American Museum of Natural History

On Tuesday I joined my friends Maggy & Joanna at the Museum of Natural History in Manhattan. Their girls (Elaine’s friends) are both in Kindergarten this year and they are studying dinosaurs. We were invited to tag along on their field trip!

It probably doesn’t seem big to most of you, but this was a very big adventure for me. Why? A couple of reasons. It seems I have had at least one sick kiddo for quite a while, so we really haven’t been out of the house much. The twins are much more mobile now and I am “out of practice” at being out of the house with four littles. But the real reason is that I planned to drive. To Manhattan. By myself. I have lived in Brooklyn for three and a half years, but I have never done any driving in the City. I was always either with Ben, or I took the train. I knew the train was an impossibility with the stroller and the twins, so it was drive or stay home.

The driving part was actually relatively easy. There was a little bit of traffic exiting the FDR, but I had no complications – until I tried to park. Apparently it is street cleaning on the West Side on Tuesdays. After circling for over a half hour, I finally snagged an empty spot and stayed in the car until the time period was finished. Elaine was bummed to eat lunch with her brother in the car instead of with her friends in the museum, but it was okay.

My next hurdle came when I reached the front of the museum. I had forgotten that there were a lot of steps! I assumed there was a side ramp, but apparently the accessible entrance was way back over where I had parked. With two kiddos desperate for the potty I opted to pull the stroller up the steps rather than walk all the way back around in the rain. Getting up the stairs wasn’t that much of a problem…until I realized that the doors were revolving doors. My double stroller wouldn’t fit.

I still didn’t want to go down the steps and all the back around to the accessible entrance, so I carried the twins and my bag through the door with Elaine and Nolan in tow. I plopped them on the carpet out of the way and went back for the stroller. I was very fast, but when I got back inside there was already someone asking “Who left these kids here?” Next time I’ll go around. We took the proper exit when we left.

We had a good time in the museum and being with our friends again.

The best “group shot” – Nolan, Ian, Hava, Elaine, Elli

Nolan likes his triceratops dinosaur the best. But he can never remember what it’s called. So he runs up and says, “What call this, Mommy?” I reply, “Triceratops.” He walks away muttering “’Ceratops. ‘Ceratops.” He was excited to see a real triceratops, and all of the other dinos and skeletons hanging from the ceiling.

The twins had a good time, even though they were in the stroller the whole time!