National Museum of Play

Earlier this month Kristen and the girls came up for another visit. We decided to pile everyone in the van and head to Rochester to meet PJ - my cousin Denine's new baby boy. PJ was born at 10lbs exactly and at 6 weeks old was up to 13lbs. The boy has a lot to love. He has perfectly kissable lips.

He started sleeping with one eye open since Jamison got a hold of him.

**cue JAWS music**

Jamison loved PJ. It got to the point that when I was holding PJ Jamison was not jealous that I was holding PJ but that HE wasn't holding PJ. Jamie would grab at him and try to pull him from my arms.
It was a bit awkward for Jamison since PJ is a chunk. Being 13lbs PJ looks like he should be able to hold his head up - but, as we all know, six-week olds typically don't hold their heads up.

My mother pointed out how large PJ looked when Jamie was holding him. "Look at the size of his feet!" Kristen then had to let mom know that she was looking at Jamison's feet, not PJ's. So PJ is not that big. To mom's credit it did look like an optical illusion due to the way Jamison was sitting and holding the baby.

The next day we decided to meet up with Aunt Linda, Denine, and PJ at the Strong National Museum of Play. Lily helped Maddie and Ruthie put their shoes on so we could leave on time.

I wasn't sure what to expect at the museum but there is no way I could imagine how fun it would be for all of us. There is a whole area devoted to Sesame Street. There are four different areas that look exactly like the sets from Sesame Street.

The kids waved at Big Bird and Aunt Linda joined in. I'm sure she was just showing them how it's done.

Elmo's World. I think the twins enjoyed this area more than my kids.

Lily, Jamie, and I bought extra tickets to go into the butterfly area. They both were equally excited even though I mentioned, repeatedly, "DO NOT TOUCH THE BUTTERFLIES."

LIly and I have a few (understatement of the year) things in common. One in particular is that we do not like the heat. We enjoy the sun, we like warm weather, but we do not like heat and humidity. Once we entered the room Lily and I immediately said the same thing - "it's really hot in here." And it was. Humidity was at 3,000%.

So Lily was not in the mood for pictures. She refused to look at the butterfly that Jamison found and for added drama crossed her arms and pouted. But Jamie did a good job of not touching the butterfly.

Don't enjoy yourself too much Lily. I wouldn't want to think that you appreciated the experience.

Excellent example of not touching the butterfly!

DON'T TOUCH THE BUTTERFLY JAMISON!

I wasn't, I was waving at it.

And it appeared that was the case. I apologized for flipping out.

Afterwards we headed toward the middle of the museum that was packed with all sorts of things. There was a replica Victorian home that Maddie and Ruthie stayed in for about an hour playing tea, a dress up/stage area for performances, a pirate ship, and a huge airplane that the kids could climb in.

I'm sure you can guess who was first to run to the airplane.

Lily joined him for the pre-flight checklist.

There appeared to be a mechanical problem with the aircraft.

Having fun in the airplane Jamie?

And that's when I was corrected. Jamison pointed out that it wasn't an airplane but a helicopter. What? And then as I looked closer it did, in fact, have a propeller on top. How in the world did he notice that?

There is another area that is a small replica of a Wegman's supermarket. The kids grab a cart and are allowed to choose five items to check out.

Lily unloaded her cart and prepared to check out.

Each item has a UPC code that gets scanned and is actually entered into the register. After everything is scanned Lily hit "total" and an accurate receipt came out.

Aunt Linda pretended to be Lily's customer and tried to greet Lily.

Linda:" Hi there."

Lily: (silence)

Linda: "Lily, you're supposed to say hello to the customer."

Lily: "hello."

Linda: "my Wegman's is a lot more friendly than this Wegman's"

Lily: (silent and apathetic, just wants to scan her food)

Lily proceeded to go food shopping five more times, each time insisting to check out at the "5" register since she is 5 years old. The four other registers could be completely open and she would wait in line for the "5" one. It was a little too intense.

I wasn't sure how Maddie, Ruthie, and Jamie would do at Wegman's but they caught on and were pretty good shoppers.

Notice that Kristen has a different hair cut all of a sudden? My cousin Myriah works at a very nice hair salon and was able to squeeze Kris in for a new style. I never got a close up shot of her but I promise it looks cute.

Jamison was having a hard time scanning his sweet potato. Or his yam. I'm not sure which one it was.

Naturally Lily made her way to the stage. Oddly, dressing up and performing was the last thing she did in this area. The stage also has a sound board and a light board (is that what it's called? any theater lighting technicians out there to correct me?).

She spent the majority of her time changing the lighting and the music to everyone else's performances (which is allowed). So when she got her opportunity to get on stage can anyone guess what she did? It's embarrassing. She completely called out the other girl doing the lighting and the music and ran over there to change it to her preference. It all happened so quickly that I didn't have time to explain that what she did was incredibly inappropriate. Lucky for her, the girl couldn't have cared less about the lighting and music. And lucky for me, the girls' mother was no where in sight.

After her performance I had to sit her down and explain that while the lighting and the music may not have been to her satisfaction it was rude to tell someone else how to do it. Yes, sometimes we don't agree with how other people do things but that doesn't mean we have to be rude about it. And then I had the opportunity to tell her that I do the exact same thing all the time and I have to work on it too. It's hard having a mini-me.

After four hours in the museum we had to head back to Albany. The kids were exhausted but I think we could have made it a full day in there if we had the time. Since we go to Rochester a few times a year I will make sure that we squeeze time in for the museum each time we go. Next visit with the kids is in June for my cousin Jill's wedding. I wonder if we can go to the museum in between the wedding and the reception?