What: “ZooLights!’’

Where: Stone Zoo, Stoneham

When the sun goes down and thousands of twinkling lights come up, the living-and-breathing residents of the Stone Zoo take a back seat to the mechanical, stuffed, revolving animals and lighted trees. This winter wonderland is part amusement park, photo op with Santa, illuminated nighttime stroll, trip to the zoo (including two live reindeer), Santa’s village, and dancing Barbies. Piped-in Burl Ives greets us, along with the announcement from our almost-6-foot-tall son, “We have to go on that ride!,’’ as he points to a spinning toddler-sized amusement.

We walk by Santa’s Castle, where Mr. Claus meets, greets, and poses with his fans, and then start our stroll along tree-lined paths filled with toy soldiers, penguins, stuffed Santas, Muppets, snowmen, polar bears, storybook characters, toy trains and villages, and Charlie Brown’s pathetic Christmas tree. In my hunt for the Barbies, I almost miss the cute doll head that pops out of a bucket. Elise describes it as “creepy’’ (perhaps some childhood trauma resurrecting its ugly little head?).

There they are; there they are, the dancing Barbies. Three Kens are scattered throughout the display of about a dozen gowned dolls twirling inside their plexiglass display case. Moving along, there’s a huge stuffed bear that Cam and Elise snap pictures of because one of the bear’s large blinking eyes has a mechanical malfunction that they want to immortalize at the exact time of the lid droop (where did we go wrong?).

Time for the main event for our not-so-little darlings - the spinning buckets ride - where Cam turns the steering wheel to make their bucket revolve faster than any attraction in the place. All the little kids point and admire their speed, and Elise walks off a little wobbly, saying, “That was fun,’’ while Cam sports a grin wider than the Barbies’.

“ZooLights!’’ is at the Stone Zoo, 5-9 p.m. through Dec. 30 (closed Dec. 25). $5 Mon-Thurs, $6 Fri-Sun, $1 online discount, free under age 2, $11 for Santa photos (through Dec. 23). 781-438-5100. www.stonezoo.org