Places to Go - Denver Museum of Nature & Science AND The Children's Museum of Denver (Denver, CO)

(All pictures were taken at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science)

Since we live right outside of DC, one may assume that we spend tons of time at the Smithsonian museums, they are free after all. And we often visit the Hirshhorn and the National Museum of the American Indian, but we've only been to the Natural History Museum a handful of times. Don't get me wrong, the museum itself is wonderful, but the crowds keep us away. I'm talking MAJOR crowds, as in "stay close or we'll lose each other" crowds; and by the dinosaurs, the crowds double, as in "mom, this man keeps pushing me, where are you? where are you?" crowds. Back when I lived a law firm life, our firm rented out the Natural History Museum for a night and the exhibits awed my husband, he kept saying "wow, without tons of people this is the best place ever." Anyways, my basic point being that while kids love dinosaurs, kids and crowds don't mix, which (for me) makes the Smithsonian Natural History somewhat of a bust.

So where to find dinosaurs (besides Baltimore)? Denver of course. Seriously, if you want to visit a LARGE, kid-friendly, minimally crowded museum (with lots and lots of dinosaurs) then go to Denver. The Denver Museum of Nature and Science has it all - a great outer space exhibit, a huge kids' space with live demonstrations of things ranging from African music to tornados, various smaller play spaces throughout the museum, a planetarium, and lots of wildlife exhibits. For adults and older kids, the museum hosts Exhibition Health, where visitors receive a plastic card (like a credit card) which they can insert into computerized stations in order to measure various aspects of their health. So fun. The girls LOVE this museum (I also visited Denver with them this summer, so they've been twice in the last year) they keep asking to go again (despite the day of commuting required). And parking is free and AVAILABLE (which continues to amaze me). Admission is $12 for adults and $6 for children. The museum includes a cafe, so you can make a day out of it.

If you're looking for other Denver options with children, during our trip we also spent a morning at the Children's Museum of Denver (which also had FREE PARKING). Though somewhat smaller than children's museums we've visited in the past, the well-maintained, beautifully-designed exhibits made it a great place to spend a few hours. F especially loved the bubble room, as did I (so much better than water play) and P couldn't stop playing in the nature room. T, as always, gravitated towards the grocery store and the train table room (yes, they have a WHOLE ROOM full of train tables). And my friends' daughter, R, played dress up for hours. Older kids will love the assembly plant, where they can create with real tools. Admission is $8 per person ($6 for kids 1-2, under 1 is free).

What about everyone else? Any other great places to go with kids in Denver?


(All pictures were taken at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science)

Things to Make - A Dinner Party Feast

During our stay in Denver good friends hosted a dinner party for us. Their cooking always manages to impress me, but this time they outdid themselves, truly superb. By the end of the night, no leftovers remained, including alcohol (hence the fuzzy lack of focus in the bw picture above). Since I can't fly back every weekend, I asked for the recipes instead. Here's the scoop:

Braciole - The recipe, via the Food Network, is available here. The sauce tasted amazing, so, if you have the time, I'd suggest forgoing the store-bought option.

S's Homemade Bruschetta:

INGREDIENTS:

1 baguette - sliced and brushed with olive oil
Parmesan Cheese

Olive Paste
1 c. green olives (pits removed)
1 garlic clove
1 T olive oil
2 tsp balsamic vinegar

Tomato Mixture
2 c. tomatoes diced
3 green onions diced
3 T fresh Basil (we add more)
Salt and pepper to taste
1 T olive oil

PREPARATION:

Pre-heat oven to 400 degrees
Place baguette slices in the oven and heat 3-4 minutes on both sides.
Combine all ingredients for olive paste in a food processor and puree until the paste resembles tapenade and set aside.
Combine all ingredients for tomato mixture and set aside.

Spread the olive paste over the baguette slices followed by a spoonful of the tomato mixture. Sprinkle with parmesan cheese and put back in oven for about 3 minutes.
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The girls decided to dress for dinner, so cute.

Things to Do - Go West!

