Blog-a-thon 2009!

I have a ton of posts to write and just can't seem to get to it. I feel like I always have homework to do. Strange.

And since I will be digging deep in my memory bank to capture all of the happenings of the past 2 months, some details may be a little off. If you happen to have been with me for one of the events I blog about and my account of what happened, time frames, etc. are inaccurate, let's just keep it hush-hush and chalk it up to me being a tired, worn out mother of a very energetic, time-out hating, terrible-two-ing toddler. Silence is golden.

So I will first blog about our ride on the Pumpkin Patch Express on October 26, 2009.

Bryce is in to trains and my mom had mentioned that Brett (who was obsessed with trains when he was little) went on a train when he was younger and loved it.

Katie, Mike, Bryce, and I went on the train ride down in Parrish. Bryce was excited when he saw the engine and cars but I don't think he understood that we were actually going to ride on it.

We got there about 30 minutes before we were scheduled to depart, which I thought would give us plenty of time to find seats together, but our car was packed already. We had to sit in separate rows with a mom and her 2.5 year old daughter sitting in our row. Mike and Grandma's window didn't open, our window did.
Just shortly after we started chugging away, I realized we were on a moving daycare and that the 45 minute ride to the pumpkin patch would seem much, much longer. Bryce enjoyed sitting next to the little girl (cannot for the life of me remember her name) and would sit in the sit next to me and then get down and stare at the girl and then jump back up on the seat.

Then he wanted to walk around so we went to the back car (Mike and Grandma took him on walks too,) which was an open car (like a tram almost) and then walked back through our car in to the cars ahead of us. It was a little scary crossing between cars, being able to see the ground or track below and with the cars swaying back and forth, it made it a little difficult to walk. I held Bryce just in case...

The ride itself wasn't very eventful- the scenery was of fields, pastures, lots of Florida vegetation. Not exactly the Orient Express that travels through the Rockies or Alaska. Bryce obviously didn't care though. He was a little antsy but manageable between the 3 of us.

We made it to the pumpkin patch and had an hour to pick out a pumpkin, grab a bite to eat from the boy scouts that had a tent set up, selling hot dogs, pizza, nachos, pumpkin pie, drinks, and pork sandwiches.

We spent our first part of the hour trying to find a pumpkin (and taking a ton of pictures of course.) They were small for the kids and Bryce would pick one up and say "Mine" and walk around with it for a minute and then drop it and find another one that was his.

Mike grabbed one just in case Bryce couldn't make up his mind.

They had a hay pile and the kids loved jumping in it and throwing it. Bryce wasn't too sure at first about the hay but then I think once he saw how much fun some of the other kids were having he realized he needed to join in on the fun.

There was a corn maze, hay ride, coloring area, sack races, and even a table with train merchandise for sale on it. Grandma bought Bryce a Thomas the Train coloring book and crayon set and a t-shirt.

We ate some lunch and then took Bryce over to the coloring table.

There was a lady making tootsie pop ghosts out of tootsie pops, kleenex and yarn. Bryce could care less about the ghost part and went straight for the tootsie pop. This boy can smell a lollipop a mile away. Loves them.
The hour we had at the pumpkin patch seemed much longer than an hour and I didn't feel rushed like I thought I would. We eventually had to re-board and were told to sit in the same seats. Bryce and the little girl sharing our row, both were deep into their lollipops when the train started rolling. Bryce was better behaved on the ride back due to the lollipop or being too tired to be cranky. Lollipop.He sat next to the little girl and her mom for most of the ride, sucking on his lollipop.
The total train adventure was about 3 hours and definitely worth doing again. They have different themed trips depending on the month or holiday. There is a Polar Express this month (which was already sold out when I booked the Pumpkin Patch Express seats) and it was only $15 per ticket (or $12...can't remember.)

Bryce had fun. Grandma and I had fun. Daddy Byrd LOVED it and did not mind at all that he was on a train full of screaming kids and that the Bucs were playing and he wasn't watching.