museum momma

some people want to see the seven wonders of the world. others dream of setting foot on every continent. for me, i'd be quite satisfied if i could take the kids to the local children's museum in every city we visit. the teams who design these things really know what they're doing. liam and susanna are absolutely ecstatic every time we walk into one. no matter where you are – we've gone to these museums in atlanta, raleigh, cary, hendersonville, charlotte, asheville – they all have certain things in common. you can bet your bottom dollar there will be a grocery exhibit, complete with carts, fake food, and cash registers. for some reason my kids are always drawn there first, which is fairly ironic since they're really only happy at the real grocery if a free sugar cookie is involved. [side note: chris finds it funny that the atkins family refers to these places as simply "groceries", and not "grocery stores". i apologize for this quirk. i come by it naturally.] in addition to the grocery, there is almost always some kind of lifesize rescue vehicle, like a fire truck or an ambulance. a theater or stage of some sort. an artsy/craftsy area. a train. basically, anything and everything that will captivate and enthrall the 2-5 year old crowd. last week, i drove the kids back to raleigh from spending a few days in charlotte with chris's parents. i figured we could stop off in greensboro and check out the children's museum there – a perfect halfway stopping point to stretch our legs, eat some lunch, and exert some energy. i hadn't told them ahead of time where we were headed, for fear that i'd get lost, or stuck in traffic, or really, so they wouldn't be hounding me the whole way there. but the second we passed by a sign a few streets away, liam, ever the observant passenger, started with, "mommy! it says children's museum! it says two blocks! it says go left! it says parking! THERE IT IS!" even now, five days later (which is like five years in adult time), the kids still can answer immediately when asked what their favorite part of the greensboro children's museum was. liam loved filling up the tank of the real racecar (surprise, surprise) and sitting behind the wheel. and susanna, even though she thoroughly enjoyed the post office and the mountain bikes, is apparently a diehard fan of the automatic faucets in the restroom.