My husband’s birthday is around the holidays so we decided to do a weekend in Solvang to celebrate both!

We’ve been to Solvang once before for a night during pandemic as we made our way down the California coast. We weren’t able to do much since we arrived late and only had time for a quick walk through the following day so we were excited to experience Solvang more this time! We arrived Friday and went to the Copenhagen Sausage Garden! We loved the variety of sausages and I especially love the giant pretzel (baby boy loves carbs so mama is happily partaking!).

We walked around a bit and got to experience holiday magic with live carolers! Then we went to rest up for the next day where we started the morning with brunch at Brekkies which has Dutch pancakes which are like crepes and just so delish!

Next we walked downtown which is only a few streets. It was quite crowded especially compared to the last time we went. Honestly it was a bit overwhelming with people everywhere, but we should have expected it being during the holidays – everyone wants to enjoy the Hallmark-esque holiday vibes!

Then we drove about 10 minutes to the Cowboy Christmas which is basically a live ranch that celebrates the holidays with events for the tourists – gotta make that tourist money 😉 At first we were worried because it was quite empty and it seemed sad with a handful of animals and a few very handmade “booths” for games and one food truck. We tried to be optimistic and do the arts and crafts first. The employees/volunteers were so sweet! It really felt like such a Hallmark movie where the big city girl ends up in a tiny town and is unsure how to handle it when she’s more used to the hustle and bustle. Then as we kept going around, we saw the quaint joy of it all! We got to ride horses while trying to balance an ornament (I did not succeed 😅), petted goats and best of all got to do mini pony’s hair aka add bows and clips, but really we just petted them joyfully ☺️ it ended up being really fun!

Lastly we ended the night at a pasta place that I honestly can’t remember the name of…the food was good, but most of our party was pretty tired so the meal was a blur.

The next day we were off and headed back to OC! Till next time Solvang xo