{"id":2108,"date":"2012-02-20T08:00:54","date_gmt":"2012-02-20T14:00:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.crumbbums.com\/?p=2108"},"modified":"2013-01-09T12:43:32","modified_gmt":"2013-01-09T18:43:32","slug":"favorite-places-the-magic-house","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.crumbbums.com\/?p=2108","title":{"rendered":"Favorite Places: The Magic House"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Milo’s preschool had an inservice day on Friday, so I took the three munchkins to one of our favorite places in St. Louis: The Magic House<\/a>. What started off as a small non-profit project by two St. Louis women to transform a Kirkwood mansion into an interactive children’s museum, The Magic House has grown and grown since it opened its doors in 1979. Andrew remembers going there as a kid. His first trip back to the Magic House as an adult rendered him speechless- the place was nearly unrecognizable in its growth.<\/p>\n

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It is so large, in fact, that every time I take the boys there by myself, we spend the entire drive going over “important information” should we become separated: Mama’s full name, to never leave the Magic House with anyone <\/em>if you are lost, and to always stay where Mama can see you. (If that last one worked, there would be no need to go over the first two over and over and over… but I throw it in there just in case someone, anyone is listening.)<\/p>\n

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One of Milo’s favorite things to do is to climb the giant beanstalk, which is his alternate method of reaching the basement or the second floor.<\/p>\n

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Up… and up…<\/p>\n

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… and up!<\/p>\n

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On the main floor, right inside the light-filled entrance, there are grand musical instruments with which to experiment. Shared wooden balls make interesting tones as they roll down ramps to hit metal pans of differing sizes on the way down.<\/p>\n

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And something like a cross between a harp and a giant spider web produces delicate music as a hand-crank is turned. The place is incredible. I genuinely enjoy bringing the boys here, as they can spend hours and still not see everything. Which is exactly what we did! Enjoy the gazillion pictures!\u00a0\"DSC_0034\"\"DSC_0045\"\"DSC_0048\"\"DSC_0080\"<\/p>\n

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Cooking<\/em><\/p>\n

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Clamming<\/em><\/p>\n

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Fishing<\/em><\/p>\n

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Conducting<\/em><\/p>\n

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And the favorite every time:<\/p>\n

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Enjoying the “air maze” which sends objects through a maze of clear tubing to be shot out of different openings depending on which levers you open and close… we could have spent all day here, and maybe one day we will.<\/em><\/p>\n

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And though I do love this place, after 2 hours of constant movement through crowds of fun-loving kids who are not my own and helicopter parents freaking out <\/em>when little Preston touches the icky floor (seriously? I let my kids eat <\/em>off floors) and questions from other moms about how-do-you-keep-track-of-all-those-boys?\u00a0<\/em>or oh-<\/em>my-you-sure-have-YOUR-hands-full <\/em>comments, it all feels like buttermilk and hotdogs to me (cue circus music now) and just as quickly as it all started, it is time to go.<\/p>\n

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Yes, I put my face AND my open mouth on this thing. Didn’t you read my comment about eating off the floor? And yes, it was totally worth it. Especially to see the looks on the other moms’ faces. Guess what? I don’t care if you see me acting goofy with my kids and making stupid faces. No, it won’t mess up my make-up. I’m not wearing any. No, it won’t damage my sunglasses. I hate sunglasses. Yes, it will make my kids laugh…<\/em><\/p>\n

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… and then maybe one will try it out for himself.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Milo’s preschool had an inservice day on Friday, so I took the three munchkins to one of our favorite places in St. Louis: The Magic House. What started off as a small non-profit project by two St. Louis women to transform a Kirkwood mansion into an interactive children’s museum, The Magic House has grown and … Continue reading “Favorite Places: The Magic House”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2128,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[100],"tags":[174,88],"class_list":["post-2108","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-favorite-places","tag-favorite-places","tag-st-louis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crumbbums.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2108","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crumbbums.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crumbbums.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crumbbums.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crumbbums.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2108"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.crumbbums.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2108\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4092,"href":"https:\/\/www.crumbbums.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2108\/revisions\/4092"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crumbbums.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2128"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crumbbums.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2108"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crumbbums.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2108"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crumbbums.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2108"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}