Discovery Place Kids

I've been hearing for a year about the wonderful new Discovery Place Kids Museum, so we decided to take the kids there as a special outing during Grampa Neil's visit. Chris had to work and I was very grateful to have a second adult with me. The museum was very well designed, clean (at least of visible dirt!), and the kids loved it. There were hundreds of children there and the volume level was nearly deafening, so it was very stimulating. I saw plenty of children melting down because they couldn't handle the stimulation or couldn't possibly share at that young age, plus we witnessed one child who got lost from her weeping mother. Our children certainly loved it and I give the museum an 'A' grade for what it is meant to be, but it was such an exciting, "Disney"-style experience, it's something I'd want to limit to once or twice per year.

A real fire truck

Am ambulance

A real tractor

A grocery store probably 300 square feet big

Neil commented that "the mothers here look very tense." It was true: they and I were walking around with stern mien, looking somewhat like soldiers going out on a serious mission (a mission to keep their children safe from being lost), keeping alert at all moments, with no time for monkey business.

So, while I was definitely 'on alert' the whole time, the only time I felt scared (Nervous Nellie that I am) was when the kids went into this two-story den of hamster tubes. I was afraid they'd escape out the other end, so I sent Grampa Neil up to the top, but there he discovered that the upper door was locked, which was a good safety measure. Kids had to enter and exit through the same door.

A full bank, with vault and ATM with pneumatic tube

A full airport with security, luggage X ray, and airplane

I noticed a gaggle of girls working carefully at this airport flight board and it occurred to me that there were no boys playing there. I stood there and watched and never saw a boy interested in playing that game.

Then we went over to a two-story brick factory which this giant crane, levers, and many doohickeys for which I do not know the proper name. And there I studied for 15 minutes and noticed that no girls came to play at it! Indeed, Mary tried for a minute because I told her she had to stay together with John, but it didn't interest her, and she found that if she sat in a certain spot on the floor, she could spy down and watch a puppet show being performed on the full-size stage down below.

A race car

Water play

An auto mechanic shop

A railroad

A real motor boat

The museum had many convenient bathrooms, a nursing room (because, believe me, no babies could concentrate to nurse amidst all the noise and chaos), and a lunch room with tables. However, I thought that the tables were probably crawling with germs, so I scrubbed down the children's hands in the bathroom, commanded them to touch nothing as we walked out the last few feet, then we sat on a bench in the sun to eat our lunches.

Now we just wonder and wait for a couple of days to see if the children caught a new virus!

In bonus news: Chris and I think that Margaret is saying 'mama' with intentionality!