It looks like y'all picked a perfect day to go to the water park!
Since it seems that y'all do this on all of/most of your Disney trips, maybe I can pick your brain. We tossed around the idea of doing either BB or TL on our next trip just because we have the Premier AP's so we can get into a water park using that (I doubt we would ever do it if we had to pay OOP for a ticket, we are not that big on water parks). Do y'all normally plan your water park day to be the "off" day or do you find it too busy to be considered a relax day? We probably would not want to set aside a day for the water park AND have a day spent away from the major parks since we will only be there for a week. We will be going in October...I can't remember from your Oct TR, did y'all do a water park and if so how were the crowds? Thanks for any wisdom you can impart on a water park newbie!
Good questions. I would generally consider the water park day to be more of a relaxing day. Now, because we went to the park in the evening, ours wasn't really so much, but I've sort of told myself that next time I want to try and resist the "parks in the evening". But, at least at TL is definitely more relaxing for a number of reasons;
1) Much less walking than a regular park. The size isn't nearly as big as one of the theme parks, plus you can use the "lazy river" form of transportation.
2) Much less "must-dos". You can pretty much ride all the "rides" in very short order, so there isn't the pressure to get it "done". Realistically you could really ride everything in about 2 hours if its not super crowded. (We probably could have done it in an hour that day.)
For you, with the Premeire AP, I would definitely go and check it out on your off day. Bonnet Creek is right next door to TL I think, and it's got a great kids area. Get there early and stake a spot in the shade in the kids area, and then you and DH can switch off watching Paxton while you each check out the slides. Ketchakiddie Creek has a little sandy area near the "spray box" (New England term) area that little ones just love. At 2 years olf, there's not a lot he'd be able to "ride" there - they might let him in the lazy river with a swim diaper and a life vest, but I don't think I would take him in the big wave pool, but you could go for a few hours and then head back to the hotel for nap time.
October is a good time for the water parks - not that you will have the unreal low crowds we just had, but we went to TL the year before in October, and the crowds were quite managable. the biggest deal for getting they're early is to get the best seats in the shade, if that's what you want. Otherwise from a crowd standpoint, the lines and crowds in the wavepool were totally doable.
At Paxton's age, I would personally pick TL over BB. BB does also have what most describe as a pretty good kiddie area, but I think overall there are more areas to go with a small one @ TL. There are some very shallow pools set back from the main wave pool with sand, and also the run-off pool from Crush-N-Gusher is a very shallow (perhaps 2 feet deep). Plus there's a viewing area for the shark reef where you could bring him to look at the fish. (It's inside the overturned ship if you look at my first underwater picture it shows the view ports.)
(I also agree that I wouldn't PAY for the water parks with a Toddler unless I also had older kids. We first took DD @ 3.5 and that to me was maybe even a little young to really get value out of it. However, as part of an AP I would.)
I hope I didn't ramble too much for you.