Remember when I mentioned in this post that we’d discovered something entirely new to us over at the Discovery Science Center (DSC) in Santa Ana (CA)? Yeah, sorry, I meant to tell you about it way earlier than this, but turns out with summer ending and school starting – as well as football season – other things have been on my mind and therefore, on the blog instead.

So here’s the deal… I took T over to DSC at the end of August for a play date with one of his buddies who also has a membership (yes, we finally got a family membership here, and C loves it, too!). They raced a garbage truck (the formal name for that being the EcoChallenge Race to Recycle, by the way), launched a few rockets, ran around through the dinosaur exhibit outside, and hurled a few pucks (and had a few hurled at them) at The Science of Hockey exhibit (of course).

Then came the grocery store, AKA the EcoChallenge Discovery Market. Navigating this exhibit in a summer crowd is a huge hassle, let me tell you what, and if the kids didn’t love it so much I’d skip it completely (there, I said it). However, our journey through the fake store paid off big time once we hit the check-out line. You know, the check-out line where the kids enter a code to take a photo and it puts it up on the wall? Yeah, so they love that… a lot. But here’s what you might not already know about the check-out line, RMT’ers…

YOUR KIDS CAN TAKE PICTURES OF THEMSELVES OVER AND OVER AGAIN USING THE SAME CODE! Yes, as long as you remember the three-digit code you get when first checking out from your shopping trip (and thankfully I’m good with numbers), the kids can simply go back into the check-stand area, enter that code again at any of the terminals, and take another picture… and another, and another, and another! Turns out that from our experience anyway, codes are not used and discarded once but are good for at least the next whole half-hour or so for some repetitive photographic fun!

We preferred the check-stand near the front windows as it had benches and lovely natural light. My friend and I could just sit and watch the kids run back and forth taking photo after photo as they checked themselves out on the television monitors on the wall right there past the store area. And I have to say, we moms got a great break as the kids ran themselves silly doing this activity for a solid half-hour! Happiness.

So next time you’re at the Discovery Science Center, RMT’ers, make sure the kids are ready for their close-ups and then hunker down and enjoy the show. Cheese!