Cabrillo Aquarium and Fanfare Fountain

Cabrillo Marine Aquarium 
Basic Info

Cost: Free! There is a suggested donation of $5 for adults and $1 per child.

Hours: Tuesday through Friday - 12 noon to 5 pm
            Saturday and Sunday - 10 am to 5 pm
            Closed Mondays, Thanksgiving and Christmas

Our Review

The Cabrillo Aquarium makes a great family day trip. It is located in a quiet section of beach. Parking in easy to find and only $1 an hour.  We spent about 2 hours in the aquarium and exploration center. 
The exploration center is a great room with an opportunity for interaction and kid friendly exhibits. We spent most of our visit in this area. There was something to do for all of the kids from 2-8. The staff was very helpful and answered all of the questions the kids asked with great age appropriate explanations. My 2 year old had a great time with the puzzles and my 4 year old really enjoyed the dress up area! The main exhibit area of the aquarium has a nice variety of fish and other sea life. My kids favorites were the whale size comparison and the stuffed birds. We enjoyed the touch tank as well. There are nice clean bathrooms with a water fountain. 

Looking for a spot to eat lunch in the shade was a challenge. There are many picnic tables outside the aquarium and plenty of beach space but most was in the sun. There were also several large family groups all along the beach area and picnic areas. We decided to drive to the San Pedro Harbor part of the area. We ended up at the Fanfare Fountain. We found plenty of benches and enjoyed out lunch. We also got to enjoy the spectacular fountain water shows every 10 minutes. 



Fanfare Fountain at the Port of Los Angeles
Basic Info

Cost: Free!

Hours: During the Summer and Fall
            From 10 am to 10 pm the fountain plays one song every 30 minutes.
            At 12 pm it switches to every 10 minutes till 1 pm and then again from 8 pm to 9 pm

Our Review

This has to be one of the coolest musical fountains I have seen since it is also a splash pad! You can not go all the way into the fountain but you can lean all the way in and splash around. Plus the water shows shower lots of water on anyone in the splash zone! There are also wooden ledges for kids who just want to put their feet in. The fountain is not more then a foot deep in t the play areas. Also the fountain overflows and the kids really enjoyed running their hands through the cascades. We spent an hour in the fountain and could have stayed longer! 

Bottom Line

This was a really great combo trip. Each part was not a major adventure but worked really well together. The kids had a good time and we didn't get any complaints!

Colored Salt

Being a stay at home mom is a lot of fun for me. I am always trying out new activities to keep me stimulated creatively and as a side point to keep my kids entertained. Don't you know... I only buy my kids toys I would want to play with! Today's activity was colored salt. Really I would have liked it to be sand, but I used what I had on hand.

I started by dividing the salt into 3 bowls. I added a few drops of food coloring to each bowl. then mixed to get the color spread throughout.

 After I got all three colors - I chose red, yellow, and blue - I spread out a sheet, dumped out the sand toys, and let them at it. My 15 month old had a lot of fun with the shovels and dragging his fingers through it. My 3 year old had more fun scooping it up and letting it trickle off his shovel. They were very serious during this activity. I think the weird factor of playing with a sand like substance in the house threw them off. Either that or they had their thinking caps on.

After about 40 min the salt was all over the place but I brought out our handy dandy vacuum cleaner and that tidied things up real quick.  

Patterns and Colors

At 7:50 each morning my two big boys go off to school, leaving behind their two little brothers. It is then up to me to somehow fill the hours till 5pm when they are reunited.

Today's activity was Mega Blocks. A dear cousin to the Lego but much easier to build with for little hands. 

For my 1 year old this simply means working on his fine motor skills by building towers. For my 3 year old on the other hand I need to make it a little more interesting. Since we have been working on patterns, I thought this would be a good opportunity to practice with a visual aid. I designed this worksheet for him, and he really enjoyed it!

His job was to copy the pattern on the paper using the blocks. He did it in two ways. At first he put the blocks on the paper in a row to follow the pattern. 

After he grew comfortable with the idea, he began to build the towers and configurations separately.

All in all it was a great activity. He spent around 40 minutes figuring out the different patterns. We are definitely going to do it again! Especially on the rainy days to come.