Thursday, January 28, 2010

Chicago Children's Museum



I just love the Chicago Children's Museum.  We've only been here twice, mostly because parking is $23 every time we come. I'm sure we'd be here a lot more often if parking was cheaper.

Anyhow, it was fun to see what exhibits Jared and Alexa still enjoyed and what new things they were drawn to. When you first walk into the musem, there is a fire exhibit. Alexa loved pulling the hoses. Jared's favorite part of this exhibit was dressing up. They were disappointed there wasn't an ambulance here like last year.




They have this amazing net rope lader/tunnel kids can crawl through. Jared did a fantastic job climbing this last year when he was 2 1/2 (with Steve crawling behind him). Once again, my little climber was fearless, climbing the net ladder up two stories tall. Alexa wouldn't climb with them (she hadn't last year, either), so we watched the boys and took pictures. The picture below is at the very end of the climb.



Last year in the building section, the kids hammered golf tees into styrophome. This year they went all out and tried to build something with real tools and wood.






Very briefly, we visited the water section.




Then we headed over to the winter/snow exhibit. Last year the kids had fun dressing up the snowmen, but this year snowman's costume was much more elaborate. It's so fun to see the picture of the snowman from last year and put it up to this year's picture. I really hope they have the same exhibit there this December. It's becoming something of a family tradition.







The last section we visited we stayed the longest. First, the kids slid about thirty or forty times down a slide that made music as you slid down. Ours were one of the few kids who also went down belly first, both head and feet first.




Alexa was absolutely enthralled with the last activity. You'd construct your own flying machine out of foam, and then put it on a ledge attached to a pully contraption. Then you'd crank the flying machine about forty to fifty feet in the air. Then the flying machine would come floating down. They had a stop clock for those who wanted to time how long it took for thier machine to hit the ground. It was a perfect exhibit for all ages. In fact, we had to ask this one adult to step out of the way because he wasn't taking turns!  I really love children's museums.  All kids should have to opportunity to visit often and have full say in which exhibit they visit and for how long they stay.






2 comments:

Jena said...

Hi Chris! thanks for visiting my blog. It's so nice to meet you! Looks like you have two great kids who are in for lots of fun in their lives. So are the museums free in January? How about February, since January is about over now. I love the Chicago museums. Wish we got up there more often. :)

Chris said...

Thanks for checking out my blog, too! Next week we're going to the Field Museum. They have free days on most Wednesdays and Thursdays in February. Also, the Art Institute is free every day in Feb. as well. We're going the third weekend when there will be a family festival. We're also going to a Mozart/mime production at the Chicago Symphony Orchestra (not free though!) We just love doing things like this with the kids. We've also taken them on many trips, including out if the country already. I've been researching our trip to Greece next year, and this year we'll head down to the Smoky Mountains to stay in a cabin for a week. I just love this lifesyle!