Monday, August 16, 2010

A Redirected Day

Yes, I know I still haven't gotten around to moving the old blog over.  It's not a high priority at this time.  Look at it this way--I'm taking the Creative Memories mantra to heart: start with now, then work your way back as you're able.  *wink*

So the current "now" is today, and how today didn't exactly go as planned.

The original plan for today was a parkdate with lunch at home and brief lessonwork; but life happens while making plans and the parkdate fell through.  Additionally, a good friend was unexpectedly available and looking for something to do.  We decided to head out to the recently renovated art museum.

So, the second plan was to go to the art museum and then maybe look at some legos while we were in that neck of the woods.  As mentioned previously, life happens while making plans....none of us remembered that the art museum is closed on Mondays.  We decided to head to the natural history museum instead.

Amazingly, that actually happened!  We had a pretty nice time looking at things.  The kids and I had been a couple of times, but our friends had never been.  And they're into "mysteries," so when a hidden doorway in the rockwall of an exhibit was discovered we had to determine what it was for--as any good homeschooler would, right??  *lol*

We gathered data, we plotted maps, we compared locations.  We investigated details from the floor above.  We also continued to explore the museum during this.  Afterwards, we returned to the scene of the mystery and discussed our findings and honed our hypothesis--though the hypothesis was not quite a unanimous agreement.  Then we decided that since there weren't designated docents in designated areas that we would go to the front desk (on our way out) and check with them.

Upon arriving at the desk the two eldest children chickened out about speaking, so I hoisted up second-born, so he could see, and briefly explained the above.  One of the young ladies behind the desk asked who came up with the hypothesis, and second-born piped up with the exact verbage he'd given during our discussion--I wish I'd documented it!  Something about the water going up the pipe and down the waterfall to the fish.  She gave him a high-five, told him he was absolutely right and then the eldest two opted to be involved in the conversation.  *wry grin*

She was so tickled with second-born and his adorable intelligence that she took us up to see what was behind the door.  Then she took us to see one of the hidden kittens in the wall murals.  And after that she took us to one of the behind-the-scenes animal rooms where we visited a variety of turtles, snakes, baby American alligators, owls, doves, guinea pigs, hampsters, rabbits, and mice.  Oh, and a fabulous tortoise.  She and one of the animal curators also informed us of homeschool days, and their Junior Curator program (which is a few years off for us age-wise).

The only bummer of the day?  We never got her name...and we didn't quite catch the curator's name when she had introduced us.  I'll have to try to call in the morning to see if I can get that information.  We were so bushwacked, and she had other work she had to run off to take care of that we didn't get to have a parting conversation.

One of the best parts of the day?  Besides all of the awesomeness above??  Second-born kept his hands in his pockets the ENTIRE time we were in the critter room!!!

Afterwards we headed to the mall for an over-priced snack (not doing that again) and a quick look at legos.  I picked up a couple of 32x32 platforms so we can work on micropolis scales.  We took backroads home to avoid the inane rush hour and didn't get home until almost 6pm!

I have a couple of pics--will try to upload them later.

No comments:

Post a Comment