Babyland is in Cleveland, Georgia (about 90 minutes north of Atlanta, about 90 minutes south of where I live) and it's where all the Cabbage Patch babies are born and where you can adopt them.
I thought this would be a wonderful chance to explain how children are adopted, albeit in a slightly twisted way, since real children are not born of cabbages solely for the purpose of adoption...but I thought the concept would work.
So I went onto eBay and found some super cheap Cabbage Patch babies for the kids.
So we loaded up the car, along with some friends, and drove down to Cleveland. We were very impressed with the "hospital," and the picture taking started right away.
Once we got there, the children were presented with their new babies. They were so excited. SB had wanted a bald baby with a pacifier. Mac chose the pink skunk. All day long I kept hearing SB exclaim, "I love my baby! I can't believe she's here!" It was very sweet.
When we went in the Cabbage Patch babies were given "visitor" tags and we signed in for the grand tour.
Except it wasn't much of a grand tour. It started out with a hallway of very old and expensive dolls - some worth $15k or more. I can't believe they're worth so much! There was also a giant cabbage couch which was a great photo op.
We saw a baby nursery, a preschool room and what not before going into the big room in back.
Which was a giant store. I mean seriously, the entire thing was a store. And when you have a parcel of preschoolers with you, they want everything. Every outfit, every shoe, every bottle...I was a little miffed that it wasn't a hospital with a gift shop - it was a gift shop with a hospital.
But we managed to find the location where the Cabbage Patch babies are born.
And then they announced it was time for a birth to happen. It was very cute - over the PA system someone said that Mother Cabbage was in labor and for someone to attend to her. A crowd (I was shocked at how many people were there on a random Thursday morning) gathered and a very cute little nurse showed up to assist in the delivery.
The baby was a girl and the crowd got to name her. I think they chose Adrianna Jaden. (No idea how it was all spelled...probably Adryanna Jaydyn - Cabbage Patchers are notoriously bad spellers.) I would have picked something nice like Penelope Amelia.
Anyway, they passed little Adrianna around and let the kids hold her.
Mac was a little unsure of the entire thing.
The kids each picked out a little prize - SB an outfit and Mac a flashlight. I also got the three big kids all nurses hats. I managed to spend less than $10 in there.
Then it was time to go. The kids didn't formally adopt their babies - that was only if you were paying for one in the hospital. But SB decided to name hers Lucy and Mac called his something like Skunky Bang Pop.
We spent about 2 hours there, but we easily could have been in and out in 30 minutes. We really stretched it out. Overall it was cute and we enjoyed it, but I wouldn't make the trip super often.
We were only about 15 minutes from our favorite Bavarian village, Helen, so we went there for lunch and a quick walk around.
And on the way home we stumbled upon a quaint General Store that does Easter, Christmas and Halloween festivities. It was pure luck we stopped there, Mac and Carly wound up having to go potty about 10billion times each - the joys of traveling with newly potty trained children.
Overall we had a great day. I would recommend the Babyland General Hospital to people who are adoption minded and those who just like seeing something a little different. Just be prepared to spend if you don't already have a Cabbage Patch in your family.
