This past weekend, we took advantage of the weather & visited a local park that I remembered from my childhood. They closed it for renovations over the past few years & it is gorgeous, but much smaller than I remembered. Isn’t it funny how things from childhood seemed larger than life, but then you revisit them as an adult & realize their true scale? Funny how so much of life is like that.
Harrison loves slides. ”Baby ‘lide?” he asks on the regular, which means “Baby wants to slide” as he calls himself Baby.
Because we call him Baby & we never even realized it until he became our tiny human parrot.
It was a little chilly that day, chillier than most of our winter weather this year.
I was thrilled to revisit the carousel, which I remembered so fondly as a little girl. I love carousels & used to pretend to race the other children on my plastic horse. Harrison wanted nothing to do with the moving ponies or even the huge giraffe that stood with no movement, so we sat on the benches. I used to wonder who would choose a bench on a carousel, but now I know – mommas of irritable toddlers.
The absolute highlight of the trip was the small train that circles the park. For $1.00 each, we rode the train & listened to the whistle & Harrison was in toddler heaven. His little eyes stayed lit up the entire ride.
The rest of the day he made train sounds & repeatedly asked, “Bye-bye? Choo-choo?” which meant that homeboy wanted to go back to the park with the train. I have a feeling I’ll be hearing those questions without fail this week considering they were the first words out of his mouth on Monday morning.
It’s days like this that make my heart so happy & I think I might die for the love of my tiny family.
I have been wanting to visit pullen park since moving to NC its the first park i visited and it was closed so I have been waiting for it to open up (then it did) and I wanted to go (which I haven’t yet) I think I might just go to check it out this weekend.
We took Wesley a few weeks ago…they’ve done so much out there! I love that they have sectioned off specific areas for bigger kids to play away from the smaller ones. We’ll be going back again soon for sure. I’m hoping we’ll actually get to ride the train and carousel next time…when we went, the lines for both were ridiculously long.
We have a similar park here (although not where we live in DC, it’s in MD bah). But there’s a carousel and a train and a huge playground and mini golf. Oh, and a nature center. I can’t wait to take him to the nature center. I remember when we sold my mother’s house my sisters and I stood in the basement in utter disbelief of its smallness. Our heads were nearly to the ceiling and we could reach it end to end in like 10 paces. How is that possible when I know full damn well I used to have to sprint from the stairs to get to the other end? Being big sucks sometimes.
It’s funny. I call Zaid Baby so now he calls me Baby. He calls his sister Buddy b/c that’s what she calls him. It looks like y’all had a blast and yeah, who could resist returning to the baby ‘lide?
fun!!! i wish we had stuff like that where i live!
What an awesome park! He’s so cute and I love the picture of you all on the train. I completely agree that sometimes I love my family and the life we have together that it physically hurts. I’m such a sap.
Oh my gosh, look at his eyes on the train! I don’t know why but all locomotives seem to blow our little boys’ minds.
I love days like this.
I think you should start calling him “homeboy”. See if he can replace “baby” in his vocabulary. I can just see him on the playground calling himself homeboy… LOVE IT
!
Great pictures and you can tell what an awesome time he, well, all three of you are having! We haven’t been to Pullen since it reopened, but I think I need to change that soon. We call Daniel “Doodle,” and he refers to himself like that too. It’s so cute!
We love Pullen Park! Our son will be three at the end of June, and he’s EXTREMELY active. I’m always looking for things to do to keep him entertained. Sadly, he’s not so great at just hanging out at home. We like the NC Museum of Science in Raleigh (free!), Marbles, and we go mall walking. The Cary Towne Center opens early for mall walkers, and it’s great to be able to let him just go…. It’s usually just us and senior citizens getting their exercise. Since the stores aren’t open, I don’t spend any money. (except when I take quarters for the kiddie rides) Just thought I’d share my out and about ideas. If you’ve got secrets for entertaining a toddler boy, please share!
You should plan a trip to the NC Transportation Museum. It’s amazing. We took H there over the summer… they have a ton of real trains, and also a lot of old school cars and a few airplanes. It’s really awesome, even my husband and I enjoyed it! Definitely worth a day trip. http://nctrans.org/
Such a sweet story! My son only rode the up and down animal for the first time this fall at 4.75 years old. He always wanted the bench. Made me nuts!
PS, your boy is adorable!
Boys and trains go together like pb&j! At least in our house.
Love these pics!
Kevin said the EXACT same thing about Pullen. He remembers it being so huge. I wasn’t exposed until college and it seems similar to me. So yeah. I think it is the kid mentality. i was very disappointed with the limited baby swings and their location. Who designed that mess? Dumb people, that’s who.
dude, the swings were straight-up CLOSED.
Ha ha – our old neighbor in Durham designed it. He’s a gay guy with no kids. Go figure!! LOL. We loooove the park, though. Max talks nonstop about the carousel. We’re there probably once a week
Pullen is the greatest ever! So many memories and pictures of me there as a kid.
And then I died of cuteness.
It’s been a good life
my 20 month old is in a Choo choo fetish phase now also. I discovered that the fancy, expensive Thomas trains fit perfectly on the wooden train track from Ikea. Same magnetic train attachments and it’s super durable…he generally throws the pieces around like a Babyzilla shouting choooo chooooo!
Rock on momma
-w
Mittens was PETRIFIED of the carousel, too, until I rode a horse with her sitting in front of me (on the same horse). After about four or so tandem rides, she finally told me to ride my own horse. Guess she just needed to make sure it was safe before trying it solo!
My family and I love Pullen Park simply because it holds lots of memories. My mom went there when she was young, and then she took us when we were kids. Now that I have a little guy of my own, I can’t wait to take him when we come home to visit NC (because daddy’s job moved us to FL). Pullen is a pretty fun place…especially the train.
We always loved playing in the old caboose car too, although I’m not sure if it’s still there. I love how a place like that gets “passed down” through generations.
The red caboose is still there!! I didn’t go in it, but Doug took Harry inside.