This week we had our end of the year field trip to the The Children’s Museum of Indianapolis. If you are local, I’m sure you know how wonderful it is and if you are not, if you ever get the opportunity to visit, you don’t want to miss The Children’s Museum of Indianapolis. It is AMAZING! We go regularly but we hadn’t been in a while and we especially were excited to visit the new CHina exhibit and see the touring Terra Cotta Warriors exhibit. However, I did a lot of people watching while I was at the Museum. I don’t know whether I was more observant or things have changed but there so interesting things I noticed.
So for my Random 5 Friday post I’m going to tell you —
5 Random Observations from our Museum Visit
1 – Parents are WAY too busy on their phones these days– Sadly I noticed a lot of parents on their smartphones and electronic devices while their children played. I saw a lot of kids yelling to their parents – “Watch me mom.” And a lot of mom’s just looking at their phones and waving off their kids. It was really sad. And not just moms, but dads too. It made me very aware of how important electronic devises have become and made me make the conscious effort to disconnect from my phone for the day. It felt good to pay full attention to my kids and not worry about my phones, text, or emails.
2 – It’s fun to watch how my kids gravitate– I always love watching my kids play. It was fun to watch what activities to which they gravitated in the different exhibits. My daughter always goes for something creative – designing clothes, making art, playing music – and my son always goes for something very engineering oriented – building block, ball runs, circuits. It is fun to guess what they will find interesting and watch them go for them and thoroughly enjoy them.
3 – It’s a Small World– There were SOOO many people there. Lots of school trips for the end of the year as well as families viewing the new China exhibits. But as I was standing in the mock-airplane that was “taking” me and my children to China, there stood an old Navy friends and his family. I hadn’t seen him in almost 10 years. He has been retired from the Navy for many years and moved to another state but was back in Indiana visiting family. It was great to see him and meet his family and so wonderful to run into an old friend. What a small world. As I get older I notice how small the world really is. It’s amazing!
4 – I love watching kids ask questions when given the opportunity– I really enjoyed watching this girl, probably about 10 years old, ask questions of the curator in the Terra Cotta Warrior exhibit. She was full of questions. It was great to listen to her intelligence questions and see her parents look at her proudly as she asked away. Then listening to my 4 year old asked questions of the curators about the bronze birds that the Emperor had in his tomb. It was very interesting to watch him ask questions and discuss things with the curator.
5 – We can NEVER get out of a field trip early – It just doesn’t matter where we go, we can NEVER leave somewhere in a timely manner we almost always are the last ones out of a place. We got to the museum at 10am (a little before) and then walked out the gate at 4:50pm (the museum closed at 5pm) and then headed to the on-site library that didn’t close early and spent another hour. It was a LONG day but it was such a great time. We all had a wonderful time and so much quality time together.
Be sure to check out more Random 5 Posts.
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