Have you ever been exhausted by sheer boredom?  That’s me at a science museum.

In all honesty, I’m not really a science-y person.  I’m also not a mom that really gets in to “playing” with my children.  That’s why I bring them to science museums.  To make a mess at someone else’s place and play with other people.  And learn.  I’m big on learning.  Besides, if I start playing with them at science museums, I’ll set an expectation that’ll carry over at home.  And that sounds exhausting.

But, while my children get all the benefits of learning, socialization and burning energy, I’m walking along thinking of other things I need to remember to do later, some other time, when I’m not at a science museum.

Why We Science Museum

We go to a lot of science museums.  We’re really fortunate that my parents like to very effectively utilize their timeshare and invite us along to a lot of places.  Those trips are the backbones of the loving relationships my children have with their grandparents.  However, a lot of the timeshares are pretty far away.  So my children and I slow travel – drive a couple of hours, go to a science museum for several hours, drive a couple of hours, stay in a hotel, repeat until we get to our location.

We belong to our local science museum and it is a member of the ASTC Passport Program, which allows us to visit participating science museums for free.  Which saves a lot of money.

Surviving Science Museums

I’ve considered ways to make the science museums more fun for me.  I try not to be the parent sitting in the corner looking at my phone.  But sometimes……sometimes I’m taking pics of the children to show how awesome our life is……sometimes I’m doing everything in my power to stay awake.

I’ve seen other moms listening to podcasts or books on tape while they follow along behind, keeping them out of trouble.  That may work for some moms, my children on the other hand are constantly talking to me, asking me to “watch this” or “why” that.  It would soon become an exercise in frustration in pausing, answering or murmuring in “amazement”, hitting play, zoning in, hitting pause…..you get the idea.

Sometimes I’m in a step challenge with my husband, so I simply pace the floor around the children, racking up step after step.  This does start to make me look crazy.

Every so often there will be an activity that catches my eye and I’ll start working on it.  In general, I stay out of the art tinkering areas because that generally leads to my children asking me to finish their projects, which is far from the point.  But, if there’s a brainteaser or a puzzle to solve, I’ll sometimes get involved.  That’s led to some troubling aftermaths of me sternly talking to the children to quit trying to help me, hurt feelings, someone laying on the floor yelling and my children looking away in embarrassment.  Totally not the point of the excursion.

Which leads me to walking along, numbly, behind them, answering the “whys” and nodding along to their exclamations.

My husband, on the other hand, enjoys every single minute with the children at the science museum.  Or maybe every single minute at the science museum.  I sometimes wonder, when we go as a family, if my husband forgets he has children.

“Science Rules”

When my daughter said that, I knew we had a lot more science museums in our future.  The exposure to scientific ideas is too important.  I’ll continue to zombie my way through.

Consider if you see a mom zombie at a science museum who maybe is sneaking a few minutes on their phone, that maybe the boring exhaustion has just over taken them and they are trying to jolt themselves awake.

What are your experiences at science museums?