Friday field trip: Children's Museum of Phoenix

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On the final day of my recent stay with Bubby and Baby Mac, we went to the Children's Museum of Phoenix. The museum is located less than 10 minutes from the airport, so it was a great way to end the visit—and gave us a spot to play in case my flight was delayed.

The Children's Museum of Phoenix is three floors of fun and one of Bubby's favorite places to play. It was Baby Mac's first time there, and he found plenty of fun himself.

We started on the top floor, with the plan to work our way down. The "Noodle Forest" is the highlight there and something Bubby couldn't wait to show Gramma. Right outside the forest is a paint-with-water activity that proved Baby Mac to be a passionate artist.

It was just the beginning of my last few delight-filled hours with my grandsons:

 

Other exhibits on the third floor include a shopping market, ice cream cart, a "Texture Cafe" for making meals with various materials, a "Grand Ballroom" where you can see the chain reaction from beginning to end, make-believe pickle and pencil cars, and much, much more. It's easy to see why the third floor is Bubby's floor of choice.

The second floor features a "Building Big" room for making forts of all shapes and sizes, a trike wash, and an art studio with ongoing projects (Bubby made a pretty butterfly and helped paint a purple rocket).

On the first (atrium) floor, the main attraction is the Schuff-Perini Climber, a climbing gym like you've never seen before. It's visible from all floors, and I climbed with Bubby all the way to the top...in a dress and thankful it was a rather slow day so Gramma could take her time. The first floor also has a Whoosh! machine of connected tubes where kids can feed nylon scarves through and watch them fly—one of Baby Mac's favorite exhibits, along with the many "Baby Zone" play areas throughout the museum.

The atrium wall is lined with a stunning display of CDs hanging from top to bottom. A museum worker told me children from around the area, including a school for homeless children, wrote wishes on the CDs to be hung on the wall at the museum's opening about four years ago. She said the wishes are touching and sometimes heartbreaking to read, everything from "I want an iPod" to "I want my daddy to come home."

Our visit to the museum was exhilerating—and exhausting. Bubby and Baby Mac were sound asleep in their car seats by the time we made it to the airport, just minutes after leaving the museum. When Megan dropped me off at the departure curb, I opened Bubby's door to give him a farewell kiss; with eyes still closed, he mumbled, "I love you...send me mail." Totally zonked-out Baby Mac got a kiss, Megan got a hug, and Gramma headed for home.

The Children's Museum of Phoenix was a great way to end my visit to the desert. We just might have to make pre-flight visits there a farewell tradition.

Interested in taking a similar field trip? Find details here:

Children's Museum of Phoenix • 215 N. 7th Street, Phoenix, AZ 85034 • (602) 253-0501

(If you want to see the full pictures from our visit or see them more slowly, feel free to take a look in my Brag Book.)

Today's question:

If you were asked to write a wish on a CD like those in the stunning display at the Children's Museum of Phoenix, what would today's wish be?

Cooking, codes, and ending child hunger

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Since becoming a blogger ambassador for ConAgra Foods' Child Hunger Ends Here campaign, I've made a concentrated effort to purchase as many of the specially marked products that have a code that converts to a meal for food-insecure children when entered on the Child Hunger Ends Here website.

The product I've bought most of is the Hunt's Pasta Sauce. Next up would be the Hunt's Tomato Sauce. That's because I have recipes I've made for years and years that use exactly those items. But I was ready for something different this week, in terms of recipes and the specially marked products I was purchasing, so I set about searching for a new recipe that used something other than pasta sauce or tomato sauce.

Of course, my go-to spot for recipes anymore is Pinterest, so that's where I headed. I just so happened to find a ConAgra Foods Pinterest board with several recipes, many of which feature products included in the campaign. One using Manwich (a campaign product) struck my fancy. So I purchased my can of Manwich, entered the code, and made the following for dinner Tuesday night.

Savory Chicken and Pasta Skillet (recipe and photo courtesy ReadySetEat)

2 cups dry small penne pasta, uncooked (2 cups = about 8 oz)

1 pound boneless skinless chicken breasts, cut into bite-size pieces

1/4 teaspoon garlic powder

1/8 teaspoon ground black pepper

PAM® Original No-Stick Cooking Spray

1/2 cup chopped yellow onion

1 can (15.5 oz) Manwich® Original Sloppy Joe Sauce

1/2 cup water

1 cup shredded part-skim mozzarella cheese

Cook pasta according to package directions, omitting salt. Meanwhile, sprinkle chicken with garlic powder and pepper.

