Our final day of “planned” activities was Friday and after an exhausting three days of parks it was nice to settle into the New Children’s Museum and be greeted by such a wonderful group of people.  I will lead everything off by saying that this was by far the best experience of all of the wonderful things we did while on our trip and that isn’t just the parent’s opinion.  Both of the boys ranked this as the top activity, but only slightly above Legoland.  We have been to several Children’s Museums, but this was our first New Children’s Museum.  I’m not exactly sure what makes it New, but I really liked all of the activities and exhibitions that centered around trash.  They presented a great message to the visitors without beating you over the head as they presented it with incredible subtlety.

We were greeted by Nina and Kaitlyn, the boys dressed in smocks, and quickly whisked away into a flurry of fun activities starting with painting a car.  They have an old Datsun that has been in place for over a year and every day it is coated with a new color of paint.  Nothing like starting off the tour with a bang as this was perhaps the boys’ favorite activity, but definitely not the messiest.  This was followed with a trip to the dumpster turned into a play area where the boys were garbage zombies and thoroughly enjoyed the slide after climbing up the used tire wall.

By now Nina had left us for her real job, but Kaitlyn was with us every step of the way and not shy to join in the garbage zombie fun.  She was an awesome guide/playmate for the boys the entire time we were there.  We then moved on to several displays using magnets and old tube televisions, magnets and rusty particles, a rain house, a climbing wall made from recycled garbage, a wall of funky mirrors, and finger painting.  This was easily the messiest activity and Cutler slapped the paint on so thick the painting is still drying in Aunt Emily’s house as it was too wet to ship home.

After a couple more coats were applied to the car we started in on a scavenger hunt where we had to find “alien” heads throughout the museum and draw the symbol on each one of them.  Mason would take his time and try to draw it exactly and was actually fairly artistic at it while Cutler would scribble and look at us for acceptance and then move on.  The difference in these boys is amazing.  Once done there, the museum has an awesome set of tubes that sucks ping pong balls from your hands through an intricate set of tubes where bells are set up to be rung as the ball passes throughout.  This may have been up there with the car painting as the boys couldn’t run the balls up enough.  The “usual” visitors pay for the balls in an effort to raise money for art, but as Cutler is Cutler he was given what seemed to be an endless supply.

If you are ever in San Diego, I can’t recommend this as an activity enough.  Their website is http://www.thinkplaycreate.org/.  I know that if we get back to San Diego it will be on our list of things to do.  In fact, after we ate lunch, the boys wanted to go back but we distracted them with Petco Park and heading to the shore to see just how cold the water is and why it probably wasn’t in their best interest to swim in the ocean instead of the pool.  Or perhaps that is not in dad’s best interest.  🙂

This slideshow requires JavaScript.