Travel NC With Kids: April 2012

Tuesday, April 17, 2012

Greensboro Children's Museum – Interactive and Educational Activities for Kids

Children's Museum in Greensboro NC © Katrena

The Greensboro Children's Museum offers a nice assortment of fun, educational activities for children of a variety of ages. My kids were quite excited to see this children's museum because of the huge black and white sculpture standing out front. Many colorful and interesting surprises awaited inside as well!

Fun Things to Do at Greensboro Children's Museum © Katrena

Parking is limited at the Greensboro Children's Museum. We have visited the museum more than once, and each time we have had to circle the parking lot waiting for an open space because the lot was full. They have a sign stating that parking is available across the street for a fee, but we circled for a while and ended up getting a spot in the museum parking lot both times.

Wear Costumes and Act on Stage at Greensboro Children's Museum © Katrena

Practice Using Sound & Lighting Equipment © Katrena

The museum is set up in a circular fashion and the floor is painted to resemble a road going through a town. Fun and unusual opportunities for educational play are found throughout the museum. My kids decided to turn to the right first. They loved dressing up and putting on a play for the adults in the theater. The raised stage has a curtain, some props, and several choices of different sized costumes back stage. Out front, the kids can get some practice with lighting and sound effects. It was interesting to see the kids being creative and imaginative in their productions!

Practice Being a Dentist at Greensboro Children's Museum © Katrena

Kids can try their hands at being a dentist a little farther down the hall in the medical area. This can be a great opportunity to talk to little ones about what to expect at the dentist's office and to give them a chance to sit in the chair and role play being the dentist as well. My girls were really hoping that the chair would go up and down, but it was stationary. My oldest daughter in particular thought it was cool to dress up and be on the giving, rather than the receiving, end of the dental chair!

Practice Being a Surgeon © Katrena

Practice Taking Care of Babies in the Greensboro Children's Museum © Katrena

Just a few steps away is the doctor's office, where kids can practice being a receptionist, inspect x-rays, take care of newborn babies in the nursery, or perform surgery. The surgical table resembled a huge life-sized Operation game. My youngest would have probably been content to take care of the baby dolls in the nursery the whole time we were visiting. They had lots of blankets for the babies, and my 3-year-old particularly enjoyed tucking in the dolls and holding and rocking them in the rocking chair.

Nonie's House in Greensboro Children's Museum © Katrena

Collecting Eggs at Greensboro Children's Museum © Katrena

Nonie's House was next on my kids' list of fun places to visit. This area was set up like an old fashioned home, complete with hens sitting on their eggs in the "yard" beyond the picket fence. You could pick some wooden flowers, place them in a vase, and walk into the house to decorate the dining room table and even look out the windows to see the view of the street. Great Southern homes often center around the kitchen, and kids can explore the cabinets, refrigerator, and more in this vintage-style kitchen.

Delivering the Mail in Children's Museum in NC © Katrena

The mail room had lots of letters, a full-sized mail truck, and some equipment one might see behind the counter at the post office. My girls loved taking the mail around to the various areas in the museum and placing them in the mailboxes. This can be a great activity for kids who are learning how to read in particular.

Tot Spot Provides Fun Play Activities for Toddlers © Katrena

The center of the circular area hosts a large Tot Spot, designed for preschoolers. My kids were all wanting to go explore in that area and were disappointed that it was for little ones! There are lots of safe places to crawl, explore, and play in that area. It is especially nice for the caregivers to have a gated area so that the little ones can explore away from the bigger kids for part of the time.

Practice Balancing on Rope Bridge and Stepping Stones © Katrena

Climbing Wall at Children's Museum © Katrena

Camping Area in Greensboro Children's Museum © Katrena

On the far side of the museum circle is a large room with stepping stones, a small climbing wall, rope bridge, and camping area. Two of my kids want to climb on everything, so they particularly enjoyed the challenges in this section. They also enjoyed climbing in the sleeping bags, zipping the tent, setting up a picnic, and telling a few stories in the camping area. Their granddad, an avid camper and fisherman, would have been proud!

