Knitting Zeal

Hershey park happy...or chocolate for dinner

On our second day in Hershey, we went to visit Chocolate World and rode the simulated chocolate factory tour ride.  For the rest of the trip Andrew referred to "going to the chocolate factory" constantly.  Apparently it made quite an impression.  I think more than the ride, he loved that he got to eat chocolate at the end of the ride.  He really likes chocolate.  Lucky for him we were in the right place, since there was chocolate for sale everywhere!  We bought many chocolate gifts as well as our own samples.  

  

There was a giant candy chalet on display...the Amish built it completely out of Hershey's candy products.  The roof is all Hershey bars!  Thankfully there was a fence around it, otherwise there would have been bite marks out of the house!

 
At night, we went back to the Hershey Park complex and went into the park.  Limited rides were open, but there were lots of holiday decorations (ok, 99.95% were Christmas decorations.  They had one lighted menorah and dreidel.  Not diverse at all!) It was very pretty and extremely cold.  Later I learned it was about 27 degrees out, but it was also windy.  Andrew REFUSED to wear mittens.  I brought his hand knit mittens and I bought him mittens to match the monster hat he is wearing but no.  He is part polar bear.  His hands looked awful and he also got angry when we tried to cover him with a blanket.  Crazy two year old...

Chris met his favorite thing--the walking Reece's cup.  There was a walking snowman too, but he was in front of a basketball game, so Andrew didn't care that a real live snowman dancing in front of him trying to get his attention.  He wanted to see the basketballs!  We also warmed up watching a half hour long musical that Andrew seemed to really enjoy.  The actors/singers thanked Andrew at the end for coming to their show.  The one young girl who was in the production tried to engage Andrew in a conversation before we left.  He just watched her for a few minutes and then said "I like chocolate!"  What a pick-up line!  We attempted to get some dinner after that, but all Andrew wanted was chocolate.  

 
On our way home from Hershey we stopped in East Earl at the Shady Maple complex.  We went shopping for cookie decorations at the grocery store there.  I love their selection of bulk foods.  We scored enough sprinkles and toppings that will last for a while.  We also picked up some soup mixes.  We went to lunch at the Smörgåsbord, but it wasn't all that fun with a toddler.  Plus, I found the other diners to be really rude.  I was really surprised at that.  All in all we had a great trip!!  
 

Christmastime at the sweetest place in PA

We are currently on a mini-vacation in Hershey, Pennsylvania, home of all things chocolate and cocoa related.  We are staying at a reasonably priced chain hotel that actually smells like chocolate.  The lobby must have chocolate infusers hidden because the place reaks of cocoa.  Not that it's a bad thing, but I would imagine one might get sick of smelling it all the time if one worked here. 

We decided to stay here because the events we want to go to are at night and with the toddler's need for sleep to prevent crankiness, we thought staying overnight would make it more pleasurable for all.  Plus, he is free for most things because he is under age three!

We arrived late this afternoon and got a quick dinner and then went to the Hershey Sweet Lights display, a two mile ride through a field and woods illuminated by lots and lots of lighted images related to the holidays.  They even gave out hologram glasses to wear, which made everything look like snowflake patterns.  Andrew enjoyed his back seat ride through it and even liked listening to the piped in Christmas music on the radio.  It was fun and very clever how they managed to power up so many lights in middle of the woods.

   

It is now a bit after 10 at night and my toddler, who is too excited to be in another place, is still wide awake and talking to the walls.  We are in a small suite that has a living room and a separate bedroom.  My thought was that we could get him to sleep in his pack and play while we stayed in the living room part to read, surf, etc. and then go to sleep later.  So far it doesn't seem like that is going to happen and I have a feeling I'm going to have a toddler kicking my kidneys in bed all night.  Hmm.  Let's hope we all get some sleep because tomorrow morning is our visit to Chocolate World!  Yum.
 

