Another weekend, another children's museum

Yesterday was forecast to be a gray, cool day, so we headed down toward Richmond to one of the three branches of the Children's Museum of Richmond. This one--known as the Short Pump location--is located a few miles outside the city and is geared toward toddlers.

After a quick 90-minute trip, we started the day in the Whole Foods next to the museum for a fast snack to fuel up before the fun. Then, it was onto the museum.

First we started in the (very conviently walled in) toddler play area, which was filled with books, blocks, pillows, and other toys. The kids also had a perfect view of the train.

Notice Piper's hair is pulled back a bit. It's finally long enough to start doing cute things with it like ponytails and pigtails.

Leave it to Fletch to find the Sesame Street book as soon as he arrived.

After going through all the toys and realizing there were other fun things to do, P&F attempted an escape.

After they escaped (and we rode the train, but sorry, no pictures), it was onto the next adventure--the indoor playground.

This was followed by some fun with the moo-ing cow and farm area. If I ever wondered if Fletch had hearing issues, this put it to rest. Every time he heard the cow moo, no matter how far away he was from that area, he responded with the word, "cow." He loved it.

The number of veggies in the farm area was limited because every time a kid put one in his mouth, it then was supposed to go into a basket to get cleaned. This meant, the veggies spent most of their time in the to-be-cleaned area. Oh well--better than catching the plague from some other child, I suppose.

After the farm, we moved onto the sandbox, which used tiny woodchips instead of sand, so it wasn't as messy. Ingenious!

In addition to the areas shown above, there was also a pirate ship that Fletch loved to climb on, an area where kids could learn about weather (that looked a little worse for wear), an arts and crafts area that will be fun when they are a little older, and a section with lots of tutu's and superhero capes to play dress-up.

We spent about 2 hours at the museum. After short lunch back at Whole Foods, we hopped in the car and the kids immediately went to sleep. It was the perfect way to spend a morning.