The Maryland Science Center

July 22, 2009 - It's L's 8th birthday! We were planning on celebrating when we got home, but we still wanted to make her day special. We started out at the Maryland Science Center.

They have a really fun kids room upstairs where the kids could run around and "learn" things.

The only bad part was that there were several summer camps there so it got crowded with "yellow shirts".

Even Dad got in on the fun.

Don't forget the planetarium. (No flash photography please!)

We even got to lie on a bed of nails. First the kids, then Mom and Dad. I couldn't upload the video of the kids - I think it was too long, so here's me.

The best part about the Science Center is that most of the museum had hands-on exhibits for the kids. We were excited to see a dinosaur exhibit where the kids could find fossils,

climb on a Tyrannosaurus,

and put together a dinosaur skeleton.

Good job, W! (He might have had help!)

They had huge life-size dinosaurs from Maryland that roared inside of the exhibit. (No, that's not a T-Rex, it's an Acrocanthosaurus, biting an Astrodon.)

The museum employees were so great with the kids and they were excited to tell us all about the dinosaurs. Yea, dinosaurs!

L really wanted to ride the paddle boats for her birthday, so off we went. Unfortunately, you could only fit 4 into a boat, not 5, no matter how small the 5th person might be. I volunteered to stay on shore but was out-voted. So Dad took L and W in one boat,



while M and I got into another one.

Ours was defunct. It wouldn't turn properly and H teased me about it being user error, which it wasn't. All I can say is that it's no fun paddling a huge dragon by yourself. They popped a cork in the bottom of their boat and started to flood. I decided I'd rather have one that won't turn right rather than one that is sinking. Don't worry, H got the cork back in and they didn't go down.

Thank goodness I'm in your boat, Mom!

No! I'm too young to die!

And we finished it off with ice cream. Happy Birthday, Boo!