A Great Time in Grapevine!

Last month, we had planned on taking a trip to Grapevine, Texas, which is right outside of the Dallas area.  Our plan had been to knock another ballpark off of our list with a Rangers game, go to Legoland Discovery Center, and ride the Grapevine Vintage Railroad.  Unfortunately, Daddy had to work, so we rescheduled our trip to this month.  We didn't get to do the baseball game, but I have to say that the weekend ended up being pretty fun.

The first amazing part of our trip was the fact that we found a rest stop...with. a. playground.  For real!  I think Little Buddy and Little Sweetie were so enamored with that, they could have been happy just stayed at the rest stop instead of taking the rest of the trip!  Especially once Little Buddy found the statue of the buffalo!

    

Playgrounds at rest stops should be mandatory.

He literally told us to go on without him.  He was just going to live with the buffalo statue on the white rocks.  

Our hotel was the next big adventure.  Someone should really start offering hotels with kid-friendly room options.  You know, like rooms WITHOUT working fireplaces or ways to keep your kids from coming out of their room and walking out in the middle of the night (Little Buddy is totally tall enough to unlock everything).  Luckily, we like to make creative solutions.

Thank God neither kid showed interest in the fireplace.  And seriously, a fireplace in a hotel room in Texas?  Necessary?  I think not.

    

 

Some of our creative room arrangements.  Little Buddy's bed is pushed against the closet in his room (with a desk and dresser pushed up on the other side to keep him from rolling out in the middle of the night), the couch is pushed in front of his door to prevent late night escapes while leaving the door open so we could hear him if he needed us, and a chair blocking the door out of the room just in case he made it over the couch.  Stuff you don't think about until you have kids!

Also, the kids' favorite thing about the hotel?  The corded phones.  We just unplugged all the phones and let them have at it.  Why do we even bother to travel?  We could just stay in a local hotel and let the kids play with the phones for a few days and they would be thrilled! 

We started our real Grapevine Adventure the next day by going for the fun run on the vintage railroad!  After a quick walk through the town (which was so cute and full of lovely shops...I'm already planning more trips back to explore the town some more) we came to the train!  The fun run is only an hour long, which I have to say was just about right for the kids' attention spans. 

Headed to the train!

Choo-choo!

    

Little Sister was excited for her first train ride (and for the flags they handed out for Veterans Day)!

Attempting a group shot with Daddy!

Thankfully, the train photographer got a better family picture!

 

"I'm the conductor!"

After the train ride, we walked around town a bit more to look for some food and Little Buddy found his new favorite statues:  roller skaters!  He was quite intrigued.

          

After attempting to help the fallen skater, we had lunch at local deli (again, loving the small town feel.  We found several small town restaurants that we liked a lot and were kid friendly.  I'm going to the miss the pizza place we ate at..twice!) before heading back to the hotel for naps.  The kids needed to rest up before we headed out to...

Legoland!

This was pretty much a dream destination for Little Buddy, and Little Sweetie ended up having a blast too!

    

   

Playing with blocks while waiting to enter, rocking our Emmett jacket and Wyldstyle hat.

   

    

Little Sweetie jamming out in the Duplo area!

"Let me get this straight...I can play with all these blocks?  For real?"

    

Great time on the pirate-themed spray ground turned playground for the fall season.

    

Entranced by the mini-city replica of Dallas/Grapevine area...

...and of the Star Wars special exhibit!

Little Buddy was ready to move in and live there!

Happy Lego Store visitors!

We can vouch for it...everything was awesome! 

After breakfast the next morning, we began our drive home (we hit that rest stop with the playground again too!).  It was a very quick trip, but a lot of fun.  I really want to go back and find more fun stuff to do!

Have a good night,

LBM

Little Buddy's Momma