So I'm pretty determined about whenever I have any free time I make it a priority to get OUT in this city and do fun stuff with the girls. As physically exhausting as that is sometimes it would be more painful for me to live in this town and not take advantage of it.
Also before we left Arkansas a neighbor friend of ours gave us a packet of cards "52 Adventures to do with your kids in NYC" and these cards are the BEST thing ever. Audrie loves looking through them and 'deciding' what we are going to do each weekend.
The card she picked last Saturday was the "American Museum of Natural History".
So off we went. This choice was great because they open at 10am and it was one block off the subway stop (about a 20 minute trip).
This museum was SOOO awesome! I was in awe every time we turned a new corner in this place. Audrie was freaking out about how cool the dinosaurs were.
They had room after room of huge dinosaur exhibits. It was really fantastic.
Annie was entertained, too, and had that long finger out pointing at every thing she saw.
We spent about an hour with the dinosaurs (and both girls never got tired of it). Then spent another hour checking out the other exhibits. We could have spent all day there.
This huge life size blue whale was hanging from the ceiling in the aquatic atrium. And the elephant pictured below was two stories tall. Amazing!
It was getting close to naptime (and I was worn out from chasing Audrie from one exhibit to the next) so we got back on the subway and headed home. (I asked a nice man on the subway to take our photo. This was after he asked me if Audrie and Annie were twins. Ummm... not sure if he understood that twins have to be the same age...??)
This Saturday I decided to take the girls to the Children's Museum of Manhattan (a hands-on learning museum). I saw online that this was the last weekend that the Curious George exhibit would be there. So we took the subway downtown and walked a few blocks over to check it out.
And oh wow this place was kiddie heaven!!! I thought it was awesome, too. Except one small important detail. You need one adult per kid for this place! Both Audrie and Annie were SO thrilled about touching all the cool exhibits, but they kept running off in a sprint of excitement. I honestly lost Audrie twice for a few seconds and about had a stroke each time. Finally I had to take turns carrying one of them on my hip while I chased the other. I totally recommend this place! But next time I will make sure Jamie can go with us.
This museum is four stories and each floor featured different children's characters. And every few feet there were tons of choices of hands-on stuff to mess with.
Audrie and Annie both loved the kitchen/cooking section in Dora's house. They spent awhile there baking some fake cookies.
Here is Annie at the doctor's office. She kept hitting random people in the leg with the rubber knee mallet thingy. But she did it with a cute smile so that made it ok.
Audrie made a friend at the huge lite-brite. They played together for a while. I'm sure it was their polka-dot attire that drew them together. :)
I loved the bicycled powered tv! We totally need this in our apartment.
Oh then Audrie found a microphone that would playback your singing. It was a little too tall for her but you know she didn't let that stop her. I eventually had to pry her away!
These two museums were a big hit. I can't wait to see what card from the deck Audrie chooses next. (I also love to use the website www.mommypoppins.com because each week it features kid's stuff that is happening around nyc.) I see that it is starting to post stuff about Halloween festivities for toddlers, so I'll be looking forward to what we do for that. I think Audrie is going to be Cinderella for Halloween and Annie is going to be "Gus-Gus" the mouse (from Cinderella)!
