The Museum

The day started with a long, drawn-out meal at The Cheesecake Factory...with all Linda's and Cheryl's kids. I thought they were very well-behaved considering what might have been. (I mean, Will only escaped once to check out the automated hand dryers in the bathroom.)

The next stop was the Book of Mormon Spanish Children's Museum. Oh, it was so fun to see Hannah, Abigail, and Maddy swishing their huge Flamenco skirts to the music. They had huge mirrors and lifesized models dancing to the music for children to imitate. It was hard to draw them away from that, they liked it so much. Even Will put on a black, backwards vest and tried his hand as the male dancer. The next favorite place was Lehi's ship. They actually got on the ship, built up blocks in it, fished for magnetic fish, and turned the steering mechanism. Hannah liked collecting the fish, while Will lay in the 'water' to help connect the fish to the poles. Abigail's favorite place was the Casa. There, she pulled the vegetable from the pretend garden. (The vegetables were shapes that had to be matched to the holes...so the carrots were triangles, and the beets were circles, etc.) Then they had to go to the chicken coop and collect eggs. There was a table, cupboard, stoves, refrigerators, dishes, etc. to set on the table to feed the missionaries. There was a place to build a temple made of huge, foam-type building blocks. Maddy liked to just jump on them. There was a jeep full of animal puppets from Latin American countries (like iguanas, llamas, rats, turtles, etc.) that the children could get in to drive to church, while there was a missionary bike to ride, computer games to play, hieroglyphic tablets to draw on, paper doll figures of Book of Mormon stories to put velcro outfits on, musical instruments to hear, art pressing tool, a tortilla toss, and more. We stayed there and they just loved it. It was hard to get them to leave. If that is still here when you come to Salt Lake City and you have children, you should come. There was a Boy Scout Museum (100 years with the church or something like that) that had lots of cool items, but we scurried through that because Will was finding every button to push or wheel to spin, and we didn't want to lose him....and of course, on the way out, he ran up to a tree with Christmas light, found the plug and disconnected it...then connected it again. I don't know what he will be when he grows up but he definitely is wired to connect things. And we saw a new side to Will...how he behaves around girls that like him. It was so cute to watch him and this little girl follow each other from place to place.

When we came home, we ate the most delicious cheesecakes. Thanks, Janet and Thiago.