One of the many Sandra Boynton books Jack enjoys reading (and reading, and reading) is "Oh My Oh My Oh Dinosaurs" with cute little rhymes - and the accompanying illustrations - like "Dinosaurs Happy, Dinosaurs Sad/Dinosaurs Good and Dinosaurs Bad." My favorite is "Dinosaurs Early, Dinosaurs Later/Dinosaurs Crammed in an Elevator."
In addition, Ryan has recently discovered the series "If You Give a [Cute Animal] a [Form of Junk Food]" and we now own Pig/Pancake, Dog/Donut, and, as of yesterday, Cat/Cupcake. In the Cat/Cupcake book, the cat goes on all sorts of adventures including a trip to the science museum and the Hall of Dinosaurs.
Given the confluence of these two book subjects, I thought it would be fun to take the boys to the
Denver Museum of Nature and Science today. My family used to go every year back when we visited Colorado for Spring Break and Sam and I attended a few special exhibits early in our marriage, but we've never taken the boys.
Upon arriving at the museum we learned it was an
SCFD Free Day, a tax-supported program that opens up different cultural facilities for free on various days throughout the year. I never actively seek Free Days because the crowds are usually too much for me, but today didn't seem too bad - and I was thrilled to avoid paying $30 for the visit (particularly since we got a late start and I wasn't sure how much of the museum exhibits we'd get to see before it was lunch/nap time).
We were greeted at the door by a giant dinosaur puppet, worn and controlled by a staff person. Ryan thought it was funny but Jack did not quite know what to make of it (also, the dinos in his books are all cute cartoons, not skeletons, so he was having a hard time wrapping his brain around it all).
Jack quickly warmed up to the skeleton dinosaurs and became a little speed demon, running from one display to another (and attempting to climb into them). Ryan was a little more mellow, taking in the sheer size of it all.
Once the toddler minds had reached their limit of dinosaurs, we headed for the special exhibit
Lizards and Snakes. There were actual live lizards, including this rhinoceros iguana who took an immediate shine to Jack (he probably thought Jack was his next meal...). He headed straight for us and scrabbled at the glass while Jack just laughed and laughed.
This water monitor was not as interested in my little monster (perhaps he had just eaten) and Ryan was only excited about the bamboo.
And then there were the snakes. Most of the exhibits were adult-torso height, so the kids weren't terribly interested (though the vivid green Eastern green mamba caught their eye; when Jack later woke up from nap and saw our hose laying in the yard he said, "Snake!").
But the Burmese python was an immediate draw, as was this:
Yep, I let my children play with a 15-foot Anaconda... NOT. It's a life-size replica weighing 100 pounds, and the boys loved it.
The exhibit also included a green screen photo booth where you can pose with "Bo" the boa constrictor - or, in Sam's case, attempt to feed our youngest to it...
On our way out Jack had to say "bye-byes" to his iguana buddy...
We ate lunch in the museum's cafe and Jack showed off his new smiling snake shirt.
Finally, on our way out, we saw another dinosaur puppet, this one a T-Rex with a movable jaw. The expression on Jack and Ryan's faces when they saw him "chewing" on these kids' heads was a resounding "Oh heck no!"
