Night at the Museum: A Sleepover Adventure at the American Museum of Natural History

You all know how much I LOVE wandering around museums, especially the amazing ones we have here in New York.  Well… when I found out that the American Museum of Natural History hosts a special “Night at the Museum Sleepover” a few times a year, I got super excited.  The sleepover is for kids ages 6-13 and requires an adult chaperone for each group of 3, so I was more than happy to chaperone 3 sweet and adventurous boys I know for the sleepover of a lifetime.

The evening started out with a free for all of the museum; almost every single exhibit was open and free range for the kids and chaperones, which was really awesome to explore in our pajamas without the throngs of tourists in our way 😉  Next was a special animal show in the theater featuring owls, falcons, alligators, enormous pythons, and more.  Then all the kids headed up to the dinosaur fossil rooms with their flashlights for a scavenger hunt, which was both super spooky and super awesome!  Most of the kids were still awake at this point, and at 10pm the IMAX theater showed the newest 3D release, “National Parks Adventure,” which was gorgeous and makes me want to visit even more parks this summer!  Finally, at 11:30pm, someone read Milan Trenc’s book, The Night at the Museum, which the famous movie franchise was based on.  Lights out was midnight, but I was finally able to doze off around 5am, exactly 2 hours before a museum guard so *kindly* woke us all up by turning on the lights and wishing us all a good morning on a megaphone.  It was so worth it, though.  I got to see the animals in the museum awake and walking around while everyone was asleep 😉