Toddler adventures

Yesterday we took a family trip to meet friends at the NJ Adventure Aquarium.  I had gone there last fall with Andrew when he wasn't quite one year old and not yet walking, so he really did not recall it.  This time he was very interested in running around and the decor and not all that into the fish.  He was excited to point out Nemo, Nemo's daddy, and Dory in many of the tanks, which was really cute.  The aquarium is on the small side and easy to do in a morning, especially with a two year old.  We went to the pet-a-shark tank as well as the ray tank.  Andrew didn't seem to want to touch the fish, but wanted to play in the water.  I did manage to get him to touch a starfish.  They had different kinds in the same tank--some with a hard, scratchy surface, and one orange one that was squishy to the touch.  I love starfish and seahorses; for some reason they fascinate me.  When traveling with a two year old, there is no time for reading the informational posts by the exhibits, though! 
rays

We got to walk though the shark tunnel to see them up-close.  I learned how to tell a male from a female shark--Thanks Julie-Ann! 

Tonight we went to our local mall for the official arrival of Santa.  It is way too early for all this holiday stuff, in my opinion, but I thought it might be fun for Andrew to see.  The mall elves gave out party elf hats and bubble necklaces to the kids.  Andrew loved his necklace and does not know that it actually opens to reveal a bubble wand and bubble fluid.  This shall remain a secret for as long as possible, otherwise I will be finding green bubble fluid everywhere!  There were lots of people there and it was a bit too crowded for the kids to see, but the mall orchestrated it right when they had Santa descend in the glass elevator to the first floor so that everyone got a view of him.  Andrew still doesn't quite get the whole Santa Claus thing, but I hope that he is less fearful of him this year.  It would be nice to have a photo of him where he isn't trying to escape from the jolly old elf. 

 Waiting for Santa

Santa in the elevator!

We have a busy weekend coming up, filled with swim lessons and a cousin's birthday party. Happy Friday!
 
  
 

a trip to the farm

The toddler and I headed over to a (sort of) local farm this morning to check out the pumpkins and events.  Last weekend was cold and rainy, so we didn't make it then.  We had a lot of fun checking out Merrymead Farm, which is a dairy farm.  We checked out the animals first and saw cows, goats, sheep, llamas, a huge hog and some peacocks.  There were a bunch of schools/daycare kids there on trips, so it was a bit crowded.  

Then we headed to the "pumpkin patch," which is really a market area with pre-picked pumpkins.  Toddler boy was very interested in the Indian corn on display and wanted to fill his stroller with it.  I managed to put all but one bunch back.  He then later snuck a mini bunch into the stroller, so we bought that one too.  (He wanted to put it in his bed to sleep with it for his nap, but thankfully I was able to convince him it wasn't a good idea to sleep with a bunch of dried corn.)

 

He had fun putting pumpkins in wagons and even sitting on a few, until I noticed a stern sign saying not to climb on pumpkins.  

Then we went over to the corn tunnel maze, a farmer created tunnel made of corn stalks.  I thought it was just a simple tunnel, but it really was a maze inside and we had to decide what path to take to get out.  It actually was a bit long for me and was starting to creep me out, but the monkey did not mind at all.  He found a half of a dried out ear of corn inside and picked it up for a souvenir.  There was a classroom of students in there too and one young boy was crying because he was scared.  His friend was trying to help him find the exit, which was sweet.  After we left the tunnel and played in the yard with some fall themed wood cut outs, we went to the little market store there for cider donuts.  Toddler-boy loved them!  He even finished off the bag of them when I wasn't looking.  

Not surprisingly, the toddler fell asleep on the way home.  When I got him out of the car he started to cry and asked "where is the pumpkin patch?"  I told him that we would go again, this time with his daddy so we could get a bigger pumpkin.  

Merrymead Farm was a definite hit.  We didn't go through the larger corn maze or on a hayride, simply because they don't do them as often during the week and there were all of the school groups going on pre-arranged ones.  I understand the weekends bring even more activities.  We might try to visit Linvilla Orchards this weekend, but it is really a long ride and will interfere with napping, so I'm not sure.  I am hoping that the weather on Sunday will be nice.

