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If you go on the weekends or for school field trips (a school of one doesn't really qualify especially when you decide to go the day before...) they have people in costume. Blacksmiths, farmers, ladies that cook...All sorts of fun stuff!
The Gristmill was very cool but we couldn't get an up close look at it because they were doing some repairs on it. We all agreed it would be worth going back to see the little town in full swing.
The Indian Village was pretty interesting. Jake liked the tee-pee. :)
They even showed a burial mounds. There was fire pit that they must have going on the weekends. There was a building (only open on the weekends-I guess since school is back in) that was a mini museum for the Indian village information that we want to go back and check out.
The man who founded the museum was big time into Scouting and there was a room that displayed all sorts of cool scouting badges, pictures, video of a Jamboree in DC in the 60's (maybe...I can't remember for sure), etc. If it has to do with Scouting it was in that room!
The exhibit that is on display there now is Caves and it was very cool. The first room had places to crawl through with helmets and head lamps, which is right up 10 and 11 year old boys alleys!
There were live bats, and other cave dwelling creatures that were really fun to see. There were also stalactites and stalagmites, along with information on how they are formed. It was all set up so you felt like you were winding through a cave. It got darker as you got deeper in to the cave.
It was a very cool museum for being in the little city of Gastonia. The hall ways that lead you to other parts of the building were just as exciting to explore as the actual exhibits. The boys loved looking at all the different animal skulls of different shapes and sizes.
We all agreed that one of the best parts was a room in which the different areas of North Carolina were represented. They made it feel like you were looking out the window in to nature. In the Sandhills display they had bubbles coming out of the stuffed beavers and river otters mouths and even had a duck dunking it's head under the water with it's tail feather on the top and the rest of it under the water. It was amazing.
Every where you looked you would see a different animal from the region. We were pretty impressed to say the least. We were wondering how much money it cost just to create that room. Our guess was... A LOT! :)
I like the one from the Mountains the best. It made me miss our last home outside of Asheville. Corey was surprised to find out that the animals were in fact stuffed real animals. They look like they are going to turn their head and look at you at any moment-but he didn't realized they actually used real animals.
In another room they had animals of all sizes. From this huge moose all the way down to an Arctic weasel that is probably 4 inches long. The little weasel seemed teeny next to the polar bear it was displayed with.
The rocks and crystals were so beautiful too. The boys wanted to keep moving so I didn't get to read to much about...well anything, but we got to see it all! The next trip we will take notes and do a report. This time was just for fun. I asked a question about something (I don't even remember what it was now. I didn't get to read the sign) and the boys started telling me all about it. Apparently after I gave up trying to make them read an occasional sign; they ended up reading the ones that interested them on their own.
I knew they would but
the way they zig-zagged from this to that I didn't think they were going to remember any of it! :)I had to take this picture for Aaron since he loves bacon or as he calls it "meat candy" so much. Ever heard of Cave Bacon?
Jake and Corey were checking out the snakes, when all of the sudden it started checking them out. They jumped back like it was going to come through the glass at them! This is as close as I got, so I can't pick on them too much about it. Nee didn't even go in that room.
There were even alligators! I can't even remember what this exhibit was...They are permanent residents though so I will find out next time.
We took a break for an impromptu puppet show. It was very little kiddo friendly too. There was a whole bucket of puppets you could choose from. The boys decided on an eagle and a hawk.
This is how big kid puppet shows turn out.... :)
This brown bear was huge! It was bigger than the grizzly bear! We read about that because we were surprised to see it was bigger. It all depends on where you are for the size of your brown bear it turns out. Brown bears around here are not anywhere near that big. They had a display of NC's sweet little brown bears too.
What museum of Natural History would be complete without a place you can dip your hands in and touch the fish? Jake is actually reading the sign in this shot! Learning is fun!
It was very cool that had so much stuff you could actually touch. This alligator was a favorite of ours.
One of my favorite things was the little models they had of different Native American's in different areas of North America. They were so detailed. We all agreed it would be an awesome place to play with action figures. It also reminded us of the Movie Night at the Museum. You could almost see them waking up at night and coming to life...
At different places you could pick up telephone head sets and hear a story from an Indians point of view. That was pretty cool too. Unfortunately we couldn't get a couple of them to work.
There was even and under the sea style room. The boys ended up pretending to be swimming around it. They would come out the door and pretend to get a brig breath of air. Going on field trips when you are homeschooling is awesome-you get the whole place to yourself!
There was so much to see from so many different times. I didn't know what to expect, but I have to say I was pretty impressed.
You name it they had it. From Mammoths to the different layers of the earth!
You can tell we are getting at the end of the trip-they actually sat down and took a break!
After a visit to the gift shop and a show in the Planetarium (which we thought would be the high light but turned out to be a little bit of a let down...), we made a final stop at the dinosaur for one last shot inside. You can't really tell but I am making a face and giving them bunny years and they didn't even know it. :)
This one is out of order but I am ready to be done with this because I need to finish sewing part of a costume for our next field trip on Tuesday to the Renaissance Festival! So this is where it will stay. We all commented how when we were looking at the scene of the mountains we felt cold because it was so realistic.
We decided to walk the nature trail one more time when we got back outside to see if we missed anything. We came out on the front side of the building which is not where we meant to be-but we got to see the big b-day cake for the museum so it was worth it!
Nee got Jake a crystal making kit from the gift shop and Aaron helped him get it started the next day. The crystals have grown a ton already and are very cool!
So, even though I botched up the dates on what was supposed to be out first field trip; the one we ended up going on was well worth! Next time I will try to cut down on the pictures... :)
(I am sure there were several typos but this took me way too long to do so I am going to move on with the rest of my To Do list and you will just have to ignore them!)
