Little Kids' Vacation 2014, Pt. 2

After a second night at Hotel Quigley, we loaded up in the minivan and headed to Baltimore Inner Harbor. We have a two-year, family membership to the Museum of Science and Energy in Oak Ridge, Tennessee and can visit many other science museums for free. We visited four! such museums on our vacation, starting with the Maryland Science Center in Baltimore.

We did have to pay for the carousel just outside the museum; we love carousels.

With Jim's and Erin's help, my experience at the Maryland Science Center was relaxed and enjoyable, and the museum offers some cool things, including exhibits on dinosaurs and the body, a hands-on tornado vortex simulator, and a kids room.

Charleigh on the Bed of Nails

It was starting to spit rain as we left the museum, so we didn't stroll the harbor as we'd thought we might. Instead, we did some thrift shopping on the way back to Annapolis, then stopped to pick up the dinner Erin had ordered.

Dinner.

These Maryland Blue Crabs were Erin's treat and, by far, the most expensive dinner we ate on vacation. (We ate out of a cooler most of the time.) I've been picking crabs with Erin Quigley for...I don't know...at least twenty years, and she's made it a priority to teach my children to pick and enjoy them, too. She sent Cade a text message the other night, promising to buy more if he'd come visit. I love her generous heart. And Maryland Blue Crabs!

I have to end this post by sharing one of my favorite photos from all of vacation: Chip's playing in Erin's cooler with Erin's old, pink bunny. Doesn't it have amazing character about it? She sent it on up the road with us. What a beautiful person, and I wonder if I'll ever be able to fit the friend she is properly inside a blog post.