Anyhow, these pics are from the vacation we took the week before Labor Day. The fun actually started a couple days earlier when I got a new minivan -- a VW Routan! Yes, you read that right. I am now a proud minivan mom. Anyone who's too cool to drive a van can go right ahead and make fun of me -- I LOVE the automatic doors, the space, and all the doo-dads. So we happily drove our new car all over the place for this trip.
We started the week by driving to the other side of Pennsylvania to go to Sesame Place, a theme park filled with all Sesame Street attractions. On the way there, we stopped at the Crayola Factory, which isn't really a factory at all. It's more of a children's museum made up of stations using Crayola products. And then the 2nd & 3rd floors were a canal museum. I'm not really sure why. There may have been an explanation, but I was too busy chasing the kids to see it. I was actually a little disappointed in it overall, but the kids were definitely ready for a break at that point, and it was about the right length of an activity, so we're all happy. After that we drove to our hotel in New Jersey--not too much exciting about that except that it was a chance for both Jeremy & I to knock another state off our lists since neither of us had been there.
The next day we headed to Sesame Place. The kids could hardly contain their excitement. Once we were there, they made a bee-line for the merry-go-round. We actually took our time through the park, and let the kids just guide our adventures--if they wanted to ride things several times, we did. If they didn't want to do things, then we passed. Jacob's favorite ride was definitely the Elmo blast off. Even though he looks terrified in the picture, he kept saying "Blast Off. Up down. Again! Again!" Samantha attempted her first roller coaster, but I'd definitely say she takes after her mother. As soon as they hit the top of the first hill, she started screaming "too fast! too fast!" The good news is that she walked off the ride smiling, so she's not completely traumatized. Both kids also really liked the waterslide, which surprised me a bit. But I do think it helped that they got to ride with us.
After Sesame Place, we headed over to Dayton to visit the many friends who have been asking us to head down that way (yes, I know it's a weird trip). On the way there, we stopped at Hershey Chocolate World. What fun! I think all of us could have stayed for longer, so we'll definitely have to go back. But it was a long long drive to Dayton, so we had to be on our way.
We spent the first day with "Mr. Devin," Jeremy's best friend who is like an uncle to the kids. He took us to the firehouse where he works & the kids got to play in the fire truck. Sammie also tried on his gear -- so cute! Then we headed down to the Cincinnati Zoo. It's smaller than Cleveland, but really nice. The disturbing thing, though, was that the workers were busy putting up Christmas lights while we were there! No kidding!
The next day we had a laid back visit with Jeremy's cousin & his wife Sarah. They have the most adorable house. The kids' favorite part was definitely the "hidden room" in their bathroom. We ended the day with a rousing game of electronic Trivial Pursuit. We didn't pack in the activities, but we had a great time catching up, not to mention that we needed a day off our feet.
For our last full day in town, I headed to the new outlet mall that had just opened by Devin's house while the boys took the kids swimming. Can't pass up the chance for a good deal! Then in the evening, our friend Julie & her daughter Kalli came down from Columbus for dinner. Then we met up with one of my college friends, Sarah, and her husband for brunch on our way out of town at an amazing little breakfast place.
We'll definitely have to head back to Dayton again, because we didn't get NEARLY enough time to visit everyone. We've been back for a week now, and I still haven't quite recovered. I'll try to post more about last week's activities soon!
No comments:
Post a Comment