Admission to the Indianapolis Children’s Museum: $Free, thanks to the generosity of an old friend. 

Lunch at the Museum: $1, thanks to a tip from aforementioned generous friend, recommending to pack a lunch and pay only a slight fee for a locker. MUCH healthier, too.

Hotel reservation: $Free, thanks to a gift card purchased with credit card points. 
Dinner: $25 at Johnny Rockets (we thought we were to get a Kids Eat Free deal, but they “don’t participate” at that location. Boo hiss, we were on a roll.)
Breakfast: $Free, thanks to the hotel. 
Starbucks coffee: 2 @ $1.85. It had to be done, the hotel coffee was awful. You get what you pay for in that realm. 
Hearing H-Boy exclaim “Wooooooowwwwww” in sheer awe of the dinosaurs as we approached the museum: worth every penny. 
Waiting our turns to race a car down the slide. 

Pretend racing in the Hot Wheels exhibit. 

Who says genius doesn’t come early? She built this *almost* by herself. Sorta. 

H-boy was totally into the building. Miss M – also, kinda

Baby C wasn’t going to ride the carasel caraceul caraseul merry-go-round, but she kept pointing to a horse on display. As soon as she sat in the “saddle” she was bouncing with joy! 

Miss M, also thrilled with the ride. 

In the car no more than 5 minutes from leaving the museum. H-boy was out about 10 minutes later.  
*Not pictured: excitement over trains, touching dino bones, M-girl jumping from coral, and 18 trips to the bathroom. 
Let it be known: we slept horrible, the kids are tired and the eggs at the hotel (my only real option for breakfast) sucked. Not to mention H-Boy peed his pants in the car because he drank so much water at dinner. But this was in the fine print of parenting, right? The things we “treasure in our hearts” and remember fondly? We block out the pee.