Ocean City, take two

We went to Ocean City, Maryland in the beginning of May this year, sort of an early start to the summer season.  It was rainy most of the time but we had a blast anyway.  We ended the summer with a trip to Ocean City, New Jersey this past weekend.  It was mostly sunny and very windy.  Neither trip produced much beach weather, although this past weekend we made the most of it. 

We arrived in Ocean City on Thursday at lunchtime.  After unloading the car we headed over to the boardwalk so that Andrew could enjoy his first Mack & Manco pizza. 

 The last time we were there, or in OC at all, was when I was pregnant, so we all were looking forward to our favorite beach pizza.  It was good, but not as good as I remembered.  Andrew enjoyed it.  After that we went for a walk on the boardwalk--it was very humid and hot.  We were planning to have our photos done on the beach that night, but the photographer canceled due to a negative weather forecast (it never did rain, though.)  We let Andrew run around on the beach and check out the water.  This time at the Atlantic Ocean he could actually put his feet in it, since the water temperature was around 70 degrees F, unlike the Maryland trip when it was much colder.  Let's just sum it up that I have an ocean loving beach boy.  He loved the waves and had no fear.  After lunch we headed back to our borrowed condo to see if he would nap.  Then we went out to dinner at a cute little restaurant called Periwinkles.  I think I ate some sort of fish or shellfish dish every night.  That night I had the most delicious sweet potato fries--they were really thinly cut and not at all greasy.  Andrew enjoyed out table because it was next to a fish tank where he could watch "Nemo's" friends.  We then walked the boardwalk again.  Andrew enjoyed hopping out of his stroller and running on the boards.  We went up to the North end where there are no shops and enjoyed the sunsetting over the town. On our way back to the car Andrew did a pit stop at the arcade and took a ride with his favorite Sesame characters in their truck. 

I was a bit nervous about how Andrew would fare with the sleeping arrangement.  We were borrowing a condo from a friend of Chris' mom.  It had two bedrooms, so we brought our pack and play for Andrew to use when sleeping.  The day before we left for the trip I set it up in our house and told Andrew that it was his bed for the beach house.  He even played in it for an hour.  He would never use it when he was smaller and always cried when I put him in it, so I was worried that we would end up having him sleep in bed with us.  (While that isn't horrible, he is a restless sleeper and the adults end up not sleeping when he repeately moves and kicks all night!) He was such a trooper and actually slept in the pack and play, which he called his animal crib or beach house crib, at night and for his afternoon nap.  What a relief!  I had brought his bed toys and blankets, but not his music box.  He asked for his music the first night, but I was able to get away with playing a sleepy time mix of songs for him on my ipod via speakers we brought with us. 

We had planned to go to the beach on Friday morning, so we got up and got ready, packed the car and headed over.  I definitely had not seen the weather forecast.  It was sunny but cold and windy.  We stayed on the beach for less than an hour and Andrew got the chance to play in the sand and the waves.  We found lots of seashells and even fed goldfish pretzels to the collection of seagulls that tried to befriend us.  It was much like a scene from the movie "The Birds" minus the actual bird attack.  We thought that we would be having our beach photos taken that night, so we didn't make any plans for the evening.  We got dressed and went to meet the photographer at the selected beach, but when we got there he told us he thought it was still too windy.  I was VERY disappointed, as my hair looked fabulous for once!  (A rare thing, since I don't take the time to style it much anymore.) We had tentative plans to reschedule the shoot for later in the weekend, depending upon the weather, so we rushed back to the beach condo and changed out of our photography clothes and went out to dinner at the Sindia, a restaurant based on the sunken ship. The service was slow, since they only had one waitress, but she was extremely nice and the food was good.  It was late for Andrew and he had a bit of trouble lasting through the meal.  His kid meal came with ice cream for dessert, but I asked if they could give him a sliver of vanilla cake instead because of his birthday.  The waitress brought it out to him with two birthday candles.  He was so happy to see it and the fuss he got.  It was sweet.  He loves icing.  He is my child.

