King Tut

Valentine's Day is rapidly approaching, and this of course brings to mind what we did last year to celebrate. Why, it's what anyone else would do for a romantic day out: go see King Tut!

This picture here is not of us in front of King Tut, it's an early picture of Madison in front of an Egyptian set for our series "The Quest." That was seriously only two months after we met her, so that would be (scratching head here)... September of 2008! It was an Indiana Jones-type of series that was a ton of fun, especially considering there was an Indiana Jones movie that came out that year (just a month before we left for China).

Anyway, back to King Tut. Believe it or not, King Tut was one of the reasons I set up this blog. It was last July that I remembered something: I completely forgot we went to go see King Tut! It is probable that Madison doesn't remember any of it, and add to that you couldn't take any pictures at the exhibit. BUT, it would be nice to know later on.

She can now say something like, "Yeah, I saw King Tut, but I was two years old. It was on Valentine's Day."

Valentine's Day '09 was a fun day, actually. I remember getting Madison the Baby Einstein set with the pyramid (the one with Quincy holding a harp). I wrapped Mommy's Valentine's Day presents up in bandages (like a Mummy) and placed them all in the sand.

This seemed like a good idea at the time, but sand has a tendency to not go away as quickly as one would like. Anyway, it was a nice Valentine's Day gift.

As for the exhibit itself in Atlanta, it was pretty big. We brought Madison along and were grateful that we could roll her around in a stroller. For one thing, there were these alarms that went off whenever anyone got too close to an exhibit. I imagine Madison would want to touch everything!

She did very well, and never made any fuss - just like her experience with the Terracotta Soldiers. Exhibit by exhibit would go by, and those of us who got headsets heard Harrison Ford (Indiana Jones again!) tell us all about each one. Christopher Lee (Count Dooku) narrated a movie at the end, which was 3D and pretty cool.

There was a huge crowd, but we still got to see everything, from the big gold sarcophagus to the jewelry to the smaller sarcophagi that contained all the pharaoh's inner bits. I had no idea. Where on earth did these Egyptians get the idea that you had to pull out all these inner organs and put each one in an individual sarcophagus? My guess is someone who sold sarcophagi!

Anyway, it was a good day, and Madison was very good all throughout. You saw Ramses II's face - the only face from the Bible that we know what looks like today. Of course, he probably looked a bit healthier back in the day...

We went back home and plugged in the Little Einstein adventure "The Legend of the Golden Pyramid," which now that I think of it, we haven't watched in a while. This one video started Madison's huge fascination with the Little Einsteins, so we of course went on to get her more of the DVDs as the year went by. Check out Leo on the cover, in that Indiana Jones hat!

ANYWAY, as you probably figured out by now, today was another "slow news day." Daddy went to work again, and we did a little shopping together after he got home. Madison had a lot of energy - she was jumping all over us today! As you would expect though, she fell asleep while drinking her milk. She plays hard!

Tomorrow will probably be a bit more exciting because we'll all have some more time together as a family - just the three of us: Madison, Daddy ...and Mummy!

"We opened the sarcophagi." -The Nightmare Before Christmas