Family Vacation 2014: Day 4

So, after Day 3, we went home for three days and then went back on the road for another three day vacation. This time to Dallas!  Brent was attending some meetings for about 1/2 our time, which was sad, but did make our hotel stay free. 

Brent's sister Jamie and her boys joined us for the first stop of our adventure - Perot Museum of Nature and Science.   The museum is fairly new, pricey, and crowded.  That said, they had some cool exhibits, lots of hands on options and very current technology to try out. 

Brent had a great time with the microscopy and basically lots of opportunities to teach all the kids just a little science.

The first couple rooms we were in were biology related.  They learned about basics like cells, but also about their bodies.

John and M in front of slices of human bodies.

Here they are looking at the veins in their hands.

Dr. Richards explaining the "family tree" of species on earth --- with magnifying glasses as there are so many included.

B spent a long time working on this helicopter/auto-pilot simulation.  The idea was to balance the loads to get the helicopter to lift off, but it also demonstrated some of what the auto pilot does and some tricky physics of helicopters --- This was in the robots/technology section next door to the bodies/biology area.

Brent & E both helped with the helicopter project.

Meanwhile, Brent & M began programming a robot to drive through a maze.

They got more help :)

They tested it out and found there was a problem or two, but still quite fun. The next section was a brief foray in to space, but it was dark so no good photos.  Then we briefly went to the regular dino exhibit before it was time for our timed tickets to the special "World's Largest Dinosaurs exhibit," which was definitely not worth the extra $30 we paid to visit it.  It was two small and one large room that had a few neat things in them, but not really that many, at least not for our crew who mostly dug in the sand...which we can do for free.

Requisite blurry picture with dino model that is too large for the frame.

The glowing lungs in the background talk were part of the explanation of how blood and oxygen made it up the very long necks of these huge dinos.

Digging for "bones" in the sand table.

E asking a question about dino skulls.

Dr. Richards exploring and explaining.

And... then off to the children's area where we spent a solid hour.  E spent most of the time sorting play food.  The bigger boys climbed quite a bit.  M flitted around to various areas, but mostly in the farm/veg area with E.  There were, of course, a few snakes, which is what Brent & Matthew are discussing here.

The adults rested, talked, and plotted the next adventures.  The Jones crew headed home, and we took in one more exhibit about the science of sports.

This wall was pretty cool and lit up wherever we touched it.  Inside, there was another race thing (like in the Power Play exhibit at the OK Science Museum).  Then a lot of exhibits about sports medicine and nutrition.  We, of course, had horrible nutrition during this trip, but learned a lot about it??? (Does that count?)

There was a fun sports simulator where Brent threw a football and you could run the video of him doing it next to the video of a professional quarterback.  

The kids mostly loved seeing Daddy on TV :)

B's favorite part of the museum were these dancing water molecules in the lobby. They were cute, but might give you an idea of why I feel like this was kind of overpriced for the content. The price for us was only a few dollars shy of a yearly membership at the OK Science Museum....

Outside - there were some cool jumping frog statues, which we were instructed not to climb on or jump off of, which was ridiculous so we let the kids do both :)

E loved them and tried climbing and jumping all different ways.

The bigger kids know a photo op when they see one and posed happily.

M also wanted to demo her tree pose. I didn't quite capture this, but love the shadows and dance here.

I attempted, fairly unsuccessfully, to capture some pictures of all three of them all weekend.  Here are three early attempts :)

Brent's meetings were at the DFW Grand Hyatt -- the bonus was being able to watch the planes take off before bedtime :)

Where we went:
Perot Museum of Nature and Science

Where we ate:
El Fenix
Snacks from the airport shop and our stash for dinner as we were a bit stuck, and the kids were tired crazy... the kids loved it.

Where we stayed:
Grand Hyatt DFW - paid for by Intel as part of the meetings Brent was attending. Lovely hotel all around.