Life & Science Museum!

One of our favorite fall things to do is to take a trip to Boone to see the beautiful fall leaves and enjoy the colder weather. This year time and budget didn't quite permit, so we settled instead on a trip to the Life & Science Museum in Durham, thinking Kenna would enjoy the butterflies! (They have a greenhouse-type room where you can walk around and let them land on you).

Ready to leave for the museum- patiently waiting? Let's go already!
Finn, as usual, had the best seat in the house...
although Kenna's was pretty good too.
One of the major highlights for Kenna (as we thought it might be) were the hanging noisemakers outside. Give a kid a stick and tell her to go bang noisy stuff all she wants and let me tell you, that's a winner.
Inside the museum there were lots of interesting installations including a full crash test dummy example of what happens in a car crash without your seatbelt. We spent most of our time outside considering that between the museum itself and the butterfly house was a playground, a sand pit, the barnyard animals, and a train ride (and the noisemakers!).

My favorite was the train ride. It was not super fancy, but they had made cool and fun little decorations in the trees and along the train tracks... just enough for the kids to have something to look for almost like a scavenger hunt. And the weather was perfect so it was surprisingly relaxing. I loved sitting behind Matt and Kenna and watching baby girl snuggle up against her daddy:
Precious.
Looking at all the scenery!
Me and my boy.

The cutest part was that the man driving the train was this tiny little old man with a big white beard. He stepped away from the train for just a few minutes before loading the next group and Kenna asked (very loudly), "where Tanta go?" (Santa). Too funny.

The butterflies were cool but Kenna was a little more freaked out by them than I expected. It's always a little sad to see some of them have injured little wings. Matt and I both "held" one, but Kenna was not interested in coming too near.
We went by the barnyard animals just as the museum was closing, so most of them were heading inside for their dinner. The first thing we saw was this adorable friendly little duck that came right out to see us, wagging its tail like a puppy! It was the cutest thing. Kenna and I were both ready to take him right home with us.
We quickly saw the "sheepyhoos" as they were munching on their hay. Three of them shared a barn with a donkey, and they were all so cute!
It was a full, fun day and we had a bit of a meltdown when it was time to leave after no naps all day... both kids were totally conked out just a few miles down the road.

Beck's Birthday!

This year, celebrating Beckley's birthday provided us with our first trip to Marbles Kids' Museum, a great museum in downtown Raleigh that we've wanted to visit for awhile! We've heard everyone with kids Kenna's age talk about how amazing this museum is and what a fun experience for the kiddos. Unfortunately, Matt had a weekend class, but Kenna, Finn & I packed up and headed for a fun day downtown celebrating Beck's big day!

We started with cake and muffins at 10 am- what better way to start the day?! Happy 3rd birthday, Beckley!
Marbles was everything people had said and more. Kenna had a blast checking out all the kid-sized real-life play spaces, such as the pirate ship, grocery store checkout, veterinarian, and bank!
Her absolute favorite was the Wake Med sponsored mini-ambulance! I poked my head in the back several times to see her on the kid-sized stretcher, defibrillating the hearts of other kids and even herself! Actually, I was pretty amazed that she even knew that the defibrillator went on her chest, I'm not sure where she would have seen that anywhere else.
She was also very familiar with how to swaddle up the babies in their little kiddo-sized hospital buckets thanks to visiting the hospital when Finn was born!
Speaking of whom, Finn made it super easy on me by napping in the stroller the entire time we were there!
Papa just happened to be in town and was taking Evan on a special Papa/Evan trip to Marbles, so we met up with them to play for a little while in the Home Depot building area, and the matchbox car area!
What a great time! We can't wait to take Daddy to see Marbles, and it will be extra fun when Finn is big enough to play... and a very happy birthday to our Beckley boy!