Yesterday I found myself in a place time forgot, a real, old-fashioned toy store. I’d heard about this place for years but had never visited it. With many kiddos on my list these days, it seemed like a place I should visit. And I was right.

I knew from the minute I walked in that I had found my happy place — or at least my happy shopping place, non-shopper that I am. Here were dolls and dress-up clothes and scads of Legos and Duplos. Here were books and science kits and adorable stuffed animals. Here were toys of my youth, like paddle balls and those little gizmos with magnetic filings that you can use to give a man a beard or a ’60s do.

It’s all part of my “make shopping fun” campaign, at which I’ve only been partly successful. After I left the toy store I spent some time wandering in the wilderness that is Tysons. But even there, buoyed by my earlier shopping experience, I could right myself and make good choices.

Most of all, I’m glad to know toy stores like this still exist, that they haven’t all vanished. Because children are what Christmas is about.