Children's Museum of Virginia in Portsmouth

Somehow, Jim found out at the end of July that the Children's Museum of Virginia in Portsmouth was going to have a temporary exhibit on The Wizard of Oz. I'm a huge fan; like, it's a thing.

The exhibit was scheduled to open just a few days after our trip to the beach to hang out with family. "You know we're gonna have to drive back over," I said to Jim. He just shrugged. Bless it; he already knew. But in the end, we were glad for the second trip on August 9th because we were able to enjoy the ocean a smidge. (It had rained during the daylight hours of our first trip.)

The location of the Children's Museum of Virginia is charming, and the museum itself seems new and established all at once. It blows the Children's Museum of Richmond right out of the water. We were granted four free admissions through the ASTC Passport Program, and the baby was free, so we paid admission for Charleigh, only.

The Wizard of Oz exhibit revolved around the book as opposed to the movie and therefore didn't excite me as much as The Wizard of Oz exhibit we'd seen at The Children's Museum of Pittsburgh in 2012. It was cool nonetheless, and we all enjoyed the museum, in general (and not just in that awww-look-at-how-much-fun-the-little-kids-are-having way). I found the Lancaster Antique Train and Toy Collection and Dr. Forces Traveling Energy Extravaganza especially amazing.

Top Center: Clementine Crawling under Part of the Train Exhibit.
My camera wasn't wearing the right lens for the train exhibit, but it was AWESOME.

After we left the museum, we ate the dinner Jim had packed for us and drove to the beach. It was a beautiful afternoon, and Clementine was wearing the crown she'd made in the CreARTivity section of the museum.