Houston Museum of Natural Science

Another nice and sunny day today in Houston. Still had the traffic noise last night but also ran a fan which seemed to create enough white noise to make it a bit easier to sleep.

After getting school and work done we drove back to the same neighborhood we were in yesterday by the Children's Museum but this time we were going to the Houston Museum of Natural Science. It turns out today from 2PM to 5PM they do not charge admission for the main exhibits which is a great deal!

Stacey and the kids wanted to also see the Butterfly exhibit which was also discounted but did cost a bit. We got our tickets and went in to explore the exhibits. We started with one about energy and the different types of fuel sources out there to create energy. It was really well done and focused primarily on oil (we are in Houston remember!). One of the displays in this exhibit was actually an "elevator" we got into and it was a journey down an oil well site. It explained the process they use to line the hole and then perforate the lining to allow the oil to flow into the pipe. It did a much better job showing it in sequence than we had seen at the oil rig museum in Galveston.

Spin the crank for 15 seconds as hard as you can and see how your energy output compares to gasoline.
It ended up equaling about 3 drops of gas!

Diplodocus

3 Smiling faces

Chrysalis (live)

They also had a large dinosaur display, stuffed animal display with animals from Texas all the way to Africa, a sea shell display and a really cool gem display. Only Brighton and I got to see the gem display but it was really neat seeing gems from around the world both in raw form and then made into jewelry.

When the museum shut down at 5PM we crossed the street to see the Sam Houston memorial statue with him riding on his horse. We then explored the reflective pond and Pioneer memorial in the park nearby. Highlight of this time was a nutria the kids found swimming in the lake with some ducks. He just kept swimming around in large laps and came on the shore briefly before going back in .

Huge nutria

There was also an Amber alert that they broadcast out to every nearby cell phone about a kidnapped child. It was pretty great use of technology to alert that many people of a situation they could help out with. Of course every Honda Accord we saw on the jam packed evening highway traffic had to be checked by our detective crew in the car to make sure it was not the criminal trying to get away.

After running the Yukon through a car wash that nearly ripped our mirrors off, we came home and Stacey made a nice dinner and we are all ready for bed after a great day of activity.

But first, Brock lifted some weights with Heidi. ;o)