Saturday we took off for the Cape May County Zoo.  What an amazing zoo--and what a great day we had for it.  The weather was perfect--not too hot, nice breeze, sunny.  The zoo was free and accepted donations.  Andrew had a great time.  We saw monkeys, a red panda, leopards, a lion, lots of birds and farm animals, llamas, alpacas, zebras, giraffes, and alligators.  The tigers were hiding, so we didn't get to see them.  The layout of the zoo was perfect and we made it through the entire park.  Definitely a great place to explore if you are near Cape May.

While Andrew napped, I went back to the boardwalk alone to walk and do a little shopping.  One of the traditions we have is buying a Christmas ornament whenever we go on vacation.  I found a beautiful Christmas shop on the boardwalk and bought our souvenir ornament, along with two others for Andrew, a glass guitar and cookie monster.  It was still very windy, but sunny, so it was a nice walk.

After naptime, we went back to the boardwalk to find some dinner.  We ended up at the Hula Grill, a very small Hawaiian place next to the go-cart ride.  We were lucky they were still open for the season. I had great crab cakes with salad and sticky rice while Chris had beer battered shrimp.  The did not have a kids menu, so Andrew had the small order of chicken tenders and fries--food that he has never had before.  He loved the fries and the fact that he cold dip them in sauce.  He ate some of the chicken and a cucumber from my salad.  We then hit the boardwalk for one last night time visit and had to stop at Shrivers to see all the candy.  As a child we always went to Shrivers for salt water taffy.  They were not making it at the time of our visit, but sometimes you can watch the taffy machines in the back make the candy.  It started to rain so we headed back to the "beach house" to tuck Andrew into bed.  

Sunday we waited out the rain and went to breakfast at Uncle Bill's pancake shop.  I love when someone else makes me breakfast!  Afterwards we took a ride to Margate to see Lucy the elephant, although we didn't go inside this time.  (Inside is a little museum.)  

We were still debating the weather and deciding if we should stick around to try to fit in out beach photos that night.  We did end up staying and had a great time.  We really lucked out with the weather and the photographer took lots of photos.  Andrew had a blast playing on the beach and befriended the photographer and his wife.  I am looking forward to seeing what our photos look like.  

All in all we had a great trip!  Andrew is still talking about the "beach house."

Chocolate for Breakfast

On Saturday, my foodie friend and I went on our annual trek into Center City Philadelphia via train to indulge in a few kid-free hours of adult conversation and food.  In years past we went to the Naked Chocolate Cafe, which is amazing on it's own.  This year we tried somewhere new, Max Brenner, a new restaurant that opened in the city on July 1st.  I had read about it in the newspaper and had to try it.  Max Brenner is all about chocolate as a culture, a love.  The menu was outrageous and there were too many things we wanted to try.  We went for brunch, but instead of ordering from the brunch menu, we ordered from the dessert menu, which is available all day.  I had the banana split waffles, which were two waffles covered in bananas and chocolate with a small side of berries, a teeny tiny scool of vanilla ice cream and a tiny beaker of melted chocolate liquid goodness.  The waffles weren't amazing, but the entire dish was.  Hard to explain, but I think they need to tweak the waffle recipe a bit.  I definitely enjoyed every bite.  The chocolate sauce was great, but hard to dispense out of the little glass beaker.  I think it would be a fun restuarant to take Andrew and Chris too in a few years when Andrew is a bit older.  I hope it lasts that long--there were hardly any other diners there for Saturday morning. 

 I was a dork and took a photo of our food.  I really liked how everything was plated.

After brunch, we wandered around town to a few of our favorite shops, including a huge Williams-Sonoma in the Bellevue and Lush.  I had to stock up on a few more from Lush for my de-stressing baths!  We then headed over to the Comcast Center to check it out.  It is such a beautiful building--and too tall to properly photograph.  There we enjoyed a food and wine festival and sampled some amazing cheese, desserts and shared a late lunch from DiBruno Bros.  It was a great day and we enjoyed amazing weather. 