Pretend to be a Fireman © Katrena

Kids Can Drive a Race Car © Katrena

Kids who love vehicles and transportation will love the back part of this room. Several full-sized vehicles are located in this area. They feature a fire truck, race car, and police car. The kids can climb in and out of these vehicles and imagine zooming down the road! They can also fill the race car with gas, or put out a fire while wearing firefighting garb. The racing flags around the edge were cool too – I'll have to look up what the various colors mean one of these days. My girls were really excited to see kids on a UNC-TV commercial playing on the same fire truck when they were watching television!

Kids Train at Children's Museum © Katrena

Children's Museum Passenger Train © Katrena

The transportation theme continues into the next large room. A train offers kids the opportunity to ride, add coal, load suitcases, or don an engineer's hat and drive for a while. Passengers in the train can have a grand tea party. They also have a table in front of the train where kids can play with a model train track.

Airplane at Children's Museum in Greensboro NC © Katrena

Fly a Jet at Greensboro Children's Museum © Katrena

Along the other wall is the front part of a DC-9 jet. Climb the stairs along the side of the airplane to become passengers with loads of leg room and even seat belts! More daring kids may want to climb into the cockpit and test out all the instruments. If the kids don't want to climb back down the stairs, they can hop into a tunneled slide and ride down to the bottom.

Having Fun a Children's Museum in North Carolina © Katrena

Hands-on Education at Children's Museum © Katrena

Curious George at Greensboro Children's Museum © Katrena

The room with the jet and train sometimes features traveling exhibits and sometimes offers a large area where kids can play with balls, hula hoops, and other items. We saw a Curious George exhibit in this room once, and it was full of interactive opportunities. A side door in this room leads to the outdoor garden area, which is packed full of plants, flowers, and charming decorative pieces.

Walk Through the Garden at Children's Museum in Greensboro © Katrena

Several other areas are offered for fun and educational play at the Greensboro Children's Museum, but the ones I have featured have been some of my kids' favorite stops. A family can easily spend hours in this hands-on museum that is kid-friendly. Visit the Greensboro Children's Museum official site for rates, times, and additional learning and play opportunities. Readers may also wish to find more great places to visit with the kids at my Travel NC With Kids site map.

Monday, April 2, 2012

Textile Heritage Center in Cooleemee NC – Learn About Cotton Mill Town Heritage

Cooleemee Textile Heritage Museum Celebrates Cotton Mill Life © Katrena

The Textile Heritage Center, located in Cooleemee, North Carolina, has provided visitors a glimpse of a town when the cotton mill provided a way of life for many of its citizens since the center opened its doors to the public in October 1993. The museum, located inside the Zachary House in Davie County, contains the first museum dedicated to exploring and remembering cotton mill town life.

Cotton Mill Heritage © Katrena

Hundreds of volunteers from the Cooleemee Historical Association have dedicated many hours and dollars to preserving the history of a Southern town's cotton mill heritage. Approximately 330 mill houses and churches as well as the mill itself are still standing today despite the closing of the mill in 1969. Many descendents of mill workers still live in the community and are actively involved in helping to educate younger generations about a Southern way of life from days gone by.

Learn About Southern History © Katrena

The Textile Heritage Center provides a variety of educational opportunities, including:

video interviews (over 105 hours)
photo collection (more than 600 images)
mill town documents (more than 400)

Zachary House in Cooleemee NC © Katrena

When entering the mill house, it is easy to imagine walking up to the wrap-around front porch of a grandparent's house although this one does have wheelchair access. Once inside, you'll see a large room resembling a living room with couches and magazines on the coffee tables.

Antiques on Display at Zachary House © Katrena

I particularly like the Our State magazine – it has amazing photographs showcasing North Carolina and some awesome stories of southern towns all over the state. The antique vases and radios are a nice touch to this area, and I also liked looking at the old sewing machine. If visiting near Christmas time, you'll find a Christmas tree in the corner, decorated with ornaments made by the kindergarteners at the nearby elementary school.

