Come On And Ride The Birthday Train!

We had a busy birthday weekend with friends and family. Taylor thoroughly enjoyed every waking (15 continuous hours) moment of it all. Saturday began with a train ride to Burnet on the Austin Steam Train. The train departed at 10am with much anticipation from Taylor about riding on his first real train! After all 11 of us found our seats it wasn't long until everyone was hitting the snack bar in preparation for the 2 hour ride to Burnet. Taylor kept asking, "are we moving yet?" Needless to say, the train doesn't move all the quickly in the beginning. He enjoyed sitting on everyones lap in order to look out the window. He wasn't sure what to think about the outside vestibules (between) the train cars, but humored us while we took pictures and got some fresh air. Luckily for us El Nino did NOT dampen our day, it was beautiful and sunny!Once we got to Burnet we headed to find somewhere to eat lunch. With not a lot of choices, we settled for Tealicious, which happened to be a diamond in the rough. Good sandwiches and plenty of seating! Before the train departed back to Austin we watched the Burnet Gun Fight- a reenactment of the way the west once was... guns, drunks, sheriffs, robbers, and salon girls. The kids all enjoyed being thrown in Jail.

Back on the train, cabin fever started to set in a little and the birthday boy got balloons and a birthday rap song from the sweet train volunteers. There is a train etiquette video below for all of you wondering what NOT to do on a trian... just an ordinary day folks! The best fun!

The party ended with a pizza dinner at a restaurant and some playtime on a playscape with friends. Taylor received some sweet birthday wishes and had a blast opening his presents. I'm sad to see the third year over, we did so much, learned so much, and most importantly, laughed so much (even when we wanted to cry-all of us)!! Here's to the road ahead and many more new experiences.