A Family Day at the San Jose History Park

Dear Bugaboo...Last Saturday we visited the San Jose History Park, a wonderful place for children and grown-ups to learn about our local history!  There is a cute little old-fashioned soda fountain shop with ice cream and candy, an early century print shop, Portugeese, Greek and Chinese museums, an old-fashioned gas station, an heirloom garden with an old water pump, a train museum with a working trolley, and a covered wagon, just to name a few of the many sites to see.  Since you are so crazy about trains, we couldn't miss out on the train museum!  Our other favorite was the covered wagon, and once you discovered what wagon trains were, you were all ears! We discussed the similarities and differences between steam trains and wagon trains, and talked about how on steam trains there were train engineers and motormen, and on covered wagon trains there were pioneers. We talked about how trains have an engine and how covered wagon trains were pulled by oxen. And, we checked out a wonderful book from the library called "Covered Wagons, Bumpy Trails" to learn even more about covered wagons.  

We had lots of fun playing and pretending! You kept on asking your daddy to come with you to check to see if there was enough food and water to feed the pretend horses. And, you wanted me to stay behind in the wagon to watch over them to make sure that they stayed safe.  : ) 

Of course, we couldn't miss the train museum with its cable cars, trolley cars, streetcars and steam locomotives. You thought this was just great and wanted to spend most of your time here!

Little Buttercup was our favorite train, even though there is nothing little about it!  It is a beautiful piece of machinery, a truly majestic steam locomotive. 

There is something so amazing about standing in front of a gigantic steam locomotive!

You loved this little model train (on the left) and I took a picture of this huge drill for Grandpa Dibble (on the right.)  He has a similar, smaller one in his garage, and so I thought that he would enjoy seeing it!  

Here you are ringing the bell on a pretend trolley, and then boarding a real life one!

We are so excited to ride!  

Waiting patiently...

Ding-ding!  

The motorman was so kind!  He even took some extra time to take a few pictures with us.

He gave you a special riding tolken

You were mesmerized by his every word

Here we are in the old fashioned print shop learning about how advertisements and newspapers were once made. 

You said that this old beat up pick-up truck looked just like Mater from the movie "Cars."  

We had such a fun family day, and it was very educational, too.  We will definitely be back to the History Park, a hidden gem here in San Jose!

All of our love to you always an forever,

Mommy & Daddy

xxxooo