A Day Out With Thomas

Earlier this summer when they boys had just started getting into "Thomas the Tank Engine," J.D. saw an ad online and/or saw an episode of Jon and Kate plus Eight where they went to ride Thomas and was asking if we could ever go do something like that. I looked it up and found out that Thomas would be coming to our area in October, so I got tickets. A couple of weeks ago, the day finally arrived and we went to ride Thomas. Since Joey is the one who most loves Thomas, J.D. made the observation that Joey would probably be so exicted when he saw Thomas that he "would try to go give Thomas a hug."


It was about an hour drive to get to the "station" where we could hop aboard Thomas' coaches. We were running a little late (as happens when you have four kids ages six and under), but we did get there in time to see Thomas pull into the station before we had to go stand in line to get on the train. I wish we would have had the video camera running when Joey first saw Thomas because he squealed with delight and was so happy. We did turn it on shortly after and this is what we got:




Here is Thomas pulling into the station:

Here is Jake sitting on the train:

J.D. had to sit by himself in the row in front of us with some other people, but he had fun:

I had to hold Joey down most of the time because he wanted to run up and down the isles. Even though we were technically riding Thomas, Joey could not see Thomas so he didn't know that we were riding him. He kept asking where Thomas was and wanted to get off.

Jim and Janalynn enjoying the ride:

After the 25 minute ride (which was basically just backing up for 12 minutes, then going forward again for 12 minutes and seeing the same scenery), Jim and I decided that next time we wouldn't pay to ride the train, but would just show up and look at Thomas and do the other activities. They had a bunch of trains set up and the boys enjoyed playing with them. Here's Joey:

We didn't stand in line to get our picture taken with Sir Topham Hatt because Janalynn was done by then, but we did take a look at him. J.D. wanted to know how Sir Topham Hatt was moving around by himself and I had to explain that there was a guy inside the costume.

The boys had to get their picture taken with the poster of Emily. (Joey knows all the Thomas trains by name if you show him a picture of them.)

We also didn't stand in line to get an up close picture with Thomas because, honestly, I'm not a crowd person and do not enjoy standing in line with kids. I thought this was good enough.--Jim and the boys are in it and Thomas is in it.

After blowing a lot of money at the gift shop (mostly books, though), we were ready to go home. We had a fun time and it was worth the money and the trip to see Joey be so excited (and the other boys too). Janalynn was pretty good despite the unseasonably cold weather and being drug around. We were glad Thomas could make the trip from the Island of Sodor to Texas!