Hydrangeas, More Ice Cream & A Carousel Ride!

Words cannot express how grateful I am for neighborly friends. Especially when one lives in farm central near the highway with friends that live pretty far. Having Cristy as our closest neighbor has been a blessing to both Noah and Chelsea. Chelsea would love to have a little sister, and Noah wants to go to the playground with someone close to his age. Cristy has been a blessing to our kids summer, and it's so nice to be able to take her out on some of our adventures with us. After all, summer to us means spending it entirely outdoors! 

Storybook Land with Chelsea, Circa-2009.

Six years ago this week this cute little girl of mine had the privilege of going to one of the happiest places on earth. No it wasn't Disneyland, but a place called Storybook Land where all your fictional characters from books "come to life." 

I will never forget this day because it was the year Noah was born. As a matter of fact the reason I didn't chaperone on this particular school trip was because I was extremely pregnant. Extremely pregnant meaning that Noah was born two weeks after these shots were taken. As much as I wanted to be there to share this experience with my little girl, I knew I had to stay home and take care of myself, and baby. Plus the 45 minute bus ride would have been miserable for me!

Luckily Jon was there by her side to share in the joy with her on this day. It's a shame that he didn't take any pictures with her as he was behind the camera the whole time whilst taking care of other kids, but nonetheless they all had a good time. I remember him telling me how much fun she had with her little friends, and being that it was autumn made the whole trip even more beautiful. She even said that the kids loved him as if he was their dad! 

Well, it so happens that we are both heading back to Storybook Land today, but this time with Noah. We were both chosen to be chaperones this year, and Noah is sooooo excited. As always he wants his sisters to come, but we told him that they both have school, and that this is a trip just for the little kids in his class. I'm so excited to be going with him to Storybook Land. I missed the opportunity of going with Chelsea, and so in a way I'll be making it up by going with her baby brother. 

Chelsea was looking through her scrapbook, and we began to reminisce about these photos. I could tell by the look on her face that she wants to go back. Go back to storybook land, not her age! Oh yeah...that's the story of peter pan right? Never grow up! 

Once she was done looking at her scrapbook I decided to  take the photos out, scan them, and put them on the blog for the world to see, because...that's what a blog is for right?  Mind you that these were taken with a 3 megapixel camera so their not the greatest quality to look at online, but who cares. I love them all! 

I can't believe it's been six years since these photos were taken. I'm sure Jon is going to have deja vu once we arrive to our destination! 

 ^^^ Till this day these two girls have remained friends. Ali was one of her best friends in her class. ^^^

 ^^^ Jon said that these group of kids were well behaved. No stress was added to his day! ^^^

^^^ Corn mazes are always a favorite! ^^^

 ^^^ Carousels will always be at the top of her list! She's almost 11 now, & still loves to ride on them. ^^^

These kids are so lucky to be able to go on these little adventures at such a young age. She had the time of her life, and I'm sure Noah will too. That's all he's been talking about all week, and every morning asking me, "Mommy are we going to storybook land today?"

When he wakes up, and asks if we're going to storybook land today I can actually say "yes Noah, we are going to storybook land today."

The Carousel At Seaside Heights.

After hearing the news on NPR about this 104 year old carousel  at risk of being auctioned off piece by piece and removed from the Casino Pier at Seaside Heights I knew I had to go and check this baby out before it's sold. Apparently the pier wants to get rid of it to make room for more rides, and the fact that it is one of the last three antique wooden carousels left in Jersey just saddens me. Unfortunately one of the three carousels was sold and auctioned off piece by piece. I certainly hope that won't be the case for this one, and that a nice family of means will buy the entire carousel in hopes that it'll find a good home. We are lovers of carousels, and ever since the girls were little I've always taken advantage of taking them to every carousel in sight! Call me sentimental, or the fact that I just didn't get enough of carnivals, and carousel riding as a child, but the fact of going to an amusement park, and finding a carousel that spins fast just makes me feel like a little kid again. Especially when I  have kids who have the same sentiments.

I can see why they call it 'the soul of seaside'. It definitely was magical riding it with Noah. 

This particular carousel reminded me of Jane's Carousel in Brooklyn. Luckily that one was auctioned off in its entirety, and now resides in Brooklyn right in between both the Brooklyn, and Manhattan bridges.  

Since we went to the beach the day before we decided to forego the whole beach thing, and just take it easy, and walk along the boardwalk. It was such a beautiful day, and in all honesty our sole purpose of coming here was to  check out the carousel, and ride it. This carousel was unique, and I can't believe it's 104 years old! Who would want to take that off the pier especially since it survived Hurricane Sandy, and two fires. I feel as if it's meant for it to continue to dwell at this location, but we'll see. I just love 'carnival music' that plays on carousels, and this one was banging....literally! I was in awe every time I passed the drum drumming, and man was it loud! Being that the carousel is inside an arcade and surrounded by funky mirrors, we decided to get in front of them after getting off, and oh my gosh we were laughing so hard! I hadn't gotten in front of mirrors like this in ages. These mirrors made our bodies look like 'little people', and it was hilariously great! 

Our will power is pretty strong when we come to places like this, and we didn't get suckered into playing any of the games on the boardwalk, riding all the rides, over excessive shopping, or even tour the Jersyshore house. Oh no...we most certainly didn't do that (I'll use the 10 bucks on something else.) I never really watched the show, or even knew that the house was actually located here at Seaside Heights.

But I did take a picture of it!

We did however go on a round trip sky ride to take a better look at the shore from above, and it was pretty cool. I got a better view of the ocean, and the rooftops of homes, and shops. The skies were clear, and it most certainly was worth the five bucks. Noah and I sat together, and Chelsea sat with Lexie. The first words that came out of Noah's mouth  as we began to take off was, "this is so much fun mommy!" He is definitely not afraid of heights, and was scanning at everything surrounding the shore throughout the entire ride. 

 Jon decided to stay on the boardwalk so that he can capture some photos of us from below. 

We even took a selfie!

One thing for sure is that pizza, candy apples, polish water ice, and ice cream don't mix. What was I thinking!! My body is not able to handle all that junk food, and yes some of it was junk. These caramel apples were so good though! Good thing I have a few kids so that I can sample different kinds! 

The afternoon spent here was fun, and once again I hope that someone will buy this lovely carousel as a whole when it goes to auction in the fall. Keeping my fingers crossed. 

Walking on the boardwalk, and experiencing riding on yet another beautiful, fun, nostalgic, and magical carousel was the perfect end to our August. 

Thank you summer for being so good to us.