Magic Tree House & Museum Musings

Over the past year, I have read about thirteen Magic Tree House books to the boys (and Satchel read one to himself last week!), so we were very much looking forward to seeing the musical at the Orpheum last weekend. Even though we aren't CMOM (Children's Museum of Memphis) members anymore, I received an invite to their Magic Tree House party last Thursday. The actors playing Jack & Annie were going to be there and there was free food, so we decided to go.

We arrived about an hour into the festivities so I'm not sure what actually went on at the party. When we arrived, Satchel & Jiro peered at Jack & Annie from across the room and said, "Can we go play now?" I tried my best to convince them to at least go over and have their picture taken with the actors, but they were very busy pretending to be shy.

We hadn't been to the museum since International Paper's Tree House exhibit opened last year, so I was eager to see the other improvements Dick Hackett had made in our absence. Therefore, I agreed to skip the official festivities and follow the monkeys through the museum.

Noticeable changes:

The party room is now the Little Malco. It doesn't seem like there's a movie screen in there, but I could be wrong. (I believe it is still centered on stage performances.) The formerly new Quizno's Kids' Cafe was now an even newer Domino's Cafe, which I guess makes more sense. The bank was a shiny new Suntrust, and the old Kroger was gone. (A new Kroger opened up over by the dress up area.) The China exhibit was nice--very much like the Japan exhibit a few years prior minus the awesome Cat Bus. Oh there was also a new minivan and a nice new police car. (Jiro instinctively climbed in the back!) I'm pretty sure the whole place had new carpet. In general it seemed much cleaner and nicer than a few years ago. The kids' favorite part was still the sky scraper. As they climbed around I couldn't help but compare it to the City Museum. And then all of the happy thoughts I was having about CMOM dissipated. Suddenly it was one giant, boring corporate ad.

As we were leaving, I asked the monkeys what they liked better CMOM or the City Museum. Satchel immediately said, "The City Museum!" Surprisingly, Jiro cast his vote for CMOM. Huh? Wha? Then he explained: "It takes too long to get to the City Museum!" I thought about his statement for a minute and decided to just appreciate CMOM for what it is and be thankful that we have something rather than nothing. (BUT! I do have some exciting news about the City Museum as it relates to Memphis. I'll tell you next week!)

Let's fast forward to the show at the Orpheum. Even though the boys just glanced at the actors at CMOM, it left an impression. They were thrilled to point out that they had met the actors in real life. We had amazing box seats on the Mezzanine, thanks to the fact that I got our tickets during the Goner Auction for Anna Ives. I've never sat in their box seats. There's actually space between the seats and the seats themselves are cushier. I felt like royalty.

The show itself was really well done. It had a whole Camelot thing going on, and the monkeys were on the edge of their seats. At the intermission, Satchel looked over at me expectedly and exclaimed, "It can't end like that!"

I love watching Jiro clap at appropriate times. I don't know why, but it just makes me melt.

Warren fell asleep, but he always does that.

The best part though? Managing to get out of there without purchasing "Merlin's swords"/a.k.a. wannabe light sabers for $20 a pop.

We ended the evening with a trolley ride and a tour of my office.