Week 6: Children's Museum of Phoenix

The Children's Museum of Phoenix's mission is to engage the minds, muscles and imaginations of children and the grown-ups who care about them. The Children's Museum has been in its current location at the old Monroe School building since 2008, but was actually originally founded in 1998 as the Phoenix Family Museum by a small group of volunteers. From 1998 until 2008 the Phoenix Family Museum visited community events and schools all over the valley and engaged the imaginations of over 275, 000 participants through a program called Museums Without Walls (MWW).

The Museum has been in its current permanent location at 7th Street and Van Buren Street in downtown phoenix for six years and continues to add new exhibits all the time. Just this past February, they opened an outdoor exhibit partially sponsored by the Arizona Diamondbacks. It has some pretty amazing play spaces including a super long climbing tube and a cactus maze. Musical instruments dot the lawn, and the outdoor visuals are so inviting it's hard to walk by without wanting to go inside and see what else is there is to play with. They also added a super cool hot dog stand to go along with the ice cream stand inside on the third floor just outside the noodle forest.

outside play area completed February 2014

The website is pretty good, and explains in detail all of the things the museum offers, but honestly I wasn't really sold until we had been inside. Sometimes we visit museums as a family, and it's made up of things that grown-ups think will be fun for kids, but actually aren't very fun for kids. Thirty minute long videos, even about things that are fun, aren't very fun for kids. This museum is the opposite of that. Everything you wish they would have they do.

A whole room devoted to building forts out of couch cushions? Check.

A giant room that consists of rolling balls down super long ramps? Check

Car tracks to race cars down? Check

A place to paint and color and craft? Check

Lots of grown-ups (ahem, playologists, as the museum likes to call them) around to tell you you're doing a great job and to play with you? Check

Chompy in her fort

Also, this place is super eco-friendly. If they can recycle it, they do, and there is some pretty amazing art in this building made out of old silverware, milk cartons, guitars, plastic bags and anything else you can think of. We have been there once a week since we moved to Phoenix, and we find a new favorite thing every time we go.

ceiling decorated with umbrellas

Only a few complaints, sometimes it gets super busy with school groups. Parents can check before they go and see how many groups are expected on the web site, though. Some parents complain there's not enough to do for older kids, and I could see that as a problem eventually. The memberships are a little confusing. I'm still not sure exactly how ours works, and we've belonged for almost a year. I'm going to get a better explanation this year when I renew.

Washers with giant bolts. This actually makes for a pretty cool visual and audio effect. 

 Chompy is two, and there's plenty she can't do yet. Stinko is only  months and he's really getting into the baby areas. Whoa, did I mention that in every space there's something for the older kids to do, there's a safe soft place to put your baby down to crawl around. Yep, they thought of everything. This is the place I go to on hot days where I can take a break and sit down and let the kids play. It's the ultimate indoor playground, with an extra bonus in that I don't have to chase Stinko around and make sure he's not eating cigarette butts.

Koi painted on floor of the eating space

chompy waiting to get in

chompy and stinko, happy until it's time to go.

I have taken everyone in my family to the Children's Museum in Phoenix. There are things to engage your little ones attention on every side.

Leeroy Jenkins

So, I used to play a lot of World of Warcraft. I'm actually pretty lucky my boyfriend and I broke up and I didn't personally own the computer hardware to let me continue my obsession, or I'm pretty sure they
would have found my diet soda encrusted body mummified circa 2005.

Anyway, I love this video, because leeeeeeeeeeeroy mmmJenkins is AMAZING.

Week 5: Papago Park Hole-in-the-Rock

Papago Park has  rich Native American History. It was also used as a P.O.W. camp for German prisoners during World War II. Its area includes the Phoenix Zoo, the botanical gardens and our chosen destination The Hole-in-the-Rock.

The Hole-in-the-Rock is a natural geological rock formation in Papago Park. There is evidence that the Hohokam Indians settled near this natural monument thousands of years ago. Climbing to the top is easy for kids of all ages. Better, you can park right at the base. Every time we go there are always a couple of families and grandparents with their grand kids.

