With the heat increasing it is always nice to find something to do as a family that is indoors yet still offers plenty of entertainment so why not look into some of your local Museums or centers? Today I took my family to visit the
Arizona Museum Of Natural History which is located in Mesa,Arizona.The Arizona Museum of Natural History is the premier natural history museum in Arizona. It is dedicated to inspire wonder, respect and understanding for the natural and cultural history of the Southwest. It was Founded in 1977 & has 60,000 objects of natural history, anthropology, history & art.Explore Arizona and the Southwest from the creation of the earth 4.5 billion
years ago to the present. See the origins of life on earth, meteorites and
minerals. Along with bones of animals they also have Tom the soft-shelled turtle and a live Gila monster along with live beetles.

The drive from our house to the
Arizona Museum Of Natural History is about half an hour to forty-five minutes but it is well worth the drive, & parking was easy to find once we arrived to the Museum. You start to feel the museum experience as soon as you walk thru the door because you are greeted by a giant skeleton of a Mammoth & other large animals. The staff was friendly & welcoming it was a nice family friendly environment & it was nice to get out of the Arizona heat.The Arizona Museum Of Natural History offers a lot of exciting exhibits & activities for children as you walk through the halls you see many skeletons & fossils on display along with videos,animated creations & interactive activites such as floor puzzles,gold mining,& fossil finding.

I took a group of four adults & two children to the museum our group ranged from 3 as the youngest & 61 as the oldest each of us found the Museum calming,educational & entertaining. The floors & exhibits intertwine with each other it was quite entertaining going from being on the first floor to being on the second because you are too busy looking at all the displays to notice that your slowly climbing up a ramp. My favorite parts was the Dinosaur Mountain where you can ear the roars of these amazing animals from a time long ago,& you get to see a Flash Flood which happens every 23 minutes,This part scared the little ones a little because lights begin to flash as thunder begins to roar as the water comes flowing down the rocks,We watched this both at the very top of Dinosaur Mountain & the bottom. I also enjoyed the Gold mining & Paleo Dig Pit which both offer hands on experience for all ages. We spent two hours walking the museum & viewing everything they have to offer the kids didn't want to leave but we had to depart.The last stop on our trip was of course the Gift Shop! It offered a large range of Dino toys,stuffed animals,Rocks,candy,jewelry,books & more all at great prices we bought quite a few things including a Memory pack which included: A map of where fossils have been found in Arizona,A pencil,A dino toy,Stickers & two rocks. I know that my family enjoyed their trip to the Arizona Museum Of Natural History & I enjoyed it myself, If you live in Arizona I suggest heading over on your next day off to learn & explore with the Arizona Museum Of Natural History. If you currently are not located in Arizona or aren't planning to visit here anytime soon I suggest checking out your own local Museums they are perfect during the summer & give you entertainment along with an educational experience. I wanted to personally thank the
Arizona Museum Of Natural History for providing me with a four pack of tickets to visit their museum we look forward to visiting again before the summer is over. Since I was unable to post all of the pictures I wanted here you can head over to my
Photobucket album to see other pictures from our trip.

Above you can see a photo of my daughter,my mothers boyfriend,his daughter & my daughter. On the right is a Memory pack example. I know it isn't a huge prize but I would like to Offer one of my readers a Memory pack I picked up in the gift shop,You can use it to have a small educational session with your child. Tell them about the rocks included,tell them about the dinosaur toy & stickers included and teach them about fossils. You can find them on
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