 

A toddler playland haven

Chris had a vacation day today so we took advantage of it by taking the wee toddler to the Please Touch Museum in Philadelphia.  I recently had heard some great things about it, especially since it had relocated to a larger location outside of Center City Philadelphia to Fairmount Park.  I used to joke with friends that it was the Please Catch a Germ Museum because the idea of all those germ filled kids touching and tasting everything.  Thankfully, it was an amazing place and we had a fantastic time.

 

Andrew adores cars and trucks and had a ball "test-driving" this little race car.  They even had a real full sized car for kids to climb in and out of, but there was always an occupant in the drivers seat when we were nearby, so Andrew didn't get a turn. 

 

This was in "Fairytale Garden," an area just for kids under three.  There were all sorts of interactive play areas related to fairy tales here.  The spinning wheel, which was inside a mock castle turret, had a tiny little entry door for the kids and a taller one for parents.  I loved that Andrew chose the spinning wheel to play with here!  They also had some trees to pick off magnetic apples, a little boat to ride in, and a beanstalk.

 

In the grocery store, kids got to use a kid-sized cart to shop for "real" foods that were actually empty containers or plastic fruits, veggies, and breads.  This seemed to be a popular area filled with tons of kids, but there were enough carts and food items for all the kids to shop.  The staff was constantly replenishing the shelves or re-shelving items.  It was adorable. 

It was such a pleasure to see the joy on Andrew's face at being in such a kid friendly place where he could do everything he wanted.  He truly had a blast playing.  I was impressed with how clean everything was, including the bathroom.  I appreciated that they had a changing station in a family bathroom.  There were places to sit all over and the Please Taste Cafe had many healthy items to choose from for lunch.  The only exhibit I wasn't thrilled with was the McD's play restaurant.  I believe that the corporation donated the funding for the exhibit, but I don't like the name branding or the fact that it isn't a healthy restaurant for anyone, let alone kids.  A no-name diner would have been a more appropriate alternative in my opinion. 

There was so much to see and do that I think another visit is called for in the future so that Andrew can discover new things to enjoy.  The museum offers memberships, which I may consider since it was such a pleasant day.  More photos of our day can be seen in my flickr account.  If you have little kids and are in the Philadelphia area, it is definitely a place to check out!

Vacation Recap

Now that we've been home and had time to unpack and review all the photos, I thought I'd finally finish a blog post I started last week, but never finished.  On Thursday of our vacation week, Andrew woke up sick with a fever.  He wasn't lethargic and his personality was still present, so I knew he must have just had a bit of a bug, nothing serious.  A dose of Tylenol helped so we headed out for a visit to the historic town of Berlin, Maryland.  The movies Runaway Bride and Tuck Everlasting were filmed in town.  (I did watch Runaway Bride prior to traveling--the story was boring, but the town was featured!) It was not a stroller friendly town, as in the store fronts had lots of steps and it definitely wasn't a great place to explore with a curious toddler (lots of antique stores too!)  but we had fun walking around.  We stopped at the Pink Box Bakery to buy dessert for the afternoon--yummy cookies! There seemed to be a dog sleeping in every shop window!  Here is my sick boy posing in front of the beauty shop window with the sleeping dog he was trying to communicate with, but without luck!

We headed home for lunch and naps.  While Andrew napped, Chris and I tooke advantage of grandparent babysitters and went for a walk to the crabbing pier and kayak dock when the sun came out (after a week of rain!)  It was a great walk and we saw lots of interesting birds and critters.  I believe we saw a bald eagle, but it flew away before either of us could capture a photo or video.  It's wingspan was huge and the head had that distinctive shape.  We saw hundreds of tiny fiddler crabs digging in the mud on the shore line. Chris got some good video of them, but my photos really don't show much.  The view of the Sinepuxent Bay from the pier was beautiful. 