So the trick to this Phoenix, Az,  thing is to get out early or stay out late, and since with little kids staying out late means lots of crying, screaming and possible biting, we tend to choose the early option. My kids are worlds better in the morning. The trick is getting them up and out early enough to enjoy the cool weather (by cool I mean 90 degrees guys, don't get too excited).

As we all know with kids, having definite plans is a no no. Things have a tendency to implode just at the critical moment, so I always start out the week thinking, some morning this week we will make it to Papago Park, and then, I am the best mom in the world because we DO make it to Papago Park some morning during the week. If I planned it for a specific day and it didn't work out, then I would feel like a failure. We missed one day that seemed promising due to an unforeseen shoe disappearance,but we managed to make it to Papago Park not once but twice this week! Take that universe!

Chompy calls it climbing a mountain, and ever since she did it for the first time with her big cousin she's been dying to go back! So we finally went. These pictures are from two different days. The climb is perfect for young kids because it's not too long, and there's plenty for older kids to do as well. Plus it's like a secret passageway when you climb up the back way. Super Awesome.

Stinko went, too, but he was in the carrier so no pictures! He's super fast, too, so he stayed in the carrier, too. I'm not trying to have him fall off a mini mountain when he's not even one yet.

Don't Mess with Nature

Seriously guys, we don't know what's going on out there.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_sparrow_campaign

The Berenstein Bears

While my family and I were in Coronado, Chompy was taking a break from all the fun and watching a show with her pal. The show they were watching was called the Berenstain Bears. My husband mentioned to me that he remembered it being the BerenstEin bears when he was a kid, and then I realized I remembered it that way, too.

What the heck! I thought maybe they changed it so it was easier for the kids to spell, or some kind of crazy anti-Semitic craziness. So I got online and I googled it. I thought for sure there would be all kinds of crazy discussion about the craziness of how they changed the name, and why they changed the name, and how kids are all getting dumber or something because we're making everything homogeneous and boring, but man, I WAS WRONG. It has always been the BerenstAin bears, not the BerenstEin bears. My mind was completely blown. I even looked up picture after picture of the old books trying to find out if there was a changeover somewhere, but nope. 

This guy Reece has a pretty amazing theory about what's going on. So I'm going with that. At least until I talk to my mom and find out what she remembers. My mom knows everything.

Also, he recently posted an update about his theory, as in, in between the time I first looked up his post, so here it is.

No one Can Make Fire More Boring Than New Employee Orientation

Seriously, you guys. We talked about fire for two hours. You would think fires would be inherently interesting. I once was able to stay up for two extra hours after working an 8 hour bar shift (it was 6 am before I headed home) to watch the Baltimore Fire Department extinguish a 6 alarm fire. It was amazing.

Somehow the safety guy made me feel as though nothing would be more soothing than putting myself inside a fire while he was talking today. Sheesh, safety training.

Week 4: Cook with your kids

Cooking together is amazing. Kids like to do what their parents doing anyway, so cooking is perfect, since it's something that needs to be done and it can be done inside out of the million degree weather. We've made cookies together and shucked corn. Chompy helps me measure out the water for oatmeal, and stirs about everything we make together.

Saturday is the perfect day to get up early and walk over to the Phoenix public market. Living in downtown Phoenix is amazing because of the close proximity to so many things. I hate loading the kids up in the car, and they hate it, too. Walking is so much better for us, and the environment.

Chompy helped pick out fresh fruits and vegetables, including green beans, and she got to run around. Stinko enjoyed all the people making eyes at him and waving.

When we got home we enjoyed breaking off the ends of the green beans. Sometimes we got more ends than beans, but there was no complaining. Then Chompy washed all the beans in the sink, and ate quite a few, and then dried them all individually in a hand towel. No four star chef was as careful with these beans as Chompy.

AND when  our big pot of ham and green beans was finally cooked, Chompy ate tons, and enjoyed telling her dad that she helped cook them.