Bye Bye Train!

We visited the NY Botanical Gardens the other day to check out the annual holiday train display. The train display is set up in the Conservatory, which is basically a giant greenhouse, around the usual plants and trees. The unique part about the train display is the buildings that serve as scenery for the trains - they are models of famous NYC landmarks and mansion houses located along the Hudson Valley and on Long Island, and all are made of only natural materials (makes more sense why the Botanical Gardens has this display?).

Our decision to buy a membership earlier this year really paid off on this trip - there were two lines - one for members and one for non-members. The member line was pretty long, but was only about a 45 minute wait, while the non-member line was estimated at about an hour and a half. So, you can guess, it was a relatively crowded exhibit.

Once we got in, there is a tour of part of the Conservatory that's not used for the trains before arriving at the rooms with the train displays. People tend to walk generally single file through the exhibit, stopping here and there to watch for a minute or two before moving on. Early in the exhibit, there was an older woman who kept pushing in front of Kd, who was carrying Fidget in the Baby Bjorn, facing front. Fidget was enjoying the trains and would wave "bye bye" as the trains came past and headed off into the plants, out of sight. As this woman kept getting in Fidget's way, she would get a little agitated and "wave" both hands up and down. Finally, Fidget had had enough, and the woman butted in a little close - Fidget gave her a good whack from behind, Mom apologized, and we didn't see the woman anymore! Fidget got to wave and say bye bye to a few more trains and Mom & Dad started to get some ideas about how to handle obnoxious people in the future...