(I banned McDonald's from our house after I read The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals (thank god for Elevation Burger), but I still allow it as a special treat on vacation, which creates all the wrong incentives for teaching my children about healthy food, but it makes for happy kids during stressful travel times).
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After college graduation I moved to Denver, CO with some friends from high school. I'm not sure why I decided to go, at the time I'd never skied and wasn't into hiking (though I am now), but I didn't have another plan and it seemed like a fun place to live for awhile. And I loved it - the place, the people I met, the fact that whenever you ask someone in Denver what they "do" they assume you mean what they do as a hobby; in other words, whether you snowboard or ski, whether you hike or climb, how many 14ers you've "bagged." So different from the east coast where strangers spend HOURS explaining their jobs to you. (I've learned to be cautious when asking people what they "do"). Anyways, I miss it there and I miss my friends who live there, especially because all of them now have kids whose ages are approximately the same as my kids' ages. But my husband works a lot so we can't exactly fly across the country on a whim. But I don't work. And February is a long month for SAHMs. And T still flies for free. So, five weeks ago, off we went - one adult, three kids venturing out west. Our trip went something like this - we drove to the airport, to take a bus (the car shuttle) to a plane to a train (inside the airport) to a bus (car rental shuttle) to a rental car to drive to CAR's (fun acronym) house. And, upon arrival, some of my favorite people and a huge glass of wine greeted us at the door.

So now I know I can fly alone with three kids and it isn't that bad. If you're considering doing so yourself, I advise trying to fly into and out of relatively empty airports (in our case Baltimore and Denver) so you can find vacant terminals and let the kids loose for awhile.

Oh and if you have a chance, please VOTE FOR ME (you can vote once a day). Here's the link - Top 25 Creative Moms!

Things to Do - Contemplate Life Through A Rocking Chair

(From the bottom to the top: (1) our family's original homesteading deed; (2) in the 1920s my grandfather's basketball team won the Nebraska state finals, my super-handsome grandpa is the third from the left; (3) my homemade family tree; (4) a little bit of everything - grandma as a young girl, the fading picture on the bottom left is of my great great great grandparents, the picture in the right-hand corner is one of the only pictures we have of my maternal grandparents)
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As I mentioned on Wednesday, last week I spent a lot of time rummaging through old photo albums and family histories. With the help of Grandma's notes, I managed to make a family tree going back to my great great great grandparents, with accompanying pictures. Sort of exciting to think of all the lives that came before you.



For example, see the pictures above? On the top, my father as a small child poses with his father, his paternal grandmother, and his great grandmother (Grandma Grossenbach). Though she died well before my birth, Grandma Rossenbach's rocking chair sits in my living room (her FAVORITE chair according to family history). My husband and I spent many a night sleeping/rocking/chilling on this chair when the kids were babies. And now the girls frequently use it to make forts and to climb to forbidden places. The chair has become a part of our family and, oddly, this fact makes me feel better about everything that has happened lately. The chair doesn't just exist as some random antique, rather we've incorporated it into our lives. And while my dad didn't leave me a chair, hopefully I'll manage to incorporate my father's memory into our daily life as well. When you merge the two pictures above, you have a portrait of six generations of my family, with my dad linking us all together. And that makes me happy, well, in a sad sort of way.


T took his little plastic stool that he now carries everywhere and climbed into the rocking chair while I wrote this post. You can't make this stuff up. And yes, at 20 months, he still drinks from a bottle, I've been lazy.

HAVE A GREAT WEEKEND EVERYONE! I'll be back on Monday with a series of posts about our trip to Denver (taken before my father passed away), so be sure to check in! And if you have a chance, I've been nominated as a creative mom blog, so please vote for me. Here's the link - Top 25 Creative Moms - help me win! You can vote once a day!

Places to Go - The Art Institute (Chicago, IL)

After my father died (sorry for the depressing introduction, but it hasn't even been two weeks yet, so please give me a little leeway), my mom and I tried to keep ourselves as busy as possible. With this goal in mind, I planned a trip to the new, modern wing of the Art Institute, which seemed like the perfect place to visit as my father had never been there (unlike the old wing where my family spent many a weekend). If you haven't had a chance to see it yet, the new wing is truly fantastic, the architecture alone warrants a trip, full of breathtaking vistas of Millennium Park. Admission is pricey ($18 - a long cry from the "suggested donation" of $10 from a few years ago) but the addition of the new wing makes the whole museum quite large. I'm now a little enamored with Gerhard Richter, especially this work. I also highly recommend the Hyperlinks exhibit, which highlights current (and fascinating) intersections between art and technology.

When we arrived I didn't feel like taking pictures, so I don't have pictures of the museum's interior. But on our way out I couldn't resist taking a few shots of the rainy foggy night. The whole mood reminded me of Gotham City, like walking into a cartoon.

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One more thing, if you scroll down you'll notice that on the right hand side I added a mix-tape to the blog. I know the widget is sort of big and tacky, but I thought the loss of aesthetics was worth it for something so cool. Check it out if you have a chance.