Special treat(s)

Last Tuesday was Jack's final day of summer vacation, before he started kindergarten the next day, so I knew I wanted to do something special together. We had a free coupon for Science City, so I decided to take him to Union Station.

But first that morning, I had another "appointment" downtown. Even though it took much longer than expected, and I was getting impatient, Jackson was an ANGEL. So when we were finally done, I wanted to treat him to the Crayola Cafe for lunch. I called up Leslie and she said she'd meet us there in 10 minutes.

The spaceship drawing in progress above ... and finished below.

Jack ate every bite of his food, so after we said goodbye to Leslie and she went back to work, I treated him to Sheridan's for dessert. Concretes are his favorite! The centaur in the background is a teaser for the "Chronicles of Narnia" exhibit nearby.

Built in 1914, Union Station is the second-largest train station in the country. Jackson liked hearing me tell how Papa George traveled through Union Station 64 years ago on his way back to Nebraska, coming home from World War II in Europe. One of Kansas City's most impressive fountains, named in honor of Henry Bloch, is on the left.

We first saw this minotaur mask from "The Chronicles of Narnia" exhibit, displayed in Union Station's grand hall. Jack was impressed with the swords criss-crossed in the back.

We went down one level to get our tickets...

...and down another to the exhibit hall (on Union Station's lowest level). It's a newly renovated space, but it's neat that they had these "windows" looking in to the old elevator mechanical room.

With the excitement of Jack starting kindergarten in a new school the very next day, the following line from C.S. Lewis really resonated with me. "All their life in this world and all their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page: now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story which no one on earth has read: which goes on for ever: in which every chapter is better than the one before."

About to "step through the wardrobe and into the wintry world of Narnia." As you enter, the temperature's chilly and a light snow is falling.

The goal was to find certain objects hidden in this treasure.

This area "highlighted the mythical creatures of Narnia, allowing visitors to create their own creatures featured in the film. Three stacks of rotating, square blocks stand in three-, four- and six-foot configurations, each level featuring different aspects of a creature. By rearranging the different levels, visitors can create well-known characters from the Narnia films or mix and match the squares to create new ones."

Jack also got to face the White Witch, sit on her icy throne, touch a frozen waterfall, storm the battlements (launch a catapult), build a castle arch and lift a sword.

Then it was off to Science City.

Not surprisingly, one of the very first areas he went to was the animals.

Since there were two parakeets, are they a pair-o'-keets?

Mississippi map turtles.

Snuggle bunnies?

Seeing eye to eye.

Madagascar hissing cockroaches. Blech!

Checking out the preserved specimens.


Jack playing one of those keyboards you step on, like in the movie "Big."

Playing the air chimes.

These "whistles" play, just by moving your hand over the open holes.

We spent a lot of time at the water table — trying out different paths, making dams, and even creating a little whirlpool to catch the floating toys and make them spin around and around. But that's exactly how I wanted it: for Jack to go at his own pace and do whatever he wanted, whenever he wanted. Plus, you can tell he had the whole thing to himself.

Then it was off to the weather center.

By moving the fan, you could see the difference it makes in blowing the sand and effecting erosion.

In the crime lab.

Analyzing fingerprints.

Next up was the optical illusion area.

Jack's sitting at a dinner booth, but where'd his body go?


These three vases continually spun around. Can you see the two heads facing each other? Because the flat ridge near the bottom that creates the "mouths" isn't centered or symmetrical, as it goes around, it looks like the two people are talking back and forth!

Earlier, we had run into Jill who I went to college with at Northwest. Then we discovered that her daughter, Riley (seen here), also was starting kindergarten the next day ... at the same school as Jack ... and in the exact same class!


Time to discover some fossils.


This area was neat; it had several hands-on activities that we both really liked. Here, you let a yellow ball go on each of the colored tracks at the same time, to see which one goes fastest. Looks like the orange track lost.

Look out!

I've seen these before and even made one once. But little did I know it demonstrated "immiscibility," a chemistry term for liquids that cannot undergo mixing or blending. I hope to never use immiscibility in a sentence again.

A whirlwind machine, to see which of the artifical "leaves" float and which ones crash.

I think this was our favorite activity in all of Science City, perhaps partly because it was new to us and we'd never seen something like it before. It also seemed deceptively simple — a big silver wheel constantly spinning around horizontally, on which you placed some circles to spin around vertically. Sounds easy, right? But as carefully as we tried, the big white and smaller black circles would go flying off the edge or just fall over ... until we figured out that you need to get the circles spinning before you let go of them on the silver wheel. Then, it was as if they spun in place, or even traveled backwards. Fascinating!

Success! We had fun doing this for a long time, trying different combinations of circles at the same time, placing them at different points on the silver wheel and putting the black circles inside the white circles. But once I got this shot of Jack's face through the spinning circle, I was satisfied and put the camera away ... for at least two minutes.

Pulling himself up with pulleys.

Jack liked the sewer area ... especially after I pretended it smelled and was gross.

Sliding down the sewer pipe.

Sitting on both sides of a two-way mirror/one-way glass. Then Jack would flip the light switch (see his hand at the lower left) and we'd only see our own reflection.

The body part.


Checking his flexibility.

Testing his balance. Obviously not this time, but Jack actually balanced on this contraption for four seconds, which was really hard to do. I balanced for 0.9 seconds.

Amazingly, this machine measures your height using sonar. At 43 inches and 44 pounds, Jackson's practically square.


This monitor plays actual footage from a real-life heart surgery. The advisory on the wall above it, warning about graphic images and getting nauseous, is pretty funny.

The bubble hydrant. And the green waste receptacle behind it that "talks trash."

Using the handle, Jack pumped up the air pressure to shoot this little rocket about 20 feet high. Then did it over and over again. Until my camera battery ran out.

So although we were there all afternoon, I didn't get a shot of him beneath Union Station's famous clock. I guess we'll have to come back again sometime. It'll be my special treat.