Sue!

Today we made a trip down to the Sam Noble Museum of Natural History in Norman with Scott, Jess, James, Matt, Liz, Chad, and Lizzi.  One of the main purposes of the trip was to see Sue, the largest preserved Tyrannosaurus rex ever discovered.  Brianna and I had a blast, and it was especially fun for me to be able to tell her all the things about dinosaurs my own father told me at her age, as well as embellishing my lessons with more recent research.  I'm pretty sure Brianna believes me that birds really are dinosaurs, albeit smaller ones.  It was amazing to get to see Sue up close and personal, and I've always been really impressed with the exhibits and the "please touch" displays throughout the museum.  The only way to interest kids Brianna's age in the sciences is through hands-on learning, and the best way to cultivate the next generation of paleontologists is to let them handle bones and fossiles.  It was great to see Brianna stroking the snout of the replica of Sue's skull and to show her the serations on her teeth.

Brianna enjoyed the rest of the museum just as much, and really liked having a group of people to tour with.  She spent a lot of time attached to Liz or Jess, and I think it also impressed her to have our very own tour guide in former museum volunteer Matt.  I so cannot wait until I can afford to take her to DC to see all the dinosaurs Dad used to take me to visit at the Smithsonian.

I've posted the first small group of pictures from the expedition already, and will try to get the rest up tomorrow.

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