A Day at the Museum

During our weekly library visit a few days ago, Carter surprised me by picking out a National Geographic documentary about a couple of paleontologists excavating dinosaur bones in Mongolia. I assumed once he realized it wasn't a cartoon about dinosaurs, he'd lose interest and turn it off. But much to my surprise he sat and watched the entire thing! (while mommy struggled not to doze off... sssshhh...!) And when it was finished he told me he'd really like to go to Mongolia someday! :-) Since Mongolia isn't really feasible at the moment, I opted for the next best option (HA!) to try to encourage Carter's rekindled interest in dinosaurs - a trip to the Texas Memorial Museum, a free natural science center on the University of Texas campus. They have several dinosaur bones on display - a very good tie-in to the documentary he had just watched. We had been before, but today was a lot of fun because it really felt like Carter was learning stuff while he was there, and understood it all a little better. Here are some photos...

Posing with a Saber-toothed Cat statue out front...Climbing the steps to the museum...In the Great Hall, Carter looked up and saw an enormous Pterosaur skeleton!The bottom floor of the museum is the Hall of Geology and Paleontology. We found skulls from several dinosaurs we recognized - Triceratops, Parasaurolophus, T-Rex.Carter standing next to the femur of a Diplodocus!There's also a paleontology lab, where Carter got to touch some bones from a mastodon. Here he's looking in a microscope with Daddy.Carter with a meteorite! He is familiar with them because they are what fall from the sky in his favorite movie as of late, Dinosaur!Upstairs from the dinosaurs, the museum also has several displays of Texas-native animals. Here we are sitting in a little "boat" in the fish room.Outside the museum there's a little sitting area, with benches made to look like the vertebrae from a Mosasaur. Here's Carter sitting on one of the benches. In his hand is his toy T-Rex skull that he carried around with him throughout the museum!And here's my sweet girl - not looking at the camera, but still looking adorable. :-)

A Day at the Park

When we stepped outside of the house this morning we didn't instantly melt or suffocate from the heat, so we decided to walk over to our neighborhood park. I managed to snap a whole bunch of photos, but I've narrowed it down to this bunch being my favorite. Oh and by the way, Courtney said her first color today - PURPLE! That's my girl. She is wearing a purple dress that Aunt Lori sent to her a while back, and was very excited about it when I put it on her. And yes, Carter is in bad need of a haircut! But I'm holding out until late next week, just before school starts again and as close as possible to cousin Gina's wedding - haircuts aren't much fun for Carter or me! But anyway, on to the photos...

Going up the slideBig brother pushing Courtney in the swingFun in the tunnelsI love this one, even though he looks mad...Riding the whatchamacallitsMy handsome boy!

Fun in the Sun!

Today was another scorcher here in Austin, with temps up around 105F! UGH! Those of you in the north complaining about the rain, can you pleeeeeease send some of it our way? Well on this hot hot day, we still did our Wednesday morning routine of visiting the Bee Cave Public Library. But instead of heading straight home with our books, I threw some bathingsuits in the car and the kids had a ton of fun splashing around in the little sprinkler park across from the library! (Note to Austin moms: another fun, FREE outing idea!!) Here's some photos...Courtney just after getting a face-full of water - love this one!Carter sat on one of the sprinklers, trying to hold back the water.Brother and sister working together to steal other kids' toys... note to self, next time pack our own toys...This view shows the sprinkler park with the library in the background. There's a small road that runs in between.Cute moment as we were getting shoes on to walk back to the car. Fun morning!

Carter & the Big Screen

Today Carter and I went on a date, just the two of us! Baby sister Courtney got to stay home with Grammy, who is visiting from Michigan. (I have more photos I need to share on here of some of the things we've done over the past month, I've gotten behind on my blogging!!) One of our local AMC theaters is doing a "Summer Movie Camp" with a schedule of kids' movies for only $1! This week's movie was "Madagascar 2", and since Carter loved the first one so much on dvd (he calls it the move it move it movie) I thought we'd give it a try - it was his first time seeing a movie in a theater on the big screen! We were going to meet a couple friends there, but unfortunately the show sold out before they arrived. But Carter had a lot of fun - he did soooo good sitting through the whole thing. And of course he also loved the popcorn! Here are some photos from Carter's first movie experience...

Waiting in line to get our tickets.At the concession stand.Whoa - look at all that yummy stuff!He was completely enthralled by the movie! (No, I didn't take this during the movie - it was during the credits - he was still mesmerized....) :-D