So much to do, so little time...

On Sunday, despite being exhausted, we all got up and out for church.  We drove separately because afterward Carter and I had to rush off to a birthday party!  His classmate Avery turned five on the same day Carter did his "About Me" poster at school.  He got invited to her party, said he wanted to go, and then promptly freaked out about it after I RSVPed.  Sigh.  We still managed to get him to pick out a present on Saturday, and with a little convincing he got back on board to go...but wasn't happy about it.  The party was at Michael's, the craft store, so I wasn't sure what to expect.

We came in a few minutes late (church ran long) and everyone else was hard at work on decorating crowns with gems, stickers, and markers.  I helped Carter get some gems glued on his crown, and then after some convincing, we moved on to slime!  I have never done slime, which probably makes me a bad parent, but hey, if they're not asking, I'm not offering!  I don't need to go on hunts for glue or contact solution, or risk dyeing our house or finding something gooey in the crack of the couch.  We first made foamy slime with shaving cream, and then moved on to this one with clear glue...

Those white things are little foam balls to give it texture.

After slime making, the kids got to decorate their own cupcake in a cone (I loved those as a kid!), and then they did a saran wrap ball, where you unwrap for a certain amount of time before passing it along to the next person.  The kids did well with sharing and encouraging each other, and Carter was happy with his prizes.  As we left he admitted that he had a great time and was happy he went.  Yay!

We headed home just in time to have some lunch and see Craig and Jacob off to lacrosse practice.  By that point I was yawning non-stop and decided I had no choice but to let electronics babysit Carter for a bit so I could nap.  I literally had to rest.  So I did.  It wasn't a quality rest, but at least when I got up I could function!  I had to drag myself out of bed to start dinner, because dinner had to be prompt so we could get on the road on time to our evening destination: Strong Museum!

It was time for our annual free night at the museum through an organization that I have an investment with (courtesy of my grandma).  It's hard to cram everything into 2-1/2 hours, but we try!  Jacob and Craig mostly play video games and pinball games, but Carter and I tried to see as much as we could.  There was one new area that we hadn't seen, so we were sure to check that out.

Our first stop was this new climbing structure with a rocket ship theme.  Those two glowing balls inside were the coolest pendant lamps.  I marveled at how easily Carter maneuvered through there, after remembering how he got a bit stuck the first time he tried to do another one of these elsewhere in the museum.

There was also this really fun area where you could shoot foam "shingles" up a tube with some serious air flow, then add them to the roof up above. 

Putting in a shingle

The view from the top looking down

Once you were done you could put the shingles down a chute to be used again.  There was a button on the wall to make a light flash, which is what Carter is so excited about here!

We moved on to the cool spaceship area near a revamped helicopter that both boys have enjoyed.  This was pretty fun, though.  Three different seats, and lots of different buttons to press. Some of them seemed to do stuff :)  There was a "window" to see out into space, and sometimes there would be asteroids or something to see.  Carter took his pilot job very seriously!

It is wrong that this was my favorite part?

I have always loved stuff that responds to your touch like that!

We moved on to a special exhibit on astronauts, and in this one you got to land a space ship or drive a rover.  It was pretty challenging but very cool! 

We wandered around to try to get in to the butterflies, but no luck, so we walked upstairs toward the big boys.  On our way we did all of our usual favorites, like controlling the giant Mr. Potato Head and putting Slinkies down stairs (Carter was pretty impressed!) before getting to this giant screen where you could virtually pop bubbles!  We had a lot of fun.  You can see me taking the pic in the background.

We used a similar virutal screen where you could "play" with toys on shelves.  Amazing what technology does now.  In the meantime, the big boys were in the video game section, and eventually we joined them.

Foosball!

Giant angry birds game!

I'm only including this because pics of me are rare!  This was a weird basketball game where you'd hit the basketball on the console to propel a small basketball into hoops. I could get it high enough but not at the right angle!

Carter and I headed back downstairs to the storybook area, where we climbed on the ship...

...then checked out the electronic harp (no strings, just lasers) and giant chess.  We also built a mini castle on an earthquake (giant footsteps) table.  Carter also handled with ease the other climbing structure I mentioned earlier, the one he got stuck on when he was little.

On we went to the pinball room, and everyone had fun with the games there. 

This one was free and Carter loved it!  I played the little Super Mario one next to it.

Carter loves the Berenstain Bear room, with the fruit conveyor belt and the diner and half a dozen other activities.  I think he could spend all day in there.  But of course our future chef would love the diner!

We were running out of time so we started heading back toward the front.  Another new feature was this tiny stage with a working light and sound board.  Jacob had fun "announcing" Carter, and then Carter would come out to lights and applause.  It's a little blurry, but check out the joy on his face!

It was extra funny when he told a joke (perfectly, I might add), and Jacob ran the laugh track!

We headed to one last space before we left, and I had to get a pic of the funny mirrors in the midst of a bit of a whiffle ball war among all three of the boys.  Normally this is a toddler area, so they were lucky it wasn't busy!

The last thing we did was the coolest thing I've seen in a while.  There was table full of kinetic sand (which is really cool, by the way).  It was fun enough to play with dinosaurs in it, but notice the colors.  Those are elevations!  As you build the sand higher, it recognized the elevation of the sand, both on the table and on a map projected on the wall.  The wall projection also recognized where you moved sand to create new landforms or "water".  It was so cool to watch it change as you created something new!

We were sad to leave, but it was a fun night!  I said it last year and we never did it, but it's just a reminder that we need to pay to go there sometime so we have much more time to play with!  There were so many things that we didn't get to do, even in two years of visits!  Carter is at such a great age, though, so it would be fun to go back--but just maybe on a day that not every district has off!

Anyway, it was a great day, but a very busy one!  Monday was a struggle after so many busy days, but that's the price you pay for special days like we had!