Today we went to the Oklahoma City Science Center before driving the rest of our road trip. We figured it would be a lot of fun for the kids, and using our membership from our local science center, the admission was free!
We arrived about 15 minutes after the scheduled time it was to open, and the parking lot was empty... it didn't take long for us to realize it was closed. What??? Closed?? We investigated with a phone call and the recorded message explained that due to inclement weather the opening hours were delayed an hour to ensure that staff would be able to make it in safely.
This was my first time to Oklahoma City, so I'm not familiar with their winter weather conditions, but the main roads were dry and clear from what we could tell (the parking lot and the side roads were still covered with snow, but not terribly slick), so we were a little confused about the 1 hour delay.
Since we had some time until they would be open, we decided to drive downtown to see the Oklahoma City Memorial. It was cold, with temps below freezing, so we decided to view it from the comfort of our warm van, but sometime I would like to go back to see it closer. Thinking about those that died that day made my heart ache... Ethan of course had a lot of questions and it was hard to verbalize the terrible reality that happened that day, the choice that one person made that affected so many. I pray that God continues to provide comfort to all those involved.
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| Notice part of the building is still left intact. |
After our short delay, we returned to the science center. The kids were excited and couldn't wait to get inside.
Derrick and I were very impressed. The place was huge and they had an extensive list of exhibits. We got to test drive a Segway on an obstacle course, play in a two-story tree house complete with a rope/pulley bucket and the tallest spiral slide in the nation, tinker and build with blocks and other materials, look out a periscope, be roared at by dinosaurs, create a harmonograph drawing to take home, experiment with a robotic arm, play around animated dinosaurs, experience winds from a tornado, investigate a large mouth, play and climb on geometric structures, view and touch optical illusions, and experience a REAL LIVE EARTHQUAKE!! Yes, you read that right... a real live earthquake!!
While we were in the dinosaur room we had an experience I won't forget. The kids were running around, playing on the slide and tunnel structures in the room while we talked briefly with the employee about the dinosaur display and the type of dinosaur that was being shown. The dinosaur let out a large "ROAR" and the room rattled back and forth for a few seconds, even the floor. I looked at the museum employee as the windows rattled a bit and then everything stopped. "Wow! That was impressive. How do you get the room to shake like that?" I asked, assuming it was part of the timing with the dinosaur roar and all. Eyes wide, he replied, "We don't. That was an earthquake!! That was a real earthquake! We just had an earthquake!"
Derrick and I both looked at each other... "Really? You have earthquakes here?" I still didn't believe him. He said that they actually get a lot of earthquakes in the Oklahoma City area every year but most are so small you can never feel them. It was cool we got to experience one while we were there!! After it happened I asked Ethan if he felt it and he didn't even know what had happened, he was too busy running around playing with Everett to even notice. Funny kids. We found out later that it was a magnitude 4.5 earthquake. Pretty impressive!
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| The giant magnet was lots of fun with the metal shavings. |
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| Giant Treehouse |
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Super fast and dizzy fun twisted slide.
Tallest in the nation! |
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| Looking out of the periscope |
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| This room was full of fun things to do and build with! |
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| Harmonograph (free floating table with weights and a fixed arm with a marker) |
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| Ethan picked green and helped push the table to make this design. |
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| Everett decided he wanted more of a circle pattern and used blue. |
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| Robotic arm |
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| Dino area where we felt the "quake"!!! |
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| Elliot was unsure about the dinosaur. |
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| Experiencing a tornado! |
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Upstairs were lots of fun things for the kids to climb on.
Even Derrick could climb on this one! |
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These were pretty neat!
I'm sure we will be buying some pencils when we get home to try this one out! |
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| What does this say?? |
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| He done got shrunk! |
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| Another illusion |
