A Day Out With Thomas...and friends

Before the Thomas post, I wanted to let y'all know about baby Lucas. I'm sure everyone knows that about 6 wks ago I was told that I may have placenta previa. We were quite nervous for a while, but I went today for my bi-weekly sonogram and got some great news! The placenta moved up and I'm no longer at risk. Baby Lucas is weighing in at 2 lbs 15 oz in the 60th percentile and all is going well. Now we're just waiting to meet him!

And onto Thomas...On Saturday we headed to Chattanooga, TN to spend a day with Thomas the Tank Engine. Ryan was lucky enough to have his friends Landon & Sophie along. I somehow managed to not get a single picture of Sophie...sorry Sophie, Ryan had fun with you too-I promise!

Our first stop was Imagination Station. Ryan was so excited to get a temporary tattoo of "James" the red engine. And Ryan and Landon had so much fun with the Lego Trains that neither of them wanted to leave the tent for our train ride.

We eventually pried them away and headed over to see Thomas! Ryan was very excited, though you can't really tell from his photos!

Once we were on the train, we couldn't get Ryan to stay seated. He was so excited he was jumping from seat to seat....until the conductor came by to talk to the kids. Both Landon & Ryan took listening to him VERY seriously.

A little while later, the conductor returned to give the boys Jr. Engineer Certificates for helping to drive Thomas. Ryan was beside himself with pride. He showed everyone that would look and then kept it with him for the rest of the ride.

Then about halfway through the train ride, the boys started to get silly

A picture with Thomas after our train ride. I SWEAR he was having fun!

And then off to meet Sir Toppham Hatt

Next stop, the petting zoo

And before we left, Ryan wanted to take a tour of the old trains around the museum. I was excited to see a little piece of home in an MBTA commuter rail but Ryan was tired and wanted to head home without a picture on a Boston train.

Overall, we all had a great family day with some great friends. And Ryan is still talking about his "James" tattoo. When it came off in the bath he was sad so I tried to explain the temporary part of the tattoo. So, now he wants a real one. I keep trying to tell him that he's going to regret a tattoo of a train in 20 years, but he's stubborn so we'll have to see :)

Fun Fun Fun!

On Saturday we went to a fundraising event at the baseballs fields to support Gavin's baseball team. The boys had an amazing day. They had sno-cones, went on pony rides, played lots of games, got their faces painted & jumped until they couldn't jump anymore!

And this is the newest member of the family. When Ryan asked to play the "pick a duck" game, I thought nothing of it, until he pulled out a duck with an "F" on it, and they gave him this...Ryan has named him "Orange".

And today Ryan went to play at Pirates Cove with his good friends Landon & Avery. They had fun digging, climbing, jumping & running. I think this is one of Ryan's new favorite places, and I know we'll be going back once daddy finds out about the cannons!

Tiny Tots

Two posts in one day...don't get used to it :)

This morning Ryan and I headed over to a nearby roller skating rink where they were having Tiny Tots morning for toddlers to bring their bikes & ride around the rink. We'd been before with Gavin so Ryan was a bit bummed that he didn't have anybody to ride around with, but eventually he found a little boy his age who just happened to have the same Diego bike. They chased each other around and had a great time.

Before we left, Ryan wanted to play a game of skee-ball. He tried and tried to get the ball up the ramp & into the hole but got a little more frustrated each time it rolled right back to him. Finally, he decided to take matters into his own hands...and cheat. I thought about getting him down, but decided to snap a quick photo first :) He eventually got 10 tickets and picked out a shiny new dinosaur.

Daddy's Little Helper

For nearly 3 years now I've been telling Dave that our yard is too big & needs to be mowed too often for a push mower, but he refuses to buy a rider-he says he needs the exercise & riders are a waste of money. Well, now it has turned out to be a good bonding experience as well. A couple of nights ago we were playing outside when daddy decided to mow the lawn. The second Ryan saw him go get the lawn mower he darted into the garage. About 30 seconds later he appeared again with his lawn mower in hand and a "let's get down to business" look on his face! He helped daddy do the entire front lawn!

And then rewarded himself with a ride around the freshly cut yard :)

Playtime

Today we went to Miss Lala's Treehouse for some open play time with Ryan's friends. It was our first time at Miss Lala's so we weren't quite sure what to expect, but the kids had fun running around and making a mess (that we didn't have to clean up-yay!) For some reason (perhaps the photographer??), all of the pictures came out super blurry, so the ones that made the cut aren't great, but you get the idea. Ryan just enjoyed spending some quality time with his friends.

A day at the zoo

Ryan got to spend all day Monday at the zoo with his friend Landon! He had a great time. His favorite parts were the train ride & the carousel. This was our very first trip to Zoo Atlanta, I'm not sure why we haven't gone until now-but, we will definitely be going back soon!

We started off at the playground area where the boys burned off some of their early morning energy by running around, climbing & sliding.

Then we headed over to take a train ride around the zoo. The boys decided to hold hands and wait for the train. Despite the grumpy look, Ryan was having a blast.

Soon we were off exploring and looking for animals. I had been telling Ryan about the zoo trip for several days before we went and all he said for days was "Ian zoo with Andon, see ooh ooh aahs" For those of you that don't speak Ryan...thats "Ryan's going to the zoo with Landon to see the monkeys" Sadly, we didn't see very many monkeys, but luckily Ryan took a special interest in the elephants. As you can see, he thought he'd just climb in there and go say hello.

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After lunch we decided to try out the carousel. In the past, the carousel has been a disaster for us, but I thought with Landon by his side Ryan would brave it....and he did! The picture on the left is before the ride started out-he was totally freaked out and wanted off. But, then we started to go and a little smile started to come out :) By the end of the ride he was laughing and wanted to go again.

And finally, the petting zoo. Ryan made sure to give a little lovin' to each and every animal before we headed home.

Jumpits!

Ryan had an especially great day today. First, he woke up to find that daddy took a day off to spend with us. Then he remembered that it was Thursday, so he gets to spend the whole day with Landon. And the icing on the cake...we all got to go to Jumpits! For a 2 year old, life doesn't get much better!

Ryan, Landon & especially Dave had a great time jumping and running around. The boys jumped for over 2 hours and were nice & worn out when we left.
It wasn't easy getting them to stay still long enough for pictures, so here's the best I could do-