Te Papa, Our House

This morning we headed to Te Papa, our national museum.

It is a great place to take kids, but for some reason we'd never taken Q before. He is at the perfect age to soak it all in.

Plus it's free! And we scored free parking.

He was loving playing shopkeeper and had quite a system down. Not altogether right, but very efficient!

There is a Formula One exhibit there at the moment (the special exhibits aren't free) and in honor of that they had a bunch of go karts in the lobby that you could sit in. A big hit.

We were so excited to see the model of the blue whale's heart. It just so happens that one of Q's favorite books right now is a book with lots of mammal facts, and one of the facts about blue whales is that their hearts are the size of a small car. That little factoid was certainly brought to life!

I returned from the bathroom to find these two making music, Pacific Island style. Made me smile.

Quincy loved it all, except...the wild boar was not at all popular. "Tinty NOT like the wild pig. Too noisy. Ran back to see the bugs." Here he is leaning on the insect cabinet, staring at it safely from a distance. (Jeremy is flipping a page in a book and not about to give Q a wet willy, by the way.)

We wrapped up the day with a little puppet action. And then it was time to head home for a much-needed nap.

All that for the cost of a cup of coffee and petrol. Not bad.