Cheer'ens Museum

So, Wednesday was the first time I had taken both girls to the Children's Museum when it would just be the three of us there the whole time.  Despite the {very ugly} ending, I think I will do it again.  Most of the area schools are back in session, so it wasn't as crowded as it has been this summer and both girls really enjoyed themselves.  I love how our museum has a little baby area in each of the rooms that allows Sydney to have a protected place to play too.  Of course, half the time she wanted to be out with the big kids.  Take after her sister much?

There were two things that Olivia talked about doing on our way there - the bikes in the bike wash and the dinosaurs in the egg.  First stop was to the bikes.  Mercy sakes, when did she get so grown up?

The room right next to the bikes has a bunch of areas for forts as well as tons of sheets and clips so the kids can build their own.  Olivia spent a lot of time in this room and Sydney had a lot of fun crawling all over the place.

Oh how this picture gives me hope!

After this, we took a little pit stop in the snack/lunch room.  It was after the lunch rush, so the room was empty.  I took a little video of Sydney gabbing up a storm - she loved to hear the echo.  You can watch it here.  

I love how their expressions are almost the same here...

...and here.

But, here Sydney clearly has no clue what Olivia is doing!

After lunch, we hit the sand table, the craft room {where despite me bringing an art shirt, Olivia managed to get paint in her hair and all over me AND she cut a hole in her shirt} and then to the calm of the 3 and Under room.  Well, it was calm for most of it....

Olivia LOVES those dinosaurs and when she stepped away for 20 seconds to see what Sydney and I were doing, another little girl came in and took two of them from her pile.  I saw it happening behind Olivia's back and immediately tried said, "Hey, let's go to the room with the grocery carts!!" before she could figure out what happened.  Unfortunately, the mom of the other girl said to her daughter, "Oh, look, you got some dinosaurs!!" and that was all she wrote.  Olivia literally leapt over wall of seats to try to get to the girl and I had to scoop her up along with my Ergo, my diaper bag, and my 11 1/2 month old baby.  She literally screamed the entire way down the echoing stairwell saying things like, "I don't want to share!! I took Jesus out of my heart!  I want those dinosaurrrrrs!" It was not pretty and it was not fun.  It took 20 minutes of crying in the car before I was able to get her in her car seat.  Sydney and I just sat in the front seat playing while she threw a fit.  

So, am I scared to go back to the museum?  Umm, yeah.  Am I thinking I may have to dye and cut my hair before I go again?  Possibly.  But, do I think Olivia may have learned a lesson?  I sure hope so.  I know I did:  When a child is throwing a tantrum and you can't take your eyes away from watching it, at least make sure those eyes show some empathy towards the parent.