We hit Assateague Island again, for the third time, on Friday morning in search of those wild horses. Andrew was still a bit moody and under the weather, so we didn't stay long.  My parents did get to "meet" a bunch of wild horses and even had a bit of a scare with ones that got too close.  Chris and I headed to the OC Beach for a walk on Friday afternoon while Andrew napped.  It was a beautiful sunny afternoon and I found a really fun kite shop.  They advertised with kites flying on the beach too. 

We came home Saturday afternoon, although Andrew got sick twice in the car on the way home--such fun!  He didn't seem fazed by it, but trying to clean a car seat with traffic speeding by wasn't fun.  I finally got it completely clean that afternoon once we were home. 

It was a fun trip!

Day Three: Traveling with the toddler

So apparently my child is much more flexible than I imagined he would be.  He not only has napped well, mostly, in an unfamiliar crib and room, he has slept well at night so far this week.  (Let's hope tonight is included!!) 

We have been in OC, MD for three days now and it has rained daily and been cold and dreary.  Despite this, we managed to spend a rainy Monday morning at the boardwalk playing arcade games and watching the beach get raked by tractors, we swam at the indoor pool, we watched thunderstorms move in and out, followed briefly by a period of...SUN!  Then it rained again!  Today we spent part of the chilly morning at Assateague Island trying to find those wild horses.  We did see several from a distance, but none as close as we would like.  We stayed in the State Park area of the island and did not continue further onto the National Park area.  Mainly because we had hungry kids to feed and nap.  Maybe later in the week we'll return.  We did take all the kids to the Assateague beach for a walk.  While we were hoping that there would be horses galloping along the shore, we only found parts of a horseshoe crab and a few broken shells.  It was probably one of the cleanest beaches I've ever been to on the Atlantic in the US, but it is before the summer season.  It was great showing Andrew the ocean for the first time.  He almost ran into it, but thankfully stopped.  It was too cold to dip our feet in, but waking through the sand was just as nice.  I imagine coming back here in July would be wonderful. 

This afternoon my mom and I headed over to the OC outlet center.  While it wasn't much of an outlet center, I did manage to get a few things at the Carter's store.  There was a supermarket in the same shopping center so we were able to pick up groceries too.  As we drove home, we drove through another rain storm. 

My sister and her family left for home this afternoon.  It was a lot of fun vacationing with them...Andrew had a great time playing with his older cousins.  He spent the evening looking for them, as he was sleeping when they left.  Now he has a huge house to run around and destroy all by himself!  We are staying in a sort of model home from a resort community.  It is technically a builder-owned home set aside for the employees of the company to use, but we learned that it has been sold, so we won't be able to use it in the future.  It is enormous...maybe 4000 square feet, with lots of room for running around.  It is probably three times the size of our house.  Andrew can do laps around the kitchen/dining/living area! 

Traveling with a toddler

We are currently on our first vacation since Andrew was born.  My parents rented a house through a work connection near Ocean City, Maryland...not too far from Assateague Island and the wild horses.  It rained the entire three and a half hours in the car down here and Andrew slept about half the time only.  Thankfully he was ok most of the time.  We stopped at a Hardee's fast food restaurant for lunch.  I haven't been to a Hardee's since childhood, since they are no longer near us anymore.  I also don't usually eat fast food, but our choices were slim and a rest stop was needed.  Andrew flirted with some older ladies and made new friends.  The blond hair and blue eyes tend to be charming to strangers. 

I don't have the usb cord to upload photos here, so that will have to wait.  The house we are staying in is beautiful, and eleven people fit comfortably.  My sister's family is here too and Andrew loves playing with his cousins.  The weather forecast sucks for the week, but we are hoping to get to see the horses tomorrow, head to the OC boardwalk, and go swimming.  Andrew just finally fell asleep, so I am hoping he will sleep through the night.  He has to share the room with us, so hopefully that will go well.  He is so fussy with sleeping lately! 

My father keeps reading over my shoulder and being a snoop!  LOL