A Children-Friendly Car Museum

My friend Nina told me a fun story about spending time with her daughter’s family, helping them get ready to move.

 

I just returned home from a last trip to Phoenix.  I won’t miss the stressful 2 hour trip up there but I’m sure going to miss the little guys.

 

I helped my daughter take another load to donations.  “I feel like such a bad mom, taking all these toys…but we won’t have room in CO,” she told me.  I assured her she wasn’t a bad mom, the boys had outgrown the toddler riding toys and the plastic toy BBQ grill, unused Tonka trucks and more.  “Think of how thrilled some mom is going to be, someone on a tight budget who would love a tricycle for their little one, finding a great deal on this one.”  

 

We took a break to go to the Martin Auto Museum and Event Center in Glendale, a suburb of Phoenix.  Remy and Elden (five and three years old) could not stop talking about this wonderful place. And I am not a car person, but why not?

 

Oh my goodness they had so many vehicles and even better, they let people sit in a lot of them.  A 60s convertible?  I slid across the front bench, remembering back to my childhood, a world without seatbelts and safety features.  I ran my hand over the rounded curves of a car from the 1940s and wondered how this one managed to avoid the junkyard and be lovingly restored.

 

Remy sat forever in a gull winged BMW sports car telling me, “Grandma, this one is the best! The seats are so comfortable.”  

 

Then we came across a long skinny racecar, close to the ground.  The staff said, “Oh if the kids want to sit in this we can move the steering wheel!” And into the little seat climbed Remy, and he just fit, peering down the long long nose to the two little wheels 8’ away.  

 

The man said, “This racecar is for straight racing for kids ages 5-17.  Its top speed is 85 miles an hour.”

 

The world is more curious than I imagined.  Who lets a 5 year old drag race?  Not this grandma! The car museum helper said that usually racing runs in families and the kids start pretty young.

 

