E-I-E-I-O

This morning I woke up feeling like I REALLY wanted to get my great boys out of the house and off to see something new. I felt adventurous and ready... but where to go? I had no idea... I was thinking maybe the zoo, but frankly the idea of figuring out how to wrangle 3 little boys in and out of a public non-stroller friendly restroom at the zoo was daunting. And we all know that they both would need to go a few times (not at the same time) and then there's the diaper changes and telling everyone not to touch anything. I thought I'd save the zoo for a day when I planned in advance to go with a friend. Then at least we could tag team the bathroom. Yes, I do think about these things before we leave the house.  You have to when you have three.

Anyway... I posted on Facebook this morning looking for ideas on what to go do and my good friend Tiffany from my college days suggested Bauman Farms in Gervais. I looked at googlemaps and found that it's only 45 minutes from here and immediately decided that this was indeed doable. Her key words in her description were, "farm animals, fort like play structure, doughnuts, fruit stand, flowers." I thought, hmmmmm... I like all those things.  And in my best Liz Lemon thinking, "I want to go to there."

I called out to the boys, "who wants to go to a farm today?" "I do, I do," was the reply. Off went Spencer to gather his cowboy boots and cowboy hat. Off went Hudson to find his crocs all the while asking me every 2 minutes, "What kind of farm are we going to?" Finley continued to crawl around the floor crying (don't worry, it's normal these days). I gathered the essentials; diapers, wipes, change of clothes for Finley, fishy crackers, water, z bars, jackets, google map, iphone, wallet and car keys.

Yes, I got lost but wow... have I mentioned how much I love my iphone? I just went into the map continually and hit the "maps" button and typed "current location." What do you know? The thing told me exactly where I was and which way I needed to go! Sorry for the tangent, I'm apparently still impressed. And it's been 6 months since I was given this amazing piece of technology but my completely and totally awesome husband.

45 minutes on the dot, we arrived at Bauman Farms. We had a simply fabulous time!  What a fun place!  Here is my photo journal of what we did there...  The first photo is taken with my iphone and the rest with my "good camera" as I like to call it.  To see them big, please simply click on them.  

Spencer and Hudson showing how tall they are outside the animal area

Spencer and Hudson both got to feed the goats... such fun!  They also had bunnies, chickens, sheep, llamas and I think I even saw a Goose!

After we saw the animals the boys wanted something to eat so we went into the charming store there.  They had doughnuts, fruit, vegetables, all kinds of snacks, a coffee bar, gift items, etc.  We purchased blueberry doughnuts, corn, peaches, a tomato and blackberries.  YUM!  This photo was taken just after they finished their yummy doughnuts.  

As we ate our doughnuts, we saw we were in the midst of a beautiful flower garden.  It was so neat because everything was labeled as to what it was.  It was so pretty!  We (I) decided to try to do some portraits.  The trick to getting Hudson to pose is to say, "I guess we're just taking a photo of Spencer and Finley."  Instantly he runs over... so as not to be left out.  

From there we went over to a play ground area.  It had tons of trikes, things to crawl through, teeter totters, slides, swings, etc.  They ran around burning off some great energy.  So fun!

This is just a silly teepee shot that we got while in the teepee.  Spencer was so curious about this teepee... what is it for?  What did the Native Americans do here?  What if it rained?

Finley wondering if we forgot all about him?



From here we went to an area with a play fort.  It was complete with slides, tunnels and lots of areas to run.  Here is Finley enjoying some out of the stroller time.  

Spencer running off some energy

They also had a covered wagon.  And the questions came again from Spencer, "What is the wagon for?  Where were they going?  Why did they build the fort?"  I told him I thought we'd rent Little House on the Prairie soon.  

"Mom!  Mom! Come quick!"  I came across the fort area to find Hudson in the covered wagon.  "Look Mom!  Sheep!"  We had seen the sheep all morning but perhaps Hudson had just noticed?

A fun time was had by all and yes indeed, we will be back!