Christopher’s been interested in starting a marble collection and my Mom mentioned there is a marble factory not far from here. Today we visited Moon Marble Company and watched a marble being made by hand! Then the kids picked out a marble tube, they had two different size tubes you could fill and then a shooter to fit into the cap. They chose the smaller size (more marbles) and had so much fun. We let the older three do it, not Emiline since it did advise it not for kids under 3 and I don’t quite trust her to keep hers away from the baby yet.

They had to stick their hands into the mouth of this big carved guy sitting on a barrel to pull out their shooter but the smaller ones they picked from jars, like candy jars. They had so many amazing marbles and the place was huge, filled with all sorts of old fashioned games and marble related things. Kit will be posting pictures soon…

The tour was free and the marble tube was $3.50 for 21 marbles. So much fun!!

Mo & C picking out their marbles:

Here’s the big scary guy you had to stick your hand into his mouth to get your shooter & Bennett eyeing all the cool games:

This came to mind tonight, no idea why – but in another 3 years we might be ready to tackle Carlsbad Caverns which is only a nine hour drive away. Hahaha! 🙂 But we could camp there and the general entrance pass is $6 per adult, free for kids under 15 and is good for 3 days. There are two self guided tours available and the bat exodus thing so you could spread it out and camp for a couple nights and spend some time exploring the caves and hiking in the area. I’m thinking if we went in September we would avoid the summer crowds and it wouldn’t be so hot. Or maybe October would be better… 🙂

Then someday much further down the line I do want to explore Arches and Yellowstone and Zion and perhaps if we’re crazy ambitious we’ll head towards Nevada and California (as the kids have begged, especially C wants to see California – his birth place.)

But first we’ll start local with the Texas parks and then slowly work our way up over the next three years. I think Carlsbad is the closest “big” national park and I remember it as a kid. I also need to see what there is to see between here and there, because I would want to stop and camp at some point on the journey. Maybe a night on the way there, camp three nights there, then head back?

Some we’re considering, though not all at once. 🙂

Natatorium is $240/year. A season pass of 4 months is less, $120 or so? It’s about a 10 minute drive from here. The outdoor pool is less but in Texas there is maybe one month of the year you would want to swim – it’s so HOT and then too cold. Indoor pool seems better investment.

Dallas Museum Nature & Science is $90 for family pass for year or $150 family pass to join Kids’ Club and get into the Heard Museum and the Fort Worth Science Museum as well… all three are about 45 minutes from us.

Texas State Parks Pass is $60. That gets us to the camp grounds (camping is another fee) and “beach” on the lake plus bike trails, hiking, etc. It’s about 30 minutes north of us I heard.

Frank Buck Zoo is $55. (Now that the Fort Worth Zoo does family memberships with a fee PER PERSON in the family it’s way too much for us. I’m bummed, it used to be much cheaper. But they do a discounted homeschool day 2x a year.) Frank Buck is about 30 minutes north so no traffic that direction.

We are looking at some of these as family gifts for the holidays. We would do probably one a year over the next few years. We decided against a pass for the art museums because they all have a free day. The botanical gardens have at least some parts free, so we’re looking at passes for the places that are the most expensive and don’t do discount days/free days.

We have three near us – the one in Dallas, one in Fort Worth and one in McKinney. There is a science passport program that lets you have reciprocal membership benefits but the catch is you cannot visit museums that are within 90 miles of your home. Dallas requires photo ID as proof of residency. There is a museum in Kansas City that is also part of the program, along with some in Kansas and Oklahoma on our route to the grandparents. And others around Texas, including Killeen (where family is.) We could visit all of those with a passport membership but NOT the ones here in DFW! Which makes me sad…

However, the three DFW museums set up another plan. Memberships with them range from $75 to $90 for a year pass for family. If you sign up at the $150 level (I sound like a PBS ad) then you can get reciprocal membership between the local museums as well as the passport to museums further away. It signs you up for the Dallas Kids Club which is a partnership between Dallas Arboretum, Dallas Children’s Theatre, Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas Zoo, Museum of Nature & Science and Trinity River Audubon Center. Plus the other two science museums. (It said arboretum but other sites don’t list it.)

Which sounds like an amazing deal! If you plan to hit all of those places even once within the year. It does not give you free admission to all of the places (except the sciences ones) but it gives you a discount to Museum of Art, Audubon Center, & less expensive theater tickets. Not something I would be ambitious enough to do in the next year but we may do that as a family Christmas gift perhaps next year. This year I think we may be doing a zoo family membership instead to Frank Buck Zoo. Much smaller price and more in line with what we can manage with the little monkeys. 🙂

Dallas Museum of Art:
Free on Thursday evenings from 5:00 to 9:00 p.m. (Special ticket prices may apply to exhibitions)
Free on the first Tuesday of each month (Special ticket prices may apply to exhibitions)

Fort Worth Modern:
The Museum is free on the first Sunday of every month and every Wednesday.

Kimball Art Museum:
Admission to the Museum’s permanent collection is always free. There is a charge for special exhibitions. Half-price exhibition admission is offered on Tuesdays (all day) and on Fridays from 5–8 p.m.

Log Cabin Village:
$3.00 for ages 4-17
$3.50 for ages 18 & over
Ages 3 & under, free

Farmers Branch Historical Park is free.

Fort Worth Zoo does homeschool days in spring & fall with discounted tickets.

We gathered some cousins and a neighbor and met up with our homeschool co-op friends (minus some sick ones 🙁 ) at Candy Haven. The tour was about 20 minutes though it started late so the kids spent awhile drooling over the chocolates in the front shop. We saw the wedding cake sample room (where Kit and I sat nine years ago, sampling all the types of cake, frosting & fillings.) The kids were quite impressed (I think so were us moms) by the beautiful cakes. Then we saw the baker, the cake decorator, and the strawberry chocolate dipping center. There were shelves and shelves for the cakes (not full on a Tuesday but packed on weekends, they said.) And racks of chocolates. I was quite impressed with the kids’ self control and there was no snitching or poking or sneaking. (But boy, it was tempting.) At the end the kids watched the cake decorating decorate THEIR cupcakes! It was half cupcake, half frosting – seriously, they looked like ice cream cones on top of the cupcakes, it was so high.

I couldn’t eat mine (egg, of course) so I brought it home for Kit. I think everyone had fun. The workers were really sweet and did a great tour with the kids. It was $1 per person (which covered the freshly baked & decorated cupcakes) and we just paid as we checked out.

This is going to be one aspect of homeschooling I love – setting up field trips! 🙂 (These are from the iPhone so not super great pictures but they captured the adventure.)