Pensacola

Every year when we go to FL, we drive through Pensacola to get to my brother in law's and then always head East to Ft. Walton and Destin for eating and sight seeing.  This year we decided to do some things in Pensacola. 

This mural was on the outside of the museum.  It looks so real!

First we went to the Pensacola  Museum of Art.  It was very small, but the building was really neat.  It was once a jail and they had left the iron doors on some of the rooms and the steel staircase.  It was pretty cool.  The best part though, was that they had a borrowed exhibit from the Kohl Children's Museum of Chicago.  The artist, Chagall, was not one that I was familiar with and I would say his paintings are not a style that is my favorite, but this exhibit was so cool!  It was specifically for children!  All the paintings were down low and there was a hands on activity for each one of them.  There were a lot too!  The girls (and their parents) had a great time.  They had also recently received a collection of very old Chinese festival type hats.  They had no information posted about them yet, but they were beautiful. 

From there we walked to the Flordia State Museum.  It was amazing that most of the items there were from one man's collection. There were also some interesting displays that local students had made.  The third floor was a room made especially for children to play in.  There was  a pretend fort, mercantile, ship, etc.  Kate really enjoyed it and we had an interesting encounter with a three or four year old who had long hair but was dressed like a boy.  He or she kept yelling at us to get out and was "shooting" at us.  It was quite funny.  It was also very cool to see Kate's reaction.  Last year, she would have refused to play and probably would have insisted on being held and would have been truly scared.  Instead of being upset, she just laughed at him with us.  She has come such a long way!  Most days, she's like a totally different child. 

After the museum, we headed down to the pier to see this ship.  Kate was dying to go on it and just couldn't understand why we couldn't ask the men to let us on.  Notice the skies....this is when the weather started to change and tropical storm Lee began to make it's appearance.

After seeing the ship we took Poppy's recommendation and ate at Wintzel's Oyster House.  It was very good.  the original intent was for Callie to have crab legs, but all they had was a pricey "all you can eat deal".  She wasn't feeling well, so she chose a bowl of crab soup instead that was absolutely delicious!  Kate had ordered fish and cheese grits and was so in love with the cheese grits that she wanted my cheese grits and she gave me her fish.  When I asked the girls today what they would like to eat next week, Kate said "cheese grits."

We took a quick walk on the beach, knowing that it was quite possible that it would be our last chance.  Thankfully, it didn't rain for a couple of more days, but I've never seen skies look like this and not actually rain.  There was one red flag, so the beach wasn't closed, but the only people in the water were a few surfers.  They were fun to watch even if I do think they are nuts! ;)