Virginia's Living Museum

Today's adventure consisted of a fun trip to Virginia's Living Museum. We've never been there before, but we heard some great things about it. The museum's main focus is educating people on Virginia's nature through exhibits. It has a conservation garden, outdoor educational lectures, a planetarium, wildlife exhibits, an aquarium, and special events.

We got tickets to see a show at the planetarium, so we had to plan our visit around that in order not to miss it. The butterfly garden was next to the planetarium; we decided to start there. It's always such a pleasure visiting a butterfly garden and this one was no different. Tyler got up close to a few and put his arms out in hopes one might land on him.

There was still a lot of time afteron visiting the butterfly garden, so we stayed in the area and walked through the conservation gardens filled with local wildflowers. The flowers were beautiful. Then we noticed an outdoor show taking place and decided to watch the remainder of it. The guide was showing everyone a Mexican snake. After the show, we went into the solar house, where Tyler tried to generate enough power to light up some light bulbs. He really liked that.

Finally it was time to see the planetarium show. Unfortunately, I didn't get any photos because no photography was allowed, but the show was amazing. Tyler kept saying how cool it was throughout the entire show. He loves learning about our solar system and this show was very educational for him.

After the show, we headed back outside to walk through the wildlife section. All the animals featured can be found somewhere in Virginia. We saw foxes, possums, deer, coyotes, and bobcats. It reminded of our wildlife park in Cape Breton. We also saw lots of reptiles and different types of birds.

We then went back inside where we saw many more exhibits that included an aquarium, night creatures, caves, cypress swamp, skeletons of wildlife, and several discovery centers where you were able to have a hands-on experience. Tyler liked touching a live starfish.

Then came Tyler's favorite part of the whole visit. Each month the museum has special exhibits. This month was a very cool butterfly maze. It was a fun way to learn about the life cycle of a butterfly. In this photo, Tyler is in the web of Nanny the Spider. Luckily for Tyler he didn't get stuck and freed his way out before he became Nanny Spider's lunch.

Before we made completed our visit to the living museum, we browsed through their gift shop.They had some really cute items, including this long rattlesnake that we bought for Tyler. I think we named him 'Rocky' though Tyler isn't awake to confirm that. LOL

What a lovely afternoon we had. It was just so great getting out and seeing something that was new to all of us. The exhibits were fantastic and very educational. It's always good to learn more about the area we live in. We are so glad we decided to visit the museum today.