Our Trip to the Museum of Science and AARGHYOUTWOSTOPTOUCHINGRIGHTNOW!!!

You know those days where you can't 'capture the moment' with your camera to save your life? Like when everyone's happy and having a good time, but for whatever reason, whenever you try to take a candid shot someone has one eye half closed, or people just look frumpy instead of jovial? Well, the day we went to the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago was not one of those days. I only took a handful of snapshots, which I present to you in all their unedited glory, but I do believe they capture the essence of the trip.

Here's the harbinger:
Granted, it's a decent snapshot of Yordanos in front of a wicked-cool mailbox, but what's important here is the question, "What is so interesting that would divert her from looking at the flippin' sweet mailbox?" The answer is, her brother, of course, who thought the R2D2 thing was pretty cool until he realized that Daddy and his sister were also enjoying it. He then noted the camera and marched off making sure that the proper tone would be set for the rest of the day. Had I really believed that he was never going to snap out of it, we probably wouldn't have even gotten out of the car.

But since we did, I got a bunch of shots like this:

Of Mr. GrumpyPants getting angrified by the mock in-flight movie in the mock airplane that's mocking him. Ahh, does this bring back memories...

MeanwhileYordanos enjoys hanging out in the car of tomorrow, today!

But when H tries, he can't seem to find anything to his liking in the future either.

So, long story short, the day pretty much went like this:
Except when it was going more like this:

Yes, I see how her elbows light up when you bend them backwards, now LET GO OF YOUR SISTER!!!

So, you know those days when you look back at the hand life dealt you and you say to yourself, "Why did I think dumping my aces would be a good idea?" Well, this day was full of them. We had a snack at 11:30 which is way too late, so by the time we stopped in the food court for lunch at 12:45, I had a full on hunger strike on my hands. "No food, No thank you," is all I got from the kid who looked at me after the snack and said, "Lunch, now yes?" Then Yordi wouldn't eat because she's empathetic like that. Now I knew they weren't starving, but I also knew that this was nature's way of saying we were done at the museum. I called Chris, who was at a meeting at the University of Chicago Children's Hospital six blocks away, and told her not to bother parking and to just pick us up at the front door. We were only there for 2+ hours but it wiped me out for the weekend.

Habtamu made an announcement while we were stuck in traffic on the way home that cleared up the question as to why today was the day to become Baron VonCranky. Perhaps if I had studied this last picture more closely when I took it, the whole situation could have been avoided.

So go ahead seasoned parents... can you spot the problem?
(Check the comments for a hint and the answer)

I go back and forth between telling myself, "Don't sweat it, I've only been doing this for 7 months, rookie errors are to be expected," and "Gah! Idiot! 7 months and I'm still forgetting the simple stuff!" As I eluded to earlier, it was just me and the kids, Chris was not there for this one so I chalk it up to the fact that if she were, we would have figured it out. I was spending so much energy trying not to rip his head off I missed the obvious. As a side note, keeping myself calm did pay off. As frustrating as it was, there was not a meltdown and I suspect if I had gotten very physical at all it would have decayed rapidly. Deep down I think he knew it too because he was generally still obedient amidst all the surliness. He even sat down and had a timeout with me (frankly, I needed one too after the thermal camera debacle) without argument.

The city makes both Chris and I cranky and tired. Hopefully this will be an isolated incident and that we haven't extended that family tradition to our children.