Veteran's Day Fun!

Mark had today off, being Veteran's Day, and so did the boys. You know what that means...

Family Day!

We wanted to go and hang out somewhere neat, keep the boys occupied and wear them out, where the grown ups would enjoy just as much as the kids. We have an annual pass to the Discovery Center in Boise, and so off we went!

We did hit Winco first, since it is 2 blocks away, and did some nice bulk shopping. Hurray for food storage!



They have a display of fans that blow air up through large tubes. The kids can cut up cups and send them up the tubes, to see which sort of design goes up the best. Nathan had a lot of fun with the scissors.





Oren is checking out how tuners work. You can change the frequencies and tune in to different channels, which come out over the speaker. Pretty neat!





Nathan found the veteranarian clinic. This little turtle didn't feel so good, so Dr. Nathan is giving him a check up. Good work Doctor!




I need one of these in my backyard. A huge bubble blower! The stick/wand lays in the soap dish, you slowly raise the rope to raise the stick, and see how high you can make the bubble wall before it pops. It looks really neat when you blow on the bubble, and I had a hard time pulling the boys away to see all the other stuff.



I love how kid oriented this place is! The grocery store room is awesome! Oren is shopping for bread. They have a dairy section in a "fridge", a produce department, bakery, and well stocked shelves of canned and boxed foods. All like a regular grocery store.

There is even a checkout lane, with real cash registers! You move the belt with a wheel, and the registers beep. They don't actually scan food, but the kids sure think they are neat.

The boys are trained well. Lots of fruit and vegetables, just like Mommy! :-) Of course, the fun part is trying to put it all away when you leave...

Is this a radio announcer booth? Nope. There are a couple microphones set up, and several choices of what you hear when you speak into them. One creates a delay from when to speak to when you hear it back in the headset. It is very hard to speak when you are hearing the beginnings and speaking the ends of words. One setting lets you hear the difference between a small room and a large room. I don't remember all of them, but those are the two neat ones.

Also on the menu is the bed of nails. Not sharp tipped, don't worry. Blunt tipped metal posts, about 1/8 inch wide and 1 1/2 inches tall. You lay on a plastic bed surface and push the "up" lever. The nails rise and support your weight, which really does not hurt, and then you lower them by pulling the lever down. William has been having issues with baby changing tables, not sure why, and he freaked out just the same as when I am changing his diaper in the bathrooms. Pretty funny actually, he is in the process of rolling over to grab the bar and is about 2 seconds away from doing that "freak out" cry/whine... :-)

We all had lots of fun today, got out and hung out as a family. Oren had a dental appointment, which went great. We were hungry and weren't quite ready to go home yet, so we went out to eat. The chef that was working tonight did an awesome medium rare sirloin steak! Plus, 4 and under is free salad bar, so William got to eat lots of yummies! He loves olives! Mark appreciated the all-day breakfast too...

A jog over to Walmart for WIC, where Mark picked up cocoa crispies and made the most amazing chocolate peanut butter rice crispy treats!

All in all, it was a blast! The mark of a good day is when all the kids fall asleep with no complaints at all!