Our 10-day road trip, Part III: Phoenix

Day 4

On our first day in Phoenix, I had work to attend in the morning.  So while I was out everyone else went to the playground across the street from our hotel. I had picked the hotel for many reasons and the park nearby was one big selling point so the kids could get out of the hotel and play each day. However, what I couldn't see on google maps was that there were several homeless people there and while they didn't bother anyone, some less than savery guys came out of the house across the street and bothered my mother in law. They asked, rather just told, her to take a picture of them...and then went on to take off their shirts and posed all different ways and wanted many pictures taken.  Needless to say, they all left the park right after this happened and they never went back the rest of the week! :(

That afternoon, though, they came to the convention center for Weather Fest.  This is a half-day event that the AMS (American Meteorological Society) puts on whenever they have their conference in town.  It's a free event, open to the public, with booths from many different meteorological and earth science organizations providing hands on activities and give aways.  Evan was probably a little too young for it still, but he liked getting a big NASA sticker (which he put on his chest and wore around) and building a "satellite" and filling a rain gauge.

Day 5

This was the one day of the conference that I didn't have too much to have to do/attend so I decided to take it off as a family day.  I had wanted to take the kids to the Children's museum that was right across the street from our hotel, but it turns out it's closed on Mondays!  I didn't plan very well on that one!  So instead we went to the Arizona Science Center, which was also great fun.  I think the highlight for me was the stomach slide that made digestive sounds, including funny fart sounds as you came out the slide.  It was too loud for Evan and Emma, and rather scared them, but once I explained to Evan was the sounds were he at least giggled about it (and he still talks about it to this day...the stomach slide that scared him).

The stomach slide

Exploring at the science center

I also liked the "Forces of Nature" display that let you experience mother nature's strongest forces, like hurricanes, thunderstorms, wildfires, etc.  It was a sensory experience for sure (yes you even got a little wet while getting blown around during the hurricane)!  Evan liked so many of the exhibits too.  Evan and Emma both spent a lot of time at the wall where you could build tube tracks for ping pong balls to go down.

 I think Evan's favorite, though, was the outdoor water-powered kinetics display where he could use sprays of water to lift balls up onto tracks.  He might have gotten just a little bit wet on this one (and may have done it more than once too!).

Day 6

A full day back to the work conference for me, but while Sarah and Louise were still with us John and them took the kids to the Children's museum.  From the stories they told me and the photos/videos they shared, it looks like a fun place.  Grocery shopping (with real food container items for them to pick off the shelves and put in their mini-carts, a cash register to pay and bag your goods, etc), a noodle forest (of pool noodles), climbing things, race car tracks, and more.

Air rushing through tubes, scarves to blow through, so magical!

Kid-sized shopping...so cute!

Day 7

Sarah and Louise left really early to head to New York City, so John and the kids did laundry and hung out close to hotel on our last full day in Phoenix, which also happened to be my longest day at the meeting yet.  At least I was able to meet up with them for dinner, and we found a nice place to get some pizza on our last night in town.  Now we just had to get ready for another set of days on the road with the kids!