Not a Lazy Sunday

Our busy day even included riding these pigs

Today was our busiest Winter Break Day yet!

My note for the tooth fairy!

It started with a bang.  I woke up early and was playing with my new loose tooth when it popped right out.  I was so excited I rushed to put it in my tooth pillow and write a note to the tooth fairy.  I told her exactly what I wanted in the note.  Dad is wondering how the tooth fairy is going to afford that.

Then we called Mom and talked to her on facetime. She was still in bed.

Dad made us an awesome breakfast and we headed over to the park. Hazel rode her bike, Turner rode his scooter, and Dad and I walked.  Unfortunately, a cold front came in yesterday, and even with all of our heavy winter coats on, we were ready to head back to the house almost as soon as we got to the park. The cold is one thing that we don't love about Winter Break!

I can do Dad'd job now

We had a yummy lunch and then it was naptime for Hazel and Turner.  While they were napping, Dad and I worked on some computer programming classes at www.code.org/learn. I was able to get through an entire introductory class and even earned a certificate!  We emailed it to Mom so she could be proud of me.

Hazel in deep concentration, painting

While normally Dad likes to let Hazel and especially Turner take really long naps, we had more to do today, so we had to go in and wake them up. Hazel was pretty easy to wake up, but Turner is a very heavy sleeper. After a few gentle attempts to wake him, we finally just all yelled "Wake up" at the same time.  That did it.

We grabbed a quick snack of graham crackers and milk (Hazel said it was the best snack she ever had), and headed to our main destination for the day - the new Austin Children's Museum.

This was our first trip there, so we weren't sure what to expect.  Before going in, we found a row of pig statues. Dad thought it was pretty strange - there was no explanation for the pigs or anything, but Turner LOVED them.  We ran around climbing on all 11 of them before even going inside the museum.

I am an artist

The new museum is definitely a lot bigger than the old one. When we first walked in they had a big painting studio. Hazel ran right into it, and I followed. Dad helped us into paint aprons, and we painted and erased glass walls over and over. Turner didn't seem as exited about the painting and instead played with some peg walls.

From there we went to a room where we could make paper rockets and use an air cannon to shoot them into the sky. Hazel's rocket went all the way to the ceiling. It was the highest of any of the rockets we saw. We took her rocket home so she could color it some more before dinner.

Tuner did this while Hazel and I painted

The next room we went into had a bunch of colored pegs that you could plug into a light board. Once again, Turner was in heaven there. Dad, Hazel, and I had to drag him away. Fortunately, the next room we went into was just as fun - a giant indoor water play area. They had water drums you could play, and buckets where you could pour out water. It was fun. The three of us played there for 45 minutes before Dad finally said we needed to see the rest of the place.

Playing with peg lights

The next room we went into was a kitchen. I thought we might get to cook something, but instead they had a neat experiment we could conduct to test our five senses. The woman was just starting to explain it to us when the fire alarm went off. It was really loud.  So loud, Hazel started crying. We all had to evacuate the museum. As soon as we got out the door, they told us it was a false alarm (a little kid had pulled an alarm) and we could go back in.  We went right back to the kitchen to work on our five senses experiment. The women said that alarm was a loud way to understand our sense of hearing!

Getting wet at the children's museum

The experiment consisted of a plate of about 8 different food items from the kitchen.  Many of them were similar, so we had to use a lot of our different senses to figure out what they were. We touched them, smelled them, even tasted them. A few tasted awful - like the vinegar that looked like water, or the baking soda and salt that looked like sugar. The sugar sure tasted good though.

All three us playing at the grocery store

The last room we went in was a play grocery store in kitchen.  This is pretty standard in children's museums. However, this one had a twist - a real scale. Hazel loved piling fruit on and watching the needle move. I had a blast looking at the numbers and guessing how much fruit would add to the total. We spent 3 hours at the museum and could have spent even more. Its nice to see a better children's museum in Austin.

Two more peppers makes 4 pounds

When we got home, Dad made us a pizza dinner, gave us baths, and read us bed-time stories. He also promised that tomorrow would be even more fun. I can't imagine what he has in store. I went to bed with my tooth and note to the tooth fairy under my pillow...