A World of Discovery

The day after our visit to two museums with Grandma Kathy and Grandpa Daryl, Brandon and I took the kids to another museum type of place.  It is a popular family attraction in our area.  We had never been there and were excited to take the kids.  

Big experiences are tricky for one of my children.  He is easily overwhelmed and acts in apparent sabotage due to his developmental delays in the areas of flexibility, frustration tolerance and problem solving.  I am reading The Explosive Child right now so I am trying out the lingo that seems to fit well haha.  

Anyway, we went to the museum on a Sunday after morning church and before evening church commitments.  It was quite a full day!  I think both kids can look back on it and say that they had fun.  T had true delight for much of it.  M had moments where he too had joy, where he was able to tolerate the stressors and have fun!  We think Brandon's mom would have loved this place and its gift shop. 

We learned that there might be a possibility that some of our friends would be at the museum that day.  We spotted them as soon as we entered.  Our kids were thrilled to have some time with friends.  They left shortly after we arrived, but we have photos to prove that we were there together. 

T: A and I made rockets!

M: R and I made the rockets soar!

I find the next picture hilarious.  Even without an explanation, you all might laugh... but I feel the need to tell you more!  So, if you know me well you know that I have a cold drippy nose all winter long.  The picture shows that indeed, even though it was quite warm in there, my nose is much colder than the rest of my face!

M must have been warm!

Some of the favorite parts of the day were trying simulators.  The first one the kids did was using some sort of excavator shovel.

M: This takes a lot of focus!

T: My turn!

T: I am not sure if I am doing it right, but I am having fun!

M: I think I could do this for a job. 

T: What will this do? 

Brandon and M worked together to figure things out. 

T: So there was some air doing stuff and the balls stayed up. 

M: I think we can get even more balls up!

The facility also has an aquarium.  We went back and forth to the different areas throughout the day.

T: It sort of felt like we were under water. 

M: We saw a scuba diver. 

They have a tank where kids could touch the stingrays.  I think that T would still be there if we hadn't told her it was time to check out something else.  She loved the water and the feel of the stingrays.  She is a little adventurer and had no worries about getting wet or falling in.

T: Daddy why are you holding me back so much? 

T: I touched it!!

T: Hi fish, can I have a kiss? 

They have a very cool ship area that T enjoying imagining on.

T: I could steer the whole ship!

T and I worked very hard to make some energy to turn on the light.  Sadly, you need a lot of speed and I couldn't go very fast because her little feet couldn't keep up.  She didn't seem to care.

T: Come on Mommy!

Me: How are we going to get this light on? 

M: I wanted to do it by myself. 

M: Hard work feels good!

T: This is fun. 

The flight simulator was M's favorite part of the day.  There was no line so he got to do it many times.  I am so thankful for this opportunity for him.  He was quite good at the simulation and successfully landed the plane his first time.  The later attempts were not as successful.

M: First the man told me what to press. 

M: I really like this!

M: Maybe I want to be a pilot some day!

T and I did some exploring as M did the flight simulator over and over again.  T wanted to try laying on a bed of nails.  Sadly, a parent has to run the machine that raises and lowers the bed on the nails.  There was a line so I had to try to take a picture while I was doing the levers.  I couldn't step away from the bed enough to really see the nails, but I promise she did it!

T: The bed of nails didn't even hurt. 

T: I decided to fly the plane too!

T: I immediately hit the ground. 

T:  They let me have another try.  It started off really well. 

T: Sadly that plane crashed too!

T: Yay, we got to go back to the boat!

T: Hmmmm

We ended the day with the kids designing a little craft thing they were able to then watch be produced.  It is a very cool process!

M: I made a Dragon. 

Sometimes family days are hard, but this one was better than many because our expectations were low and the kids both found things they really enjoyed.  We won the tickets at the silent auction last year so we only had to pay for parking the day of!  It was very special to have a family day in honor of T's Birthday!