Wednesday, May 18, 2011

Trip to Pennsylvania, part 1

This past week, my mom and I took A down to Philadelphia for a fun getaway. We took off Wednesday afternoon, had an easy drive straight down, and in four hours we had reached our hotel in Levittown, PA. A was very good in the car, spent a good part of the ride looking for trucks on the road, then played with his cars for a while, ate, and we whipped out the DVD player for the last hour (I keep it has the last thing so he doesn't think that he automatically gets to watch DVDs when he goes in the car.)
A had an OK night sleep in the hotel. It was a different story for us, since he doesn't stop moving and likes to kick... The hotel had a nice complimentary breakfast, with those awesome waffle-makers. A was excited to watch TV while he ate breakfast (which would never happen at home.)

After that, we headed out to what I told A would be a place with toys everywhere (joujoux partout!), which he kept repeating.... The PleaseTouch Museum. That place is simply awesome!
But at the beginning, A was a bit overwhelmed... until he found the car wash...

It was a bit tucked away, so he felt more at ease, and of course it involved cars, and buttons to push. For a while I thought we were going to spend the whole day at the car wash, he wouldn't move from it, nothing we said could convince him to go see something else. Besides, he had decided he was the master of the car wash and would not allow any other kid to touch the buttons...

He eventually relented and we headed to the river... it's a really cool thing with boats and ducks and things you can do to create current. They provide kids with aprons so they don't get too wet.

We played there for quite some time, because water is so much fun! After that we went through the Alice in Wonderland area, and then hit the 'mini-town'. Here are a few highlights in pictures:
there's a house and garden, where A planted potatoes
a hospital where you play doctor (see what happens when you have too many ear infections?)

a mini-supermarket (two chickens, wow!)
a postal truck!

Towards the end, A decided to go get bricks from a 'brick yard' to bring to the postal truck. I am not sure if they were supposed to be packages, but when he got back to the truck, there was a little boy who looked to be four or five years-old, sitting in the driver's seat. A offered him the bricks, the boy told him to put them in the back. Then A asked "encore?" and the little boy said "yes, bring more!", so A ran back a couple times to bring more bricks to the truck. Finally, the little boy told A to come in the truck with him and A happily obliged. The use of two different languages didn't seem to stop either of them!


A is now at the age where he starts to be interested in playing with other children, but doesn't always know how to do so. It was really fun to see him exchange with this little boy!
After a quick lunch and a Carousel ride we headed back to the car. After the nap, we hung out at the mall for a bit and had an early dinner at a Japanese steakhouse. We did the "Hibachi" dinner, since neither my mom nor A had ever done it before. A was a bit scared of the fire, but handled the chopsticks like a pro!
.. and it all ended with ice-cream!

After that, it was time for a good night sleep before our first day at Sesame Place! I'll tell you about it in my next post...

3 comments:

  1. That looks like a kid's dream come true! Can't wait for the next post.

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  2. I've been DYING to go to that museum for years. My mom lives about 45 minutes north of Philly, yet we've never gotten around to going. After seeing your post, we're DEFINITELY going next trip north. Can't wait to see the Sesame Place pics too! Looks like A had a great time.

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  3. Hi Jackie! you absolutely have to bring E to the museum, it is so well done, she will love it!

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