marbles memories

We finally took our first trip to Marbles museum downtown last week. We got to go with Ashley and Camden and Cara and John. The girls (and I) both had so much fun and they loved playing with the boys. There is so much there for them to explore and learn about. One of the things that was so special to me was a map of the world that they had upstairs. It had lots of smaller cities on it...for instance in NC it showed Greensboro and Wilmington. The coolest part was it had the small town in Kazakhstan that the girls were born in!! Even maps that we bought in Kazakhstan did not have Taldy Korgan! I got to show them right where they were born. Another neat thing they had was an exhibit about the Olympics. They had many different events set up for the kids to take part in. Claire and Ava did the long jump, walked on the balance beam and jumped hurdles. It was really cool! They also loved playing hockey in the "Hurricanes" ice rink. It is so lifelike, they even had Hurricanes jerseys for the kids to put on, but the girls didn't. Their favorite thing was cooking in the kitchen. I liked that every little play area has outfits that match. The kitchen has chef outfits, the mail truck has mailman outifits and there are firefighter outfits at the fire truck. It really allows the children to get in that role and pretend! I definitely recommend going, however it can add up, it is $5 for each person, but I think it was totally worth it!

***one side note, I love the first picture of the girls because of that genuine laughing smile and I think they look so much alike***