History and Art and Giggles - Oh My!




After the Nina, the Pinta (and no Santa Maria), we visited the Carnegie Museum of Natural History.  It may sound dry and boring, but I reminded our kids (and myself) that the "Night at The Museum" movies took place in a Museum of Natural History.

(Here's the boy measuring a dinosaur footprint.  I don't think he was supposed 
to go in there, but he got there first.  What's a mom to do?  Snap a picture, then tell him to get out, of course!)


Maybe it's because it's the first time all three kids had a long enough attention span and interest enough to make the visit fun. Yep, I think that's it.  Our four-year-old big boy was ready to learn some things!!  (Last time we went, I chased him around the entire museum.  Not fun.)

We walked through halls of giant dinosaur skeletons, watched professionals piece together dinosaur bones in their workshop, then practiced archaeology in a kid-friendly zone.




We walked through human history - Native Americans, Eskimos, and African Americans, to name a few.  We traveled all over the world, viewing so many kinds of animals I can't even remember them all - toucans, buffalo, giraffes, wolves, tigers, even local toads and snakes - amazing!

Usually all those dead, stuffed animals creep me out, but this time I learned to appreciate them because, when we go to a zoo, it is sometimes very hard to see animals.  They hide in their habitats.  Here, they're on display for all to see.  Especially nice for the kids.


They had wonderful play areas!  I think the kids would have spent the entire time there if we let them.
(Here they are dressed up as chipmunks, taking foam rubber nuts to store them inside a tree)








 
Then my husband and I had the bright idea of touring the Museum of Art.

It's good for kids to be exposed to art, right? 


Oh dear.

I've discovered I'm not mature enough to visit an art museum.  We had to cover the kids' eyes in some sections.  My five-year-old started laughing hysterically when she saw a nude portrait I failed to spot.

There was an entirely blank, white canvas posted on the wall.  What was that supposed to be?  Did someone pay money for that?  I could purchase the same thing at Lowe's for about 20 bucks.  Could've saved you some dough.  There were tv's playing old shows in one display.  Again, I wondered, what was that supposed to be?

I did like some sculptures and paintings that contained things I recognized.

They also had a museum representative in every section of the art museum, carefully monitoring us.  Perhaps they didn't appreciate our double stroller and sticky-fingered 4-year-old.  They probably didn't support our laughter at particular portraits.

I guess I don't really understand art all that well, but that's alright.

I think I'm okay without it.

You know...we may have set Art Museum history by being the first to travel through all the exhibits in 2.5 minutes.


We learned so much, spent time together as a family, and  it was beautiful...minus the parts where we had to cover their eyes.  That we could've done without.  Ah well, waddle on!



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