This past weekend, Tom had a consultation to do in Sonoma on ALEKS, an online math instructional tool. Tom and I imagined it would be a fun little family getaway — we even found a park called Howarth’s that has a little train in it and everything — but the weather was just hideous!
It rained the entire time we were there, so the train wasn’t operating and we couldn’t do any of the other outdoor stuff we’d hoped to do (possible hike in Annadel SP or Sugarloaf Ridge)!
Dylan had fun just being in the hotel room, but we’d been talking up all sorts of train activities, so we were feeling a bit bummed out by the weather! Luckily, all was not lost. After a disappointing trip to the Santa Rosa Railroad Museum (which turned out to be a “Railroad Room” in the Visitor’s Center), we found the Sonoma Depot Museum, about 30 minutes away.
Dylan fell asleep in the car on the way over, but as soon as we got there and saw trains (!!!!), his eyes sprang wide open and he immediately started chattering and identifying the cars (“that one is a caboose”, “that’s a boxcar”)! Not one minute out of the car, he was already “tooting” his train whistle with Daddy-o!!!
Once inside, he charmed the socks off the two ladies staffing the place. One woman took us into the railroad room to show us the little exhibit they had there and she could barely squeeze a word in edge-wise. Dylan was barking out all of the train info he knew! The lady was very impressed with his breadth of train knowledge; she didn’t even know that the big wheels on the engine were called “drivers!” Dylan also identified an old-style oil can used to grease up the train gears — the lady brought in the other staffer and asked Dylan to tell her what the can was for as well!
They were so tickled by him, they gave him a bandana and engineer hat to wear so we could take a picture of him on the caboose out back. He was sooo happy to be on an actual caboose! But, sweet boy that he is, after several minutes, he said, “I’m all done. Someone else can take a turn” and he climbed right off!
Once we returned the hat and bandana, we bought him a souvenir train whistle for $3.50. He just loved it…and blew it all the way home!