This area also has a piano that is sometimes used when the community comes together to celebrate, reminisce, and perhaps even enjoy some friendly competition in a fudge or cornbread contest. Take the time to look around and you'll see a wealth of detailed touches, from old books and an Edison victola to an adorable old wooden horse that probably captured the eyes of many kids in the area as its owner proudly rode the steed!

If you look to the left after entering the front door, you'll see a hallway with manikins that seem to welcome visitors to enter and enjoy. Lynn Rumley, the mayor of Cooleemee who is also the executive director of the Textile Heritage Center, may come out to greet you and will likely offer to give you a guided tour of the museum if you wish.

My kids had the opportunity to see quite a few items they had never before seen. They thought the idea of resoling one's own shoes to be quite unusual and tried to imagine how long it might take to put on a pair of boots with numerous hooks for the laces.

See thread on large spools as they might have looked as they were spun in the spinning room as well as the smaller spools in a variety of colors. Both of my grandmothers were avid quilters, and those who love to sew might particularly enjoy many of the displays such as this in the museum.

I love the Cooleemee Heritage Center's personal account of working in the spinning room that was written by Ellen Tatum Young. Stories like these provide such a wealth of information that could easily fade and be forgotten without the efforts of those dedicated to preserving family history and the history of an entire town.

My daughters found the slate and lunch bucket with the manikin of the young school girl to be quite interesting. The Cooleemee Historical Foundation is also active in educating each grade at the nearby elementary school about the area's rich history through the Discovering Our Heritage program. Those who like to read about history may find Jim Rumley's Cooleemee: The Life and Times of a Mill Town to be a great opportunity to learn more details of the town's heritage.

Quite a few old tools are located in the museum. I could not help but think of my Papaw, who began building houses as a teenager. In later years, he would sometimes ask me to get a certain tool out of his van and I would often stand there scratching my head not having the faintest idea which one he wanted after looking at what seemed to be a plethora of tools that might claim the name he mentioned!

I was particularly fond of the collection of medical supplies. When comparing the crude materials of yesteryear with the high tech ones of today, I could not help but think of how compassion in care has always made such a difference in patient satisfaction. Days of home visits may have dwindled drastically, but medical professionals often went way beyond the call of duty to help their community. Of course, I had to ask the girls to guess the purpose of the old bedpan!

The nostalgic and rare photos and newspaper articles seem to tell their own story as one can see families and mill workers at work and play. Many of these items include captions that give details about the people, and Mrs. Rumley loves to give people additional details about the pictures and any of the displays. Don't miss the beautiful community quilts lining the walls in the back hall!

Life was not all work in this Southern town. There was plenty of room for entertainment, and the museum also hosts several musical instruments, such as a banjo and fiddle. See old marbles and learn a bit about how this game was played. The slingshot was a hit with my kids as well.

If traveling to Cooleemee with kids, I'd recommend also visiting the Firefighters Museum, a tiny museum that ranks as one of the smallest around that is located just a few feet from the Zachary House. Ask for a tour of the Mill Village Museum and you'll take a short walk down to the end of the block to see a mill house decorated as if you could step back in time to see the common "modern" conveniences of the day as well as to get a nostalgic feel of life of a mill working family.

A fun playground is located behind the tennis courts on the same block as the Mill Heritage Center that can provide some active fun time for the climbers, sliders, and swingers in the family. Just a couple of miles a short distance from highway 801 on the Yadkin/Davie line is Riverpark, a park that showcases the Yadkin River, a few hiking trails, and several picnic areas.

Learn more about Cooleemee and the Textile Heritage Center by watching this UNC-TV video on YouTube. Those wishing to visit Cooleemee's Textile Heritage Center can find more details at the official site. Find more great travel destinations on the Travel NC With Kids site map.