It's Santa, Baby!

The Websters and the Hudoshi's (Brian and Kavita) headed out to the Trail of Lights for the opening night ceremonies. Aimee got us on the guestlist for Asleep at the Wheel (they were playing the main entertainment stage), so we got to ride through the trail on a fancy horse-drawn wagon. I'm pretty sure it was the first time she had ever seen a horse, but she didn't really blink an eye -- just sort of stared at all the horses as if they were overgrown doggies. Without any prompting whatsoever, Sophie began blowing kisses to the folks lined up on the parade route. She seemed interested in the lights, but much more interested in the jingling of the bells and the music piped through the park. When we rolled past the music stage, this little helper elf ran back to our carriage and said, "This is the Asleep at the Wheel wagon -- let these folks out!" So the whole procession stopped while we exited the carriage. I began blubbering "Uh...we're not really the band. We just know the daughter of the sound guy....," but Frank was yelling a hello to Ray Benson like we go waaayyyy back. Sophie started dancing like a wind-up toy and Ray Benson actually told her hello and said she was the best dancer there. (Beam beam beam) Then we walked down to Santa's Village before all the riff raff (foot traffic not cool enough to be mistaken for someone important) could make their way through the trail, and Sophie was the very first kid to sit on Santa's lap. She was actually pretty cool with it -- we were all prepared for screams and hysteria. But she was down with the Santa man.