CHILDREN'S MUSEUM

What better way to spend a stormy day than inside at the new Children's Museum?

We had planned to go on Monday, but discovered they are closed on Mondays, so we pushed my day off (I could only afford one day off while Mom and Dad visited) to Tuesday. While there was plenty for James to do (the museum is a 3-level adventure), there were definitely some exhibits that he was unable to use. He was too short to really enjoy the water tables or climb the slide structures, and he was afraid of the tunnels and the bounce house. He was also not a fan of dress-up yet. But he LOVED all the pretend equipment (tractor, car, farmer's market truck, kitchen, etc.) and the stairs.

Mama had some fun with the giant Scrabble board:James dug for fossils and weighed catfish:He was terrified of the digestive system exhibit. He refused to climb into any of it, and when I disappeared into the colon (or whatever this purple tunnel was suppose to represent) he told me 'no no no', gave me one last peek, and ran away.There was very little for Cora to do, but she did get to play some. Check out her near-crawl position...

Don't worry, she had plenty of fun just hanging with Grandpa. She's quite smitten with him (and I do believe the feeling is mutual). Mom told me she preferred him much of the week. Must be all that bootcamp bonding they did back in the summer.

It took a few tries to convince James that the tiny forest maze was a safe place. Then he found a bunny:And kissed a bobcat: While I crawled through the underground tunnels by myself (at least the other kids thought it was fun that an adult was playing in there), James was busy checking out geologic features. He loved the huge magnifying glass for studying rocks, and the volcano was cool too:

At the end of the day, I forced him to do the exercise room with me, which involved stairs and platforms and crawling over and under things. He kept fussing to go back the way we came, but I pushed on. I'm not a mean mommy, I swear. He forgave me as soon as we climbed out. He sure was ticked at me in this photo though...

All in all, a very fun day. We all had a really had a good time. James so much so that he wouldn't even break to eat lunch or nap. Not that Cora napped either. But she was happy to eat, of course.