Natural History Museum of Utah

The day after Kevin's funeral I was able to get tickets (free tickets) to the new Natural History Museum of Utah.  It was to be a great day with all of the collections open to the public.  I had scheduled to go with Melinda and Karyn.  But Melinda canceled (since Laura was in the spelling bee that day - and won), so Helene and the kids came too.

It was an interesting day.  I forgot my stroller, so I owe a huge thank you to Helene who let me share.  The kids had so much fun.  That museum is awesome!!!  And the kids loved seeing Shannen's collection.  The snakes, lizards, etc. were on display.

We started at the top and worked our way down.  The museum has a great view of the valley.  But it was windy out there!  On the top level is the astronomy stuff and the current Indian culture.  The kids got to play a game Indian children play.

 Great view, huh?

 I love this picture of Brynn

Playing the Indian game with sticks

The next level down is the life level.  We went to see the collections first.  The kids had found a bug on the level above and brought it down.  Ashton showed it to the collections manager in the Anthropology area and he quickly killed it, telling the kids that it would destroy the collections and that they put all of the collection in a freezer for two weeks to make sure any bugs were killed.

Next we got to see Shannen's collections.  There were shells in the main area and then the snakes, and lizards were on display in the fluids.  I think the kids were in there for 30 minutes.  They loved it.  And Shannen was there to answer all of their questions.  It was really cool.

Some of the fluid collection

Next on the life level the kids played in the teaching room.  We had a hard time getting them out of there to look at the other displays.

 Ashton checking out the skulls

 Elina with the butterfly puzzle

Helene and Hailey - Hailey loves animals, she was so happy

Next was the earth level.  The first draw was the sand and water table.  They have some really neat stuff.  So, some of the floor has water in it and when you walk on it it moves the water.  Also, there is this display where you get to try and flood the Salt Lake Valley.  The kids loved trying to crank the handle to get the most water in the valley.

 The sand and water table

 Hailey and Elina on the water floor

 Lily showing me some of the displays

Ashton at the "flood the valley" display

We didn't spend much time in the anthropology display.  We were running out of time, and losing kids left and right.  We just needed to get to the dinosaurs.  That is the first level.  Of course, that was totally awesome.  The kids loved it. 

 They had some awesome skeletons

 Elina got to dig for fossils

 I caught the big kids outside doing this (Ashton, Emma, Daniel, Gavin)

 They had several places with glass floor and dinosaur bones underneath, they kids thought is was a great place to dance (Lily, Ashton, Micah, Gavin)

 The girls loved the chalkboard (Emma, Brynn, Elina)

They even got to go into the dinosaur collections area (Emma, Brynn, Lily, Karen, Jessie, Micah, Clara, Becky)

Our last stop was a children's play area (as if they hadn't played enough).  The hit was the costumes, and the water.  Elina was soaked (with her coat on) up to her elbows. 

 Emma was a butterfly

 Brynn

 Ashton

 Gavin, obviously did not get dressed up

Ethan was with us, he was so good

We had such a great time.  I would definitely go again, and I would plan to spend more than 3 hours there.  It was great!  The kids loved it, and so did I.

We finished the day by Gavin staying at our house and Emma staying at Brynn's.  So fun!!