Babyland

The weekend before Easter we got to spend a day at Babyland, the birthplace of all Cabbage Patch Kids. I prepared myself for a pretty lame day, yet turned off my typical cynicism so as not to ruin Zoë’s time.

The day started with “Breakfast with the Easter Bunny”, an event with several hundred parents and children. The local Lyons club provided pancakes and sausage while a DJ kept us amused with fantastic (god-awful) music. Jen’s mom had bought the tickets and the breakfast was actually surprisingly fun. They gave out prizes like crazy, though we never actually won.

The “Easter Bunny” was a person in a massive CPK costume with bunny ears tucked away in a little nook with a line of bazillions of kids waiting to get a picture for $5. We didn’t spring for the picture, but Zoë was too busy enjoying the atmosphere and running around like crazy to even notice or mind.

Jen’s mom works as an accountant for the power company up in Habersham County, GA, and every year they are involved in a handful of parades in the area. Part of the reason we were at Babyland was because Cleveland, GA, where Babyland is located, was throwing a parade and Toni’s company was to be represented.

Originally this meant that Jen and Zoë were going to help with the parade. Through a large series of events, another child ended up being foisted upon us. That was Darcie, Toni’s step-granddaughter. Unfortunately, Darcie had ZERO interest in being with us at Babyland and would not do anything but sob. Jen decided to stay with Darcie and Zoë and I were sent to work at the parade.

All I knew about the parade was that I would be in the back of “a truck” helping to dispense candy or take photos.

That “truck” turned out to be a 1932 Ford. The one on display in the lobby of the power company. The first truck the power company ever owned. Totally awesome. I got to ride in the front while we prepared for the parade and noted the lack of seatbelts, unsafe glass, removable seats, and many other death features available in that year’s model. (Don’t mistake that for dislike, I was in awe being in that truck.)

Zoë and I were to ride in the bed of the truck with a few other people. There were some walking beside the truck handing out candy. I was asked to film the parade for the power company. Zoë got a little hardhat and off we went, zipping through the streets of Cleveland.

To call this parade small would be a bit of an understatement. It was small even in comparison to the annual Hartland Memorial Day parade. Maybe 7 floats altogether and only a few hundred spectators. But it was fun nonetheless.

Of course Zoë being the ever helpful type, recruited herself to “assist” with the candy “dispersement”.

I might add, as noticed in the next picture, that this was the day that Zoë discovered what pockets were really used for. She thought she was being sneaky, but I busted her.

Here’s a picture taken from the sidelines. It kind of cracks me up because it appears that I was the main attraction in this parade.

After the parade was done we headed back to Babyland for the Great Easter Egg Hunt.

Let me tell you, these guys know how to setup a hunt. They had 25,000 eggs set out for the kids to grab. These were broken into 4 separate sections, 0-2, 3-5, 6-8, 8+. Each of these sections had anywhere between 4,000 and 6,000 eggs to snatch.

Of course, these weren’t real eggs but plastic. That marks a distinction beyond just their outward appearance. Plastic eggs have goodies in them. And apparently a handful of these 25,000 eggs contained coupons for various local businesses. Most just had candy.

Zoë was so excited to go grab eggs she could barely contain herself. We had to stand there waiting a good 10-15 minutes before they blew the whistle. It was a tad chilly and VERY windy. This was the day after those major storms rolled through town.

We managed to keep her happy for a bit and even got a nice little family photo taken.

Finally, she could take no more and the whistle finally blew.

4,000 eggs. The space of half a football field. 0-2 years old. This should be a good 20 minutes of fun, right?

I took a fast motion series of photos when it started. 10 pictures in 5 seconds. Here is the first picture:

And here is FIVE SECONDS LATER

Note the nice young lady towards the right with her thong sticking out. She’s just tucking her child under her arm and snatching as many eggs as possible. These vultures managed to pick the lawn clean of eggs in LESS THAN A MINUTE. I started our video camera less than 15 seconds after it started, and all you see is the four of us trudging through a devastated war zone.

And because of the unstoppable greed of the other parents, this was what Zoë got:

Yep, tears. She got four eggs, and that’s ONLY because Jen snatched them up before the other carrion feeders had a chance to co-opt Zoë’s fun. Zoë never even left the starting line because we were afraid of the stampede. You would think it was a Black Friday sale at Wal-Mart or something.

I can’t fully blame Babyland for this. There’s really no way to contain that many people. But honestly, for the 0-2 area parents should be able to help and that’s it. Where’s the fun in the herd blindly stampeding towards egg domination?

When that was all said and done we made our way to the main attraction of Babyland, namely the Cabbage Patch nursery. This is where CPK are born and eventually adopted.

Jen snuck in there while we were at the parade to get the lay of the land and the two of us managed a trip while Zoë was in the car.

Those adorable Cabbage Patch Kids? Yeah, the cheapest one is $60. They go all the way up to $300. We had a team huddle with Toni and advised which section to steer Zoë towards.

Those kids that are half-ensconced in the cabbage? They move up and down, twisting all the while. It’s a tad disturbing, but not as morbid as the macabre workings of the birthing process.

I don’t have any photos of the process itself. I do have a video of the whole thing, but obviously that won’t be in this document.

I found it more than a little disturbing that the birthing process is rife with jokes about episiotomies, c-sections, drugs, and the like.

Apparently the mother cabbage is pollinated by some type of bee. Once she’s ready, a doctor comes along and puts in an IV (ivy, in this case), injects her full of Imagicillin and then determines her dilation status. (Ours was 10 leaves) If the baby is “branched”, they can perform a c-section (cabbage section). They even do a little sonogram before they yank the shivering fetus from the cabbage womb so all the kids can see if it’s a boy or a girl. Then they have the audience name it. Really quite frightening stuff.

Anywho, Zoë ended up getting a baby wearing a purple outfit. Purple’s her favorite color. As you can see from the above photo, it is an entirely unique and dissimilar doll from all the others.

She did, however, get to name it. Her decision? Mine. Mine Baby Hettenhouse. Poor girl, dad now torments her by grabbing her doll and calling it mine. J