Riding Mini-Trains and Park Fun! (Week 124)

Hi everyone!  Not a lot of pictures this week - we decided to take it easy on the outings since we had so many errands to run.  Quick recap of the week though: I went to get my blood drawn Tuesday morning for my gestational diabetes test - and then tripped and sprained my ankle!  It must have been a combination of things - not eating all morning (for the test), the super sugary drink I had for the test, and the calf cramps the night before that already weakened my left leg.  Regardless - what an accident!  It didn't hurt so much at first and I kept it elevated all day (while I hung out on the couch) - but by the evening it was super painful and I was crawling from one area of the house to the next.  Lovely huh?!  Thank goodness it wasn't that bad of a sprain and by the weekend it was as good as new. Whew!

We have started a new trend with Tyler - and it involves the potty!  I'm kind of over the whole pushing him to use the potty when  he needs to - when we ask him if he needs to he always says No.  Forget it!  So now, every morning when he wakes up he has to sit on the potty.  When he gets home from school, he has to sit on the potty before he washes his hands and has dinner.  And before he goes to bed, he has to sit on the potty and then take his bath.  No ifs, ands, or buts.  And it's working!  He's been pretty consistent on always doing his business when he sits down - now if only I can get him to tell me when he needs to go...

Friday we had a yummy dinner at Olive Garden with friends.  I haven't been to Olive Garden in AGES! I forgot how yummy their breadsticks were.  Tyler was super well behaved - he actually is pretty well behaved in general when we're eating out - but often times this involves treats (lychee jellies) and bribery with my iPhone.  I swore I would never be one of those parents who let their kids watch a movie (on my iPhone) at a restaurant - but wow - it sure keeps them quiet!  Here's Tyler and his buddy Kaden after dinner.

They seemed to think the light outside was very interesting...We're very excited - we have a Big Bear trip in the works with Kaden's family in December - should be lots of fun!

On Saturday we headed out to Costa Mesa's Fairview Park to check out their free train rides.  This place is really cool - they have mini model trains that you actually sit on and they take you around a large open track!  Third weekend of each month = free = LOVE it!  Tyler is still obsessed with trains and I found this place the night before - what a perfect quick little outing!

 

Here's Tyler and Will sitting on the Driving seat of one of the trains.  The volunteers there were (mostly) super nice and really liked to see all the kids super excited.  The rides start at 10am - we got there early thank goodness because the line got long fast!

 

Tyler loved riding the train!  I had read a review that some kids younger than 3 might have a hard time sitting still for so long on the train ride (10-12 min?) but Tyler was great!  The track goes around this large open area next to a golf course, so there were lots of trees and birds to see.  (Although the grounds were pretty brown and dry).  Tyler would get so excited everytime we went over or under a bridge.

Here's a shot of the members of the Orange County Model Engineers - they're the group that runs this place.  Old guys who love to talk about trains!  There was even a good-sized train yard to the side where you could see lots of trains and people working on them.

You can see how brown/dry the land was.  You can also see another train going.  There are quite a few tracks at this place so there are multiple trains going at once.  The best part is that you go around the track twice, and each time you take a different route!

 

After riding the trains twice, we decided to head out (also because the lines had gotten ridiculously long!).  I had remembered seeing a park once in the area that had a plane in the playground ... and we found it!  Yay!  Here's Will and Tyler playing on the plane - that thing was huge!

 

This was a park off Newport Blvd in Costa Mesa, before it turns into Newport Beach.  Definitely an older park, as you could tell from the equipment - but the plane is quite a draw!  There was an interesting slide there that was made up of rusty rollers.  Yeah.  Different though!

 

Here's Tyler coming down a tunnel slide.  It had been a while since we've taken him to a park to play - our weekends have been so busy!  It was nice to just have some down time to play.

 

Tyler is getting so big!  Stop growing Tyler!  He is talking so much now - he says things like "I want baba to play trains with me", and when I ask him if he wants a gummy or jelly, he'll say: "I want gummy AND jelly".  Haha! 

 

He likes to pretend cook for Will at the playgrounds when there's an area to play underneath one of the play areas.  Today he was making pizza and eggs for Will!

 

Last shot of Tyler in the plane - it was so big he could barely poke his head out!  The boy next to him had quite an imagination! - Will was with them and would have Tyler "press the button for the gun", and the kid was on the back part of the plane and would pretend he was a robotic gun loading and shooting.  Then Will would have Tyler "press the button for the BIG gun" and the kid would pretend he was like this giant transformer gun or something!

 

Here's Tyler coming down the rusty roller slide.  It's good to get out of Irvine parks once in a while! :) heehee.  Do I sound snobbish or what!

 

Short video of Tyler on the old roller slide.


Afterwards I found (via Yelp) a little Mexican restaurant nearby for lunch - it was actually quite tasty and they had these Salvadorian specialties - Pupusas (?) on the menu that were super yummy (and oily).  Tyler really liked his burrito though - thank goodness he eats a lot of different things.  Now if only I could get him to eat more vegetables than broccoli and green beans... It must have been a fun day for Tyler because he napped for almost 3 hours that day - I had to wake him up!

Happy Early Thanksgiving everyone - we're thinking of getting our Christmas tree this weekend - so that should be some fun pictures on next week's post!  Plus the nursery is almost done - can't wait to share pictures of that too!