Ducks

There were some CRAZY ducks just outside our hotel in PA that LOVED people and cal was enticed to pick them up...

all you had to do was walk in their direction with change jingling in your pocket to feed into their food dispenser and they would come waddling towards you very quickly. what a funny little bunch!

Hershey Day 2 cont.

We also visited the Hershey gardens and all of the beautiful and interesting plants, sculptures and items there. We also were just in time to catch a glimpse of the butterfly house that was preparing to be closed up for the fall. We were lucky enough to catch it, and Cal loves butterflies. Here you will see him sniffing all of the roses.

checking out the butterflies.

and riding the sculptures

and there were a lot of them!!

Hershey Day 2

The next day we spent at the museum and at the gardens. They have these original cars from a hersheypark ride.. very blue streak if you ask me.

this was a crystal lamp that hershey and his wife bought, only merely 10 ft tall or so!

and a giant kiss, cal gave it a kiss, I think he really wanted to eat it.

they had a play room at the museum where cal was able to get into the action, he loved the wooden horses and covered wagon

Then, off to the hershey gardens where they have the most beautiful roses and various other plants scattered all over their land

Hershey, PA

Our first actual day in Hershey, we went to chocolate world. which is the neat little place that shows you how the hershey chocolate is made and you can buy souvenirs or every kind of hershey candy you may ever know. It is right next to Hershey park, which incidentally is closed during the day this time of year and only open after 5 pm, much like cedar point.

Then we spent the rest of the day just sightseeing in the area, checking out antique stores and other random small stores, where we ran across one of the nicest toy stores I have seen in a long time. If you are ever in the area, you really have to check it out in Hummelstown, a hop-skip from hershey.

There is so much to do within a quick drive from this area, it really is ideal for a quick trip. the Amish are close, Gettysburg, you can hit philly on your way to or fro. and the mountains.

Trip to Pennsylvania

Time for a family vacation?!?! Ah, yes, I do believe so! We started out for what would be Calvin's first family vacation on September 16. We officially have been starting our family vacations in september ever since Adam and I got married, simply because there is a lot less vacation traffic at that time and it is good to get away from it all when nobody else expects it... AND we get to celebrate our anniversary in a new way each year.

What a trip, calvin of course spent about half of the car ride sleeping. which was good, except for the half he wasn't sleeping. We took a break in Penn at the cutest little rest stop with beautiful flowers and this neat picnic bench that cal just loved.

Then we had to take a break at a burger joint Adam has been wanting to visit since he heard about it some 3 years ago. Where they have 3, 6, and 15 pound burgers and you get a prize and your name on a wall if you can actually eat it all. Of course there are stipulations, i.e. can't use utensils, have to eat it in an hour etc.

Adam tried his hardest but could only get 3/4 of the way through this big daddy without thinking he may vomit with the next bite!

Then it was another 2 hours to our hotel just outside of Hershey, PA!

Cousin Zac

Recently cousin Zac stopped by for a visit. here are a few pics from that visit.

Zac is really quite bossy with Calvin, which I don't find all that surprising, since zac's mommy was always pretty bossy with cal's mommy... so I guess it just runs in the family!

Zac likes to make calvin do things when he expects them but cal doesn't do them quickly enough, here he is "making" cal smile.

Zac liked to play on our computer.

Tractors!

We had to go check out the S.C.R.A.P in the area, and of course, that involves tractors... so Cal really enjoyed it

I was amazed to see this on many of the old tractors there...

but apparently this is a common type of tractor, even though every time I say the name, I feel like I am saying a dirty word or should be saying it quietly so that cal won't hear me say it aloud!