Goin' On Dates...

... with my kids is a lot of fun!

Seth and I had a "date day" today. Originally I had planned to take him to the Children's Museum and also to a place called Kiln Creations, where he could paint pottery or melt glass or whatever. Seth is really into art. However, we were having such a great time at the Children's Museum (which we had never been to before) that when I asked him if he wanted to leave around 3:00, he looked at me as if I had just sprouted a third eye. We stayed there all day, instead, and I'll save the rest for another day!

It is not all that often that I get to go out with Seth, alone, anymore. This child who I enjoyed countless walks and days in the park with during his first year of life is getting so big! I honestly can't say where the time goes, but it goes too fast.

At any rate, Seth and I left around 8:00am and headed for Indy. The Children's Museum is so much easier to find than the zoo, and you know you're in for a good time when you pull up to an enormous building that has dinosaurs busting through the walls! Seth did, indeed, come face to face with a dinosaur later in our day, but not before I was eaten by a dragon. I honestly tried to convince Seth that he should be eaten, as it is family tradition, but he was adamant that it was my turn. He told me that he was not going to be eaten by anything, today! This is the point at which (with much fear and trepidation... this was worse than being consumed by the dragon) I put my $800.00 camera into the hands of my 8 year old. He did just fine:

We really enjoyed both the Lego Castle exhibit (which is gone now and was one of the main reasons that we had to go on the weekend we did) and Dinosphere. It was seriously cool when it started "raining" in the prehistoric world!

We traveled through the ocean, which was a hit for Seth since he got to climb into and through several submarines, and we browsed the train exhibit, which was nice but would probably be more intriguing to Caleb... and Daddy... The Egyptian tomb went over about as well as the one at Busch Gardens. A trip to the pyramids is not in the works for this family, although I would enjoy exploring them, myself.

Fireworks of glass was definitely a favorite. I think that Seth enjoyed creating with the plastic pieces that looked like the glass, but I was simply intrigued by the glass structure, itself. Seth also liked running up and down the ramp so I could snap some pics of him with the glass!

Lunch was not such a hit... I think I paid like $3.00 for a cookie! But... alas... this day was about Seth, and not about me, and the truth is, I will never be able to afford to pay $3.00 for cookies for everyone, so on individual date days with Mom, you get what you want! I wanted water... and that's what I had...

Speaking of which, the water tower clock was incredible! I am very glad that Seth agreed, because I really wanted to watch the hour change, and he acquiesced... twice! We are probably the only two people in the world who found it interesting enough to stand and watch the thing for a total of 15-20 minutes over the course of the day, but that's alright... we're just cool like that!

After lunch we took a quick spin through the Super Hero exhibit (another exhibit that is now gone). I really thought that Seth would like this, but he most certainly did not. I think this is largely due to the fact that he has not been exposed to most of these "heroes", because the trash they put out about them now is not really the kind of thing that I want my kids to associate with what makes a hero. Seth probably thought that I was subjecting him to something terribly inappropriate based on the fact that we have not really allowed Spiderman in our house. That said, if anyone feels the need to send me a gift, I would love the 1990s Spiderman cartoon series on DVD. I think it's high time that Seth was introduced to that Spiderman, and let's face it, I used to rush home from work (this is after I was married) in order to catch every episode, myself!

Next, we spent an entire hour in The Power of Children: Making a Difference exhibit. I doubt that we will be able to spend that much time when we take everyone, but I really appreciate that Seth loves to read every sign, because that gave me time to do the same! Personally, I felt that this was the most powerful exhibit in the building, although I can see how it might be "boring" for smaller kids.

We then proceeded to ask if we could take a quick walk through Playscape (the preschool area), because I wanted to check it out for future visits. I think the staff person was going to tell us no until we ran into a friend from the church I attended in High School who was working at the museum! Thanks to Kathy, we got to see what is available for Caleb and Ian, and it is always fun to catch up with someone you have not seen in 10 years! Having connections is a good thing!

We enjoyed Story Avenue quickly (we were running out of time), although I would love to sit and listen to every story in the future, and then we headed to Science Works. This was another favorite stop for Seth even before we actually crossed the threshold! I have a quick video clip of him playing the rhythm sticks here. He loved the water tables and the construction site, as well (see pics above):



We also had a great time running through the mirror maze, although it is a bit disorienting!



We swung by the museum store for souvenirs (magnets for me and an airplane construction book for Seth), and then we were on our way! We ate dinner at Chili's and desert at Dairy Queen and called it a day... a very good day...

Lisa