Tuesday, May 13, 2014

Museum of Natural Curiosity

Doug's mom is friends with the family that owns Thanksgiving Point in Lehi. 
So they were invited to bring any of our family to explore the new children's Museum of Natural Curiosity before it was open to the general public.
We were very excited to be able to get in and try it out.
This town part was my favorite. The theming was very cute. Honestly, it seemed to be more visual than functional though. Not as much to do as it was fun to look at.
However, the theater was great. They not only had props and costumes but also backdrops and sounds. 
That was great.
If I owned a children's museum though I would have four stages. I have always wondered why most of them only have one. One set of kids will get engaged in doing their show and then another set will burst onto the stage and change backdrops and start their own. Not that cool.
There was a lego area but it only kept their interest for a few minutes because it hurt their legs to sit on the hard lego floor while trying to put it together.
One cool thing in this room is that train up by the ceiling. A booth in another area controlled the train.
There was an area with groceries but it was telling that my kids walked in, looked around, and walked back out  because it was so small and not very exciting.
There was an area that had lots of these little fun things to do like see how far you can jump up, flap your wings, etc.
Another really fun part was the bank. This was well done and although the chute didn't work every time, the girls had fun sending the "money" back and forth.

Probably the coolest part of the museum was this big themed area with nets and walkways. The only problem with it is Maddy had to be carried the whole time so Doug was exhausted. I think it was great for older kids that can do it themselves /aren't afraid to do it themselves.



Above all of that there was also a nets/rope course where you get strapped in to a bungee thing. Doug and Abi were going to do it... but it was so insanely high I was kind of a nervous wreck about it. But I didn't say anything to Abi so that I wouldn't scare her. But, by the time they got up there and she was watching others do it up close, she decided she didn't want to do it anyway.
Maddy and Lizzie...
Abi and Lizzie...


the washing machine area was cute...
back at the bank with Ian...

There was a dark room with strobe light where you could "write" on the wall with light. That was pretty cool.
And a cute little kids' door.
So, here is my opinion about this museum. It was really fun to get to experience it for free. But if I had paid, I would have been disappointed.
I felt like it was geared toward babies and really young children and then much older children. There wasn't much to do for the kids in between. 

If you want to do a children's museum in Utah, I don't think any of these more expensive ones come even close to being as cool or fun as the Treehouse in Ogden.
The girls agreed. I asked if they wanted to go back to this museum and they both said no.

4 comments:

Seth and Julie said...

I find that a lot of places are getting to the point where I think my kids are too old for them. Weird though that they would also have an area that was for older kids, but no in between. Maybe honest feedback like this will help them make some modifications.

Holly said...

Super nice that you got to go see it for free because it might have been one you ended up going to anyway. Too bad it wasn't very good. I agree with Julie, hopefully they were asking for feedback.

Donna said...

That's neat that you guys got to check it out before it opened up to the public. Looks like a fun place but your ideas are good ones and I bet that would make it better. John would love that rope course thing and Sam would like the train above the Lego room and the Lego room itself!

Cheryl said...

I just saw a commercial for this place and they were showing some cool looking stuff that wasn't there when we were there... so maybe it was a partial opening. It might be much better with more options. I will probably wait to hear from others though to see if that is the case.