Spray large skillet with cooking spray; heat over medium-high heat. Add chicken and onion; cook 5 minutes or until chicken is lightly browned, stirring occasionally. Add Sloppy Joe sauce and water; bring to a simmer and cook 3 minutes.

Add cooked pasta to skillet; stir to combine. Sprinkle with cheese.

(Makes six servings.)

The dish was fast, easy, and good. Next time I may add a handful of chopped fresh cilantro to give it even a little more zip—and just because I love cilantro and use it any chance I get.

Next time you're planning dinner, consider meals that include specially marked products from ConAgra for an easy way to join in the Child Hunger Ends Here campaign. Here are the products:

Before or after preparing your dish, be sure to visit www.ChildHungerEndsHere.com to enter the eight-digit code from the package. For each code entered, the equivalent of one meal—up to three million meals—will be donated to Feeding America, the nation’s leading domestic hunger-relief charity.

Then be sure to come back here and share your recipe with the rest of us. Together we can help end child hunger—and change up our recipe repertoires.

Disclosure: I have been compensated for my participation in the Child Hunger Ends Here campaign and all posts, tweets and updates related to the campaign.

Today's question:

Of the participating products above, which is your favorite? And which have you never tried? (I, personally, am a pretty huge fan of Orville Redenbacher, but I've tried all of them—far more often than I should probably admit.)

Never too old to learn: 11 lessons Gramma wants to take

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I've been a huge fan of this season's The Voice, which ends tonight (go, Juliet!). Since the very first episode, the coaches—Blake Shelton, Christina Aguilera, CeeLo Green and Adam Levine—have regularly commented about singers being "pitchy."

Well, I don't really know for certain what pitchy means, but I'm pretty sure I'm exactly that (and probably worse) when I sing. Years of chronic laryngitis and resorting to whistling have left my singing ability with much to be desired.

As I sang at church Sunday—from my pew, not in the choir!—I thought about my probable pitchiness. And how much I'd like to take voice lessons to overcome that. Not because I want to audition for The Voice, but because I like to sing and want to be better at it than I am.

Which then made me think about all the other things I like to do but would like to be better at. Which led to the following list.

11 lessons I want to take

1. The above-referenced voice lessons. Not for opera or classical or anything grand in any way. Just regular ol' singing lessons that teach me how to use my voice effectively and appropriately. And how to not be pitchy.

2. Photography lessons. Using my DSLR camera. To make the most of my DSLR camera.

3. Photoshop lessons. To make the most of my photos after I've done the most I can while taking them. And to remove wrinkles and pounds and crooked teeth and gray hair from all the photos that someone else might take of me. (Just kidding. Sort of.)

4. Tap dancing lessons. Like these.

5. Other dancing lessons. Ones where Jim and I could swoosh across the floor with the greatest of ease. (Okay, okay. We tried this before, and I couldn't help but lead. Which screwed us all up. Maybe I need to take a few control-issue lessons beforehand.)

6. Swimming lessons. Again. Because I've not gone swimming in a while and am now scared again to go in the deep end, because the previous three times I took lessons apparently didn't stick.

7. Knitting lessons. Grandmas are supposed to knit, aren't they? I don't. And would like to.

8. Bird identification lessons. How cool would it be to see or hear a bird, instantly know which bird it is, and be able to rattle off cool facts about the little guys? Pretty cool, in my opinion.

9. Spice-specific culinary lessons. I'm a pretty good cook but I'm not pretty good at knowing which spices to use and which ones to combine for the most awesome of dishes...unless a recipe tells me. I want to know off the top of my head and be able to concoct menus that are magically delicious.

10. Piano lessons. Again. A financial crunch led to me needing to quit taking lessons. A time crunch led to me not practicing regularly. Now I need to start all over, for the most part. <klunk, klunk> (That's me banging my head—not the piano keys—for not keeping up with practicing on my own.)

11. Personal essay writing lessons. I'd like one-on-one classes with a pro on writing personal essays. Someone like Anne Lamott. Or David Sedaris. Or Connie Schultz. Sure, I dabble in a little of that by blogging, but I want to be awesome. And (maybe?) critiqued by those who make a living doing it so I can improve and eventually make a living doing it, too.

photo: MS Office clipart

Today's fill-in-the-blank?

I'd like to take lessons in ________________.