Mini Vacation - Indianapolis Children's Museum

I work on the weekends and Austin works during the week, so we don't get to spend quality days together as a family very often.  I took Sunday off of work and Austin took Monday and Tuesday, so that we could take a mini-vacation and enjoy some time together with Hadley.  Austin went to a bachelor party on Saturday night, so we left Indy on Sunday morning - destination unknown!  We ended up spending Sunday in Louisville visiting our good friends, the Boggs and Marcum families.  We spent the night at the Galt House in downtown Louisville.  Monday morning we got up and traveled back towards Indy, stopping at the outlet mall in Edinburgh.  We spent the night in Carmel at Four Points by Sheraton.  We got up this morning and took Hadley to the Indianapolis Children's museum, which is something we have been wanting to do for a while now.  It's known as the world's biggest and best children's museum, and we couldn't agree more.  Hadley had an awesome time.  We will definitely be making lots of visits in the future!  

Hadley and I checked out the Fireworks of Glass tower in the center of the walking ramps.  This is the largest permanent sculpture of blown glass by renowned artist Dale Chihuly.  It stands 43 feet tall and comprises more than 3,200 individually blown pieces of glass.   

The Fireworks of Glass ceiling floats just under the tower.  It is filled with 1,600 pieces of glass.  Hadley and I sat on the revolving platform and gazed at the glass filled ceiling overhead. 

Hadley and daddy created their own sculpture with colorful replicas of the Chihuly blown glass. 

The Dora and Diego area was one of Hadley's favorites!

Hadley is too funny!  She wanted to ride on the baby Jaguar. 

She gave Dora a huge hug...3 times! 

Hadley loved the slide.  We could not get her off of it, so that we could explore the rest of the play area.

Hadley and I put our phone etiquette to the test at the Barbie exhibit today! 

Hadley taking her phone call.  She's the next top toddler model! 

Hadley enjoyed playing dress up with the barbies backstage. 

She also got to do their hair.  I took a short video of her styling the mannequin's hair with some other little girls.  She had a blast! 

Hadley and daddy checked out the large water clock above.  Hadley loves to sit in the Corvette and pretend that she's driving, so as you can imagine, she was in heaven in this race car!   

Next we traveled to Playscape, which is an area designed to provide an area for children to learn through the simplest of play.  Below, Hadley was a little nervous, but she shook the puppets hand! 

If you know Hadley, you know that she loves water!  As you can imagine, she was in heaven playing in the water tables.  She even went fishing with daddy! 

...and what goes best with water when you are playing?  Sand! 

After we painfully drug Hadley away from the water and sand tables, she had fun playing in the construction site.

Hadley and I stopped to get our hair done...at the barber shop. Yikes!

Austin and I both drove Chevy Celebrities when we were in High School.  His was dark grey like this one, and mine was a lighter grey.  We were slightly insulted that our car was on display in the family area with all of the other dated 90's things.  I think we may be getting old!   

Our next stop was Fantasy Forest, where we pretend played in the playhouse, tree house and the ice cream shop!

 

Hadley and daddy playing with their bubble gum and hot fudge sundae ice cream.

I served Hadley and daddy today's special. 

The picture below cracks me up!  Hadley was a little weirded out that she could see image after image of herself in the mirrors.

Hadley is looking underneath a pond with turtles, fish and other marine life.

We spent some time in the Health House, where Hadley enjoyed the bathroom the most.  She had fun flushing the toilet, playing in the sink and brushing the alligator's teeth.

There was another construction zone area where Hadley and I ran some heavy equipment and played with the oversized Legos!

One of the last things we did was enjoy the Carousel of Wishes and Dreams. 

Interesting history about the carousel: It was originally installed in 1917 in Broad Ripple Park in Indianapolis.  The mechanism was destroyed in 1956 when the domed pavilion housing the carousel collapsed.  The animals were salvaged and brought to the museum in 1970.  The carousel is now one of the biggest collective artifacts in the museum!

Have you ever tried to take a picture of someone riding on a carousel? It's not an easy task!

Hadley was getting tired, so we headed over to the Dinosphere for a quick peek.  The Dinosphere is one of the largest displays of real juvenile and family dinosaur fossils in the United States.  I thought this was pretty neat.  I have never seen real fossils of that magnitude in real life! 

We had an awesome time at the Indianapolis Children's Museum, and can't wait until we get to go back!