Family Fun!

We decided it would be fun to take our boys to Day Out With Thomas. We were too late for his visit to the Baltimore Railroad Museum this year, and I'd heard good things about the Strasburg, PA location, so we turned it into a little vacation. Thursday we saw Thomas and miniature horses. Friday we went to an amusement park. And Saturday we visited Hershey's Chocolate World and the Turkey Hill Experience. We were pretty sure our toddler would love everything, and he did. We all did!

THURSDAY

Our toddler got a bit shy when he first saw Thomas.  He still gets excited when I show him this picture.

We arrived at the train station a little over an hour before our ticket time and looked around and went on a little train. I'm pretty sure our toddler was wondering why we weren't riding Thomas like he'd been promised.


But the time finally came and it was so much fun!


That's right, Thomas' eyes and mouth moved.


After riding Thomas we checked out the Thomas Tent to have lunch, and of course to play! We all got tattoos and our toddler considered the train tables for a bit but they were crowded so decided to play with the floor trains.



Before we left we enjoyed browsing the gift shop. And the gift shop enjoyed us.

The Railroad Museum is in Amish Country and a couple miles down the road is a Li'l Country Store and Miniature Horse Farm. We wanted to check out the store and see if our toddler wanted to ride a miniature horse. He said he did but I asked him too soon cause it had rained a little earlier and since it was wet out they weren't doing rides. But a little girl that was there when we arrived was feeding the horses hay and before Hot Cup or I went to help our toddler do it he started to do it all on his own! He loved feeding them.



He didn't eat much of the lunch we got him at the Thomas event, but when we went to Taco Bell that evening he was a little champ, eating most of a soft taco and some of a Crunchwrap. We let the baby try the Crunchwrap too. (I didn't take my camera in but couldn't resist a couple cell phone pics.)


Before going to sleep we had to check out some of our new Thomas stuff. And eat mango. Hot Cup cut up a mango each night. Our family loves those.


FRIDAY

We spent the night near Hershey which was sort of central to all our plans, and on Friday we went to America's largest free admission amusement park - Knoebels. I've never been to a free admission amusement park before and it was really neat. (Hershey park would have cost our family $160 admission!! We spent $30 +food at Knoebels.) And there were so many fun rides for little kids. Our baby and I joined our toddler & Hot Cup for 4 rides: 2 trains, a boat, & a carousel, but mostly we just watched them have fun.


Hot Cup went with our toddler on his first few rides.



We didn't expect him to want to do the Hand Car since he declined the one they had at the train station the day before, but he wanted to!  And after that he asked to do the Red Baron which Hot Cup couldn't stay with him for at all, and he loved it!


Then he asked to ride the fire truck, which we discovered meant the fire truck on the Spanish Bambini.  He'd been on the jeep on that ride with Hot Cup, but this time he wanted to do it by himself.  He rode that ride a few more times and since it was his favorite he did it a few more times at the end of our visit - to use up our tickets.  (He had Hot Cup stay with him at the end of the day ... he was getting rather tired.)  The fire truck and tractor seemed to be his favorites.


We weren't sure he'd love the bumper cars, but he was determined (he'd watched the big kid bumper cars while we were in a line earlier) so we told him what to expect and let him. He kept his foot on the pedal but we don't think he ever pushed it with enough force, but he didn't seem to mind getting bumped into. He was probably the youngest there. I was glad that the few kids who knew what they were doing were good about how they bumped into everyone.


For dinner we went to a barbecue place Hot Cup had found online and it was delicious. Thankfully our toddler had eaten his pizza at Knoebels cause he was not interested in the food there.

After the boys were asleep Hot Cup and I talked about how fun it was to see our toddler enjoying our trip, how cute he was, and how he's getting so independent! It's exciting watching your kids grow up! We may have been a bit giddy about it.

SATURDAY

We started off Saturday at Hershey's Chocolate World. They have quite a bit of fun stuff and our toddler enjoyed the tour, eating chocolate, picking out some kisses, and holding his baby brother for a picture. And after a little lunch we went upstairs to Dessert Creations and had yummy fondue.


Then we went to Turkey Hill for ice cream. Hot Cup and I did the Create Your Own interactive thing so that was fun. And we mixed our own ice cream flavors in the Taste Lab. Hot Cup made mango, pineapple, raspberry and I helped our toddler make (and eat) a chocolate, cake, marshmallow one.



There's a recap of our trip! I love spending time with my family, I'm one happy mama!