Coopers Unlimited: Last Week of Summer

I have been trying to cram as much as I possibly can into this last week we have of summer before the kids go back to school. It's a bad habit I have where I panic and realize we're out of time so we'd better hurry and have as much fun as we possibly can... which sometimes tips over into not being super fun because it's so intense, but let's ignore that part. Full steam ahead!

Monday we went hiking on one of my favorite running trails. It was a gorgeous hike and we were having a good time (we saw a banana slug!!) until Elinor got stung by a bee and then we had to turn back early. You know, I think it is one of the most terrifying things in the world to hear your 4-year-old cutie-patootie little girl shrieking in terror and to see her all alone up there on the trail and not be able to reach her right away. I had so many awful things going through my head for those first few moments. Luckily we had Joseph with us and he got to her within a few seconds while I stayed with Jacob. She's fine.
After hiking we went swimming with some friends and then called it a day.

Tuesday we went to see a dollar movie in the morning (horrible movie, but the kids loved it and we got to sit in some great recliner seats!) and then headed straight to the Children's Discovery Museum in San Jose. I found out in researching it that Steve Wozniak was a key donor so they changed the name of the street it's on to Woz Way. It's a pretty great museum and the kids had a great time.

Dancing to the entrance.

Sitting at the entrance with a giant party-hatted polar bear (and a sleeping Jacob).

They had an ambulance and firetruck that the kids loved. Jacob basically wanted to move in.

See how at-home he is?

He got to the firetruck before I did and I caught him pulling another kid out of the driver's seat. He had to apologize and take a little time-out before he was able to drive again, but that's how passionate he feels about it!

My little firefighters. :)

This bubble room was cool. The kids spent a lot of time there playing around and possibly learning some new things about bubbles.

There were bubbles floating down from the pipe overhead that the kids liked to catch in their bubble hoop. It was pretty fun.

Even Jake got into it.

Emi spent a good hour at this corn husk doll making station. After she finished hers she helped Elinor make one (which she promptly lost) and then helped another girl make one, after which they spent some time together making braids for hair and clothes for the dolls out of denim scraps.

I turned around for a second and Elinor was missing. After searching for a while I found her here, calmly weighing every piece of produce she could fit and balance into the scale. The museum was perfect for Elinor and Caleb's character. They both love to explore and touch new things, even when it's not okay. They had no problem wandering off to a nearby display to try things out if something caught their eye. Emily is more of a rule follower, so she had fun too, but in a totally different and more cautious way. Jake was just stuck on the ambulance and firetruck and one other display, which I will get to in a minute.

This giant pinboard thingy is something Caleb remembered from his kindergarten field trip. All the kids loved it. It often ended up a battle between the two sides to push all the pins to the opposite side.

Emi was working on this wood carving machine thing (lathe?) that she powered with a pedal.

Very early on in our visit Caleb disappeared into the waterworks portion of the museum and did not come back. I checked in on him periodically and always found him very thoroughly occupied.

First time I checked in with him: roll the ball down the railing so it can land on the fountain and shoot up in the air to land in that tank on the ceiling. It was sweet to see him helping that little baby standing at his elbow. He would reach for balls that were out of reach and hand them to him and sometimes push it along on the railing if it didn't have enough momentum. Melts my heart!

This fountain would fill with fog and then the kids could manipulate it with a knob and send out little puffs of fog.

And this pipe had a little intake hole at the bottom that the kids could stick a ball through and have it sucked up and shot out the top. Caleb figured it out early and loved teaching the others kids about it.