Carmela's Magical Santa Land — Local services in Longview

This place is definitely a WINTER WONDERLAND! It is really neat that they do it for free. Yes they ask for donations & I always give it, with a very happy heart. Because what's neat is Mom's (or anyone else!) that can't afford to pay, are able to do this for free. And that is truly heart warming to me. The light display is seriously impressive & gets bigger & better EVERY single year! We LOVED the walk thru that they added to it last year & we cannot wait to go this year & see what they've added! We go every single year. Also, IT IS WORTH THE WAIT Y'ALL! The line moves pretty quickly. I always bring yummy snacks, a holidays book or two & a Christmas activity to do with my little one while we wait. That part has actually become part of the tradition 🥰 I will come back & add more pictures after this year's visit!

Last year they had really neat vendors set up & we were able to do a fingerprint ornament as a family & it is now my favorite Christmas ornament that we have! I hope they have something similar to that this year. I also got a super cute hand-made snowman from the same lady that did the Christmas ornaments and she had several other things that I wanted 😍 I will find pictures of the snowman ⛄ & come back to add it!

We went tonight (11-21-21) & we were so impressed! There's SO many new lights! It was great. We didn't do the trail this time because it was sprinkling rain but, we will...

This place was AWESOME!! I rode with a van full of 13 friends down there from Dallas which took us two and a half hours. All of it thoroughly enjoyed ourselves and had the best time when we got there. We were a little freaked out by the giant line to get into the place, but it moves really fast and we were in there. And as soon as you drive in it's like you are overwhelmed with all of the Sparkle and the lights. It's like you literally drove into Christmas Winter Wonderland. It was spectacular awesome wonderful terrific tantalizing even... It was just the coolest thing ever. They work on donations and we donated $100. It was well worth it. However we bought ornaments in the gift shop. It was right at the end of the night when everything was closing. There was a woman and a man working it. Mind you they were only like two more days to Christmas so they were at the end of their season and the woman that worked in there is rude as rude can be. I think she's Lucifer sister. She didn't want my kids to use up too much ink putting their fingerprints on an ornament. Which I thought was rude as hell and then didn't want to give them the colored string that they wanted for the ornament. Even the woman's husband told her she was being ridiculous and rude and tacky. So...

The inside where the vendors are, was very drab. Not cheery like Christmas at all. There were new vendors as well and the ones that have been there for years are not there any longer. It was extremely disappointing this year unfortunately. I have always loved Carmela’s. It was my late mother in laws tradition to load everyone up on Thanksgiving night and go to Carmela’s, belt the songs on the radio that play while driving through the lights and then stop and get hot cocoa, kettle corn, a wooden ornament, a sweater and so on. Instead there are vendors that definitely don’t bring in the Christmas spirit with their setups and items they have presented. The toy place is still there and the clothing boutique, as well as the hot cocoa and kettle corn. But the other regulars are gone. The cup company and the wood working company. As well as the tree place. It was so very sad to see. I’m unsure if we will be back. May as well take the trip to the actual Santa land instead. We miss you original...