Boston Children's Museum 5/30

Even though this was my last day in Massachusetts, I decided to make good use of it (and make up for my relative inactivity the previous two weeks) and bring Lucy to the Boston Children's Museum with Emily, Olive, and my mom. Because Brandon and I have a membership to Discovery Gateway, the local children's museum in Salt Lake City, we were able to get in for free through the ASTC program. I didn't bother to look at the entire list of museums very closely until we decided to go and I realized that there are quite a few museums we could have gone to for free just in our area with my membership. Better remember for next time we are out of state...

Since we had a full car and Lucy and I would be heading to the airport straight from the museum, we decided to drive into the city and park instead of taking the T. Emily drove and I navigated and despite my intimidation about driving in Boston, we made it with no problems. 

The museum is right on the water and the girls were enchanted.

This museum is so big compared to our humble Discovery Gateway...

This is what greats you at the entrance - a giant climbing contraption that looked so fun, I was tempted to climb in myself. It scaled all three stories and could be entered or exited from any floor.  Lucy didn't go too far in it.

We learned a lot of about physics and motion playing with golf balls.

I loved these little signs all throughout the museum - great reminders that kids learn through play, not just highly structured activities or drilling and memorization.

And slides - slides are always a big hit!

When we heard an announcement over the intercom that there was a music and movement class that was open to everyone, we headed to the second floor. It was pretty packed.

Couldn't miss the opportunity to photograph the "rat's nest" hair. Oh yeah, and the singer lady was really good!

The girls got to play with all sorts of props like bells...

...and scarves to dance around with.

We got a nice view of the city from the third floor as we made our way to the Japanese house. My mom told us that when they were reconstructing the house years and years ago (back in 1979) they had carpenters from Japan do the reconstruction and she brought them Japanese food when she heard about it. Who knew?

The house was cool to see but nothing really new for us since we had been to Japan. The girls weren't too interested so we moved along. What was a big hit was the little grocery store. This girl loves to shop! You think she inherited that from her mama?

Does Olive have a future in retail? She sure loved that cash register. Or maybe she just really liked technology? Or money?

More great reminders:

The construction zone was our last stop before we left. The first floor was definitely the most crowded but the third floor was practically empty. Good thing to remember for next time - skip the crowds and head upstairs.

It was so awesome to have my mom there to play with the girls. I seriously want to buy up a whole street somewhere so we can all hang out together.

At least Lucy and I get to see this rugrat at least once a week.

And thank goodness there were two of these. Lucy and Olive sat opposite each other and didn't even have to take turns.

There was more climbing stuff that was just a little too big for Lucy but would have been perfect for Maya. I'm a little sad she missed out on the excursion since she had already left to go back to DC. Next time, Maya!