “Well for $5, it’s probably just a little thing, but that’s fine because the kids will probably think it’s cool since they’ve never really seen any lights before.”

Y’all.

It was NOT a little thing.

It was a huge, insanely awesome thing!

I cannot BELIEVE they do this!  And that I didn’t know about it until now!  And why does anyone around here pay $50+ for lights shows when this one is $5?!

It was great!

It was everything I wanted my kids to see and more.  Seriously.

Here’s the thing, though…

I cannot take pictures of lights to save my life.

There is an art to it, and it’s an art I do not have at all!

My photos all look…lame.

(Sorry!)

But I promise, the lights are huge and cool!

They had a tunnel of lights to drive through, and the big lights everywhere, and the dragon of lights in the water, and the nativity of lights, and a big Santa Claus and his reindeer of lights — just LIGHTS, LIGHTS, EVERYWHERE!

See this bad picture of lights?  It was WAY BETTER in person!

There’s a dragon in there.  I took 15 pictures of this…this was the best.  For real, you guys.

They also had five…trailers (?) that had different, elaborate Christmas scenes inside.  We all loved this!  They were so detailed and kind of reminded me of what Christmas store windows may have looked like back in the day.  Also? These kids’ mom didn’t know there would be stuff to do outside, so they are wearing light jackets in 30 degree weather.  (Mom of the Year!!)

The elves taking care of the reindeer!  And other random animals apparently…

They *feel* like they are at the North Pole!  And that they wish their mom not only knew how to take light pictures, but any picture at all.  Mom Shadow photo bomb! Also? Cutest kids ever.

And…they had a train ride!  That was covered in Christmas lights!  It was like they *knew* we were coming!

And then I sat this very happy boy on my lap and covered him in my vest for the ride, and it was awesome.

Afterwards, Kev bought us hot chocolate, and he bought himself a fried Snickers, which totally grossed me out. 🙂  And even though we didn’t do s’mores, we did hang out by the s’more fire, which was great.

It was the best surprise ever.

I just LOVED it and know we will be returning next year!

I feel like I already got my Christmas gift and it was that night with my sweet family.

Merry Christmas to me!

LOVE.