BYU

Being in Utah always makes me want to return to good ol' BYU.  I like walking around the grounds and walking down memory lane.  So we took a day to go see BYU.  It was also Education week so it may not have been the best idea, but it was fun.

We met up with my sister-in-law, Allison, at the Beane Museum.  The kids were all fascinated by all the animals.

Looking at 'Shasta' - the liger.

This bear is close to the front of the museum and if you get close to the glass it will roar at you.  This made Hannah nervous.  She didn't want to sit by it for the picture.

The older kids went to the show at the museum and got to actually meet some animals.  I stuck with Hannah and walked around.  Megan liked touching the snake.

We also went to the Science Center.  This has a few more hands on science - y things.  So that was fun.

Trying to make the sound travel from one side of the building to the other.  I don't think this was working all the way but that didn't bother Adam.  He just wanted to yell into it.

We also went to the Museum of Art.  Some of us wondered about this broken violin. 

Rachel and Megan peer at each other under this huge exhibit in the museum. 

And sitting in the BYU bookstore. 

And everybody's favorite part was the bus ride back to our car.  We parked at the stadium and walked to BYU.  But I am glad we were able to take a bus ride back.  Some of us were extra tired and cranky with all that walking.

Anyway, now I have walked down memory lane.  It was fun seeing everything again.

Parks, Chocolate, and Swimming

We had a fun day right outside Salt Lake.  It started off with going to the park.  Rachel wanted to go to the park and have a picnic.

I don't remember what this park is called but it is in Salt Lake and is huge.  My sister Erin had the day off work and was able to come with us.  The park had some fun and unique toys - like this funny spinning ball.

And lots of swings for everyone.

It was hot, but we found a shady spot for our picnic.  Rachel was thrilled.

Then we went to Mrs. Cavanaugh's Chocolate Factory for a tour.

This lady sure knew what she was doing.  She was really fast at making the chocolates.

From up high we could see what everyone was doing.  We also could look for the Curious Georges.  They had several stuffed Curious Georges hanging around (based on the book where Curious George goes to a chocolate factory).  So that was a fun touch.

Standing in front of the wall of chocolates.  If only they were real candies. 

All throughout the factory were fun chocolate quotes.  We got to eat some samples along our tour and even stopped for ice cream afterwards. 

We found an indoor pool halfway between Lehi and Salt Lake.  Will's parents met us there. 

The pool was pretty empty since school had already started in Utah. 

They had a great kids area and an awesome lazy river and fun slide.  Anyway, it was extra fun because with so many adults I could relax a bit more in the water.  Not be constantly counting kids.  And everyone thought the pool was great.

So it was another super awesome day in Utah.

Museum of Ancient Life

Because we are slightly crazy we also went to a third museum on this $2 Tuesday - the Dinosaur Museum. 

My sister brought her two kids along and we all enjoyed looking at the way animal life has changed over thousands of years of history.

Stopping to play in a tunnel.

We saw lots of bones of different kinds of dinosaurs.  Some small.

And some very big.

This is a favorite spot - it is like a water/sand table put together.

Hannah had a hard time reaching the dirt, which is very important, so Will went in there and helped her.

A couple of cute kiddos got on the scale to see what they weighed in dinosaur.

Playing on some dinosaur toys.

We moved up several thousand years to get to the ice age animals.

And everyone's favorite part was the pretending to be a paleontologist and look for some bones.  When it became just throw dirt at people time it was time to go home. 

So it was a fun way to end an exciting Thanksgiving Point day.

The Kids Museum

My kids had begged even before going to Utah to go to the kids museum at Thanksgiving Point.  So we went and had a great time. 

We started off going to the chamber of knowledge.  It is a cool maze.

After finding all the stations the kids put in their answers and won.  They were awesome discoverers.

Playing "soccer" on the ground.

We spent a fair amount of time climbing on this structure up high.  It is hard to tell but one of my kids is up in the net.  I ended up in the structure chasing Adam.  We only struggled a little bit trying to find the way down.

Can we jump like a frog?  Will impressed everyone with how high he could jump.

And this machine was how much you weigh in animals.

This was a new part of the museum.You pretended to be a settler landing in America.  Can you survive?

There were questions to test you and you might get points for health but negative points in morale.  Things like that.  Here the kids had to cross the stream by going across the rock wall.

Most of the kids 'died' and then wanted to try again.  It was interesting.  I guess a lot of the early settlers didn't make it.

Unfortunately, my phone died and I didn't get more pictures.  The kiddos also had fun dressing up and doing crafts and playing in the water stations.  So it was a fun time at the kids museum.

$2 Tuesday

Will's parents learned that in August there is $2 Tuesday at Thanksgiving Point.  My kids wanted to see a couple of different museums.  So it was a really busy day.  But really fun.  First we went to a new spot at Thanksgiving Point - the Butterfly Symposium.

They have hundreds of butterflies here just flying all over.  It was really neat to see the variety.  You had to be careful on your way out to not accidentally take a butterfly with you.

Megan spots a butterfly among the plants.

It is hard to tell but they were crawling all over these big windows.

Whitney got a butterfly to crawl onto her finger.  It stayed for a couple of minutes.  I guess Rachel and Megan both had butterflies on them too but I didn't get a picture.

Hannah, dressed in her cousin's clothes, liked seeing all the pretty flowers and water.

There were other parts of the museum that talked more about bugs.  Here the kids are pretending to be trapped in a bug jar.

Hannah looks at some of the other bugs.  Some of them were hiding and took a little extra finding.

There was a build a bug spot.  Rachel shows off her creation.

And Megan shows off hers.

And there was a room to pretend to be bug scientists, making a discovery of a new kind of bug.  It was a really neat museum.  I am glad we were able to go and learn more about bugs (although I will still squish ones I find in my house).