Museum of Ancient Life

Today the local Museum of Ancient Life was only $2, so my friend Katie called and asked if Kyle and I wanted to go. I love that Katie included Kyle in the invitation! Of course, we said yes.

The first exhibit in the museum is a room where you can watch people working with actual fossils. Today only one man was working far away from the window, but it was fun to see all of the dinosaur heads lined up near the front of the room.

(Kyle in front of several dinosaur skulls. In the back right corner, there is a man hard at work, but I cannot tell what he is doing.)

One of the first exhibits we visited was a representation of dinosaur remains buried in the ground. A fake stream with real fish in it ran alongside the exhibit. Kyle spotted the fish and they held his attention for several minutes before I pulled him away. He was hilarious. I wish I had a fish tank.

(It was impossible to capture the fake stream and Kyle in a picture, but you can see how intently he is watching this exhibit.)

Besides the stream, not much of the museum was interesting to Kyle. The place was packed and absolutely chaotic. After all, it really inexpensive and the perfect last summer outing before school starts tomorrow. Despite that, Kyle successfully navigated all of the crowds. He even managed to ignore the myriads of children that tried to pet him. Considering kids are one of his favorite things, that was wonderful.

(Kyle looking annoyed because Katie was snapping his picture while he was in a down.)

I've wanted to know Kyle's weight for quite a while. According to the DinoScale at the museum, Kyle weighs 50 pounds. That makes him slightly lighter than a Ingenia. The golden question is, what is an Ingenia?

(Kyle on the DinoScale. He really didn't want his picture taken and refused to look at the camera.)

(A closeup of the scale showing that and Ingenia weighed approximately 55 pounds.)

Near the end of the museum Kyle and I encountered a shark. It had pretty scary looking teeth and a red rimmed mouth. Are they really this color in nature? If so, their coloring just adds to their frightening appearance. (Cue Jaws music.)

(I held Kyle as I donned a terrified looking face. I cannot tell if Kyle's closed eyes are a sign of a willingness to play along or annoyance that I was picking him up once again.)

The final skeleton as we were leaving was of a baby mammoth. The exhibit said that it was less than a year old. It only had the tinniest of tusks that were starting to grow. I bet in real life the mammoth was actually kind of cute.

(I held Kyle up to show that he and the mammoth were about the same age and size. However, the mammoth baby would have towered over him in adulthood.)

My favorite exhibit is one that couldn't be captured on camera. It is a dark tunnel of a room with a suspended bridge and lights that look like stars surrounding you. (I love stars!) I think the room was to represent space. I loved it and so did Kyle. Turk and Mesa would not have liked walking over a grate-like bridge in a dark room that enveloped them. Kyle didn't think a thing of it. He never ceases to amaze me!