The Perot, July 13, 2013

Our Family Outing for July was a trip to the Perot Museum of Nature and Science. I "won" us a Family Membership there at my PTA's Silent Auction last May and we've just now had a chance to get down there. It's a short distance from us near downtown Dallas and is a relatively hot, happening, new museum and I was THRILLED to have won the membership. I see us making several more trips down there in the coming months.

We brought David and Kim along for the day (we get a few free passes to bring people with us) as they had not been there yet and we knew that we'd have a better chance of actually seeing something with a 4:2 ratio! We met at our house and caravanned down so as to park near one another and then get in with our passes. (One great thing about the museum is that they have member-only hours, so it's not packed at certain times.) We chose to get tickets for the 9am slot so that we could spend a big chunk of our morning exploring the museum. We ended up being there until close to noon at which point we walked across the street to eat at El Fenix. Literally across the street! And it's the biggest El Fenix I've ever seen. The inside of that place was like the inside of Mary Poppins' bag... It just kept going and going!

We fed Graham a bottle at the table and after we were all done eating, Kim and David went back to explore the museum more and we headed home for naps. We managed to keep Austin awake in the car by singing his church songs extremely loudly and putting the windows down at times, but he went down easily once we got home so it was worth it.

The Spofford Clan that morning.
I had requested that Seth wear something bright so as to be able to spot him in the crowds and that's what he chose. Perfect!

Funky-shaped building, that's for sure!

First stop: the funky frogs outside.

Second Stop: the children's area which was a HUGE hit.

This is a faux produce truck that you can "drive" and load up vegetables into the back.

Graham had fun in the small area for crawling babies.

First with these manipulatives...

And then with the mirror...

And lastly onto these spinning flowers.

Austin's favorite thing (by far!) was this huge watertable. He liked it so much he eventually soaked his shirt!

It's hard to tell, but his lips are "vroooming"...

Graham started chasing his shadow. Hilarious!

You spin this wheel and the conveyor belt moves up, carrying the black sponge pieces up...

And then they dump into this box... (Seth is reaching to remove the days-old sticker from his back)

And then you take the foam puzzle-like pieces over and put them in the correct space.
Yes, his shirt was SOAKED.

I loved this miniature version of that new bridge!

And then we peeled ourselves away from the Children's (meaning toddler and baby) area to explore what else there was. Our first stop was the sports area where you can race against different things--a cheetah, a dinosaur, a famous runner, etc. Austin chose to race a dino!

Austin and Daddy racing the dinosaur!

Then we moved onto other areas which have since melded together in my brain, but I got some great pictures!

You pull the drawer open and the snake pops up as if to attack!

This was a fun thing, but Austin was too short to stick his head out so Seth helped. :-)

I love Smiling Eyes.

These little things opened to reveal smells. Some good, some bad. I found a new favorite scent called mountain laurel or something. It's probably not as popular as my favorite lavender scent, so it seems unlikely to really add much to my life, but it smelled super good! ;-)

These joysticks were to control a few robotic cars that could lay pieces for playing tic-tac-toe, but I just loved Austin's concentration face here.

Graham had long since fallen asleep.

The simulation of the tornado was pretty cool!

This picture of these doesn't do them justice. I couldn't stop staring the entire time we were in the lobby. part of the effect, too, is that they were, one at a time, moving up and down. Very neat.

Overall it was a very good outing! We were glad we had Kim and David along to help (we got to enjoy the museum more that way). Plus they bought our lunch! But seriously, it was a really good day and we will definitely go back. Although now that we've seen everything, we might just go back to spend a morning in the children's area because it was all Austin and Graham really wanted to do anyways. I had hoped to go by myself with the boys some this summer, but the layout of the children's area is such that I am not sure I feel comfortable that I would be able to keep my eyes on Austin the whole time while letting Graham play in the crawlers area. Because now that Graham's mobile, he's not content to just sit in the stroller forever. So I'm not sure I'll do that anytime soon. And even if you don't have kids, I still recommend going. Seth and I would have really enjoyed exploring the museum if we hadn't been parenting the whole time. Maybe we'll get a sitter and go to the Perot sometime?

Have you been? What's your favorite thing? Any suggestions or recommendations about going?