The Des Moines Science Center

I took Alyssa to the Science Center this week because there was a dinosaur exhibit that I wanted her to see in order to prepare her for the "Walking With Dinosaurs" show that is coming the Danny's work in October. There is a ton of stuff to do there so we didn't spend too much time with the dinosaur stuff, but here were a few of the highlights. Here is Alyssa in front of the T-Rex Skull.

Here she is throwing sand on her friends that went with us. This sandbox had some puzzle pieces that go together to make dinosaur bone models.

This sandbox had bones in the ground that the kids could brush off as if they were part of a dinosaur dig. Alyssa got the brush in hand, but I don't think she knew what she was supposed to do with it.

This was probably her favorite part of the day. They had materials to make paper rockets and then there was a rocket launcher set up. I, of course, did this a few times throughout my schooling as a physics teaching major, so I made her a pretty cool rocket that flew all the way into the net about 50 feet away. Here she is putting the rocket on the launcher.

There is the rocket flying through the air. Okay, so you can't see it in the picture, but it is there somewhere in the distance.

There was one time when she put her rocket on the launcher and then another little boy came up and pushed the button that launches the rockets before she could. She flipped out and a took awhile to calm her down. She still talked about the "little boy pushing her button and making her cry" three days later.

Here she is playing with bubbles in the toddler zone of the science center.

For some reason she really likes this exhibit. I guess it is just because it involves rolling tennis balls and it is something that she can do all by herself.