Tuesday, October 10, 2017

Marbles Kids Museum, Raleigh, Part II

A continuation of yesterpost...

The Kid Grid area was all about producing and using electricity. A complicated system distributes circular tiles (representing fuel) throughout the area. Various machines pick up the pucks and send them down tubes to other parts of the room. The children enjoyed the complicated contraptions and learned something about the electric grid too.

Kid Grid entrance

A climbing area

A way to send power into the system

Driving an electric car

Electricity use at home

Just outside Kid Grid is STEMosphere, an area devoted to science, technology, engineering, and math. Some challenges were meant for kids to conquer, others to inspire wonder.

Building a Lego bridge

Wind on a hankie makes for an interesting display

Working with circuits

Moneypalooza is an area about using money wisely, very similar to the Kid Grid area, but using cash instead of power.

Moneypalooza entrance

One area emphasized saving for the future and let visitors shoot money through air guns into a savings area.

Aim to save!

Loading the Aim to Save air gun

Still loading

Making a deposit

Another area helps kids choose what to spend money on by that classic game of skillful choosing...skeeball!

I hope I get to spend more money on food!

Many of the soft money balls would accumulate in a big piggy bank in the middle of the room. Occasionally the piggy would get overfull and burst his seams, dropping money on excited children below.

Waiting for the bank to crash

Pennies from heaven?

On our way out, we put our faces on a hundred dollar note....

$100 daughter

Toddler bucks!

Aren't you a little young to be wearing a wig?

The final inside area of our visit was Splash! As the name implies, water was a big theme in this area. We managed to stay dry during our exploration.

Splash! entrance

Inside a yellow submarine

At the controls

Beyond the submarine is a pirate ship, which looked like more fun to me but only the oldest child was interested in playing there. I felt obligated to keep an eye on the toddler so I did not get a chance to explore. Maybe next time.

Front of the pirate ship

Back of the ship

The scurvy mate

Outside, we visited Tree Tunes. The area has plenty of musical instruments, mostly of the xylophone variety.

Playing a tune

Playing together

One last note

Tubular bells

A fountain in the middle

The area also has a river where children can play with boats and other water implements. Protective smocks were available but unused by my children.

Waterfall at the end of the river

A water tower

We enjoyed our visit but were getting hungry (and the toddler was getting sleepy). We headed off for lunch happy with our experiences at Marbles Kids Museum.

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