Seeing “Wonka” and Visiting QuikTrip JollyTown at Guthrie Green

Winter Break is off to a pretty great start! Today, Joss is at a Discovery Lab day camp, and I’m very grateful that they offered those this year! Yesterday, we did a couple of fun afternoon/evening activities – seeing “Wonka” at Circle Cinema and visiting the QuikTrip JollyTown at Guthrie Green.

“Wonka”

Some of the movies we’ve seen in theaters lately have been pretty hit or miss with Joss. He’s mildly entertained, but not enthralled. However, he really enjoyed “Wonka.” Enough that afterwards he wanted to ask his best friend if he’s seen it yet. And he didn’t even ask me to quit singing when “Come with me…and you’ll be…in a world of pure imagination…” got stuck in my head afterwards. Which is really saying something.

I was curious if “Wonka” would seem as magical as “Willy Wonka/Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.” It’s a prequel, so a completely different storyline focusing on how and why Willy Wonka wanted to build a chocolate factory in the first place. And it really was! Even though Wonka was just getting started, he was somehow creating magical, fantastical creations out of a tiny little room.

Also, although Timothée Chalamet’s Wonka was definitely recognizably Wonka and had some familiar mannerisms, he was very sweet and optimistic. I didn’t feel like there was any of the Wonka creepiness from the movie versions…like where they don’t seem to care when terrible things happen to the children.

Anyway, I really didn’t know what to expect from this movie musical, but Joss and I would both happily watch it again. The songs and choreography were great, and Hugh Grant as the Oompa Loompa was laugh-out-loud funny. Here’s the trailer:

JollyTown

The holidays get so busy, and we love doing our favorite things year after year. Garden of Lights, Philbrook Festival, etc. But it is also fun to try something new! So after the movie, Joss and I headed to Guthrie Green to visit the inaugural QuikTrip JollyTown.

A big focus of JollyTown is photo ops. They have a really lovely Santa setup, and the life-size snow globe is unique.

But in addition to the photo ops, there are plenty of fun activities. These include an inflatable obstacle course, free hot chocolate, crafting tables and a Christmas movie. The movie started at 7 p.m.

They didn’t let a lot of kids go on the obstacle course at once, which I appreciated. It was nice and calm.

Joss was most excited to see the real live reindeer! She was very sweet and good at posing!

My main suggestion if you’re going is to make sure you’re bundled up. We didn’t have to stand in line too long, but there were several lines that needed standing in. The longest was the snow globe line. Also, you need to sign a release form before doing the snow globe photo op or inflatable obstacle course, so look for those tables near the entry point. Having the movie playing made standing in line a bit better, too. The audio was loud enough to hear from across the Green.

JollyTown hours are 6-9 p.m., Sunday-Thursday, 6-10 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays through Dec. 22. All activities are free. Guthrie Green is just beautiful anyway this time of year, so if you don’t get a chance to visit JollyTown, the Green is still worth a visit.

After JollyTown, we were very hungry (OK, I was definitely getting hangry). Joss was adamant that we grab dinner at QuikTrip (he loves their egg rolls), since they were the sponsor of JollyTown. And I couldn’t argue with that, ha. It did make sense.

Have you been to JollyTown or tried any other new-to-you holiday adventures in Tulsa? Tell us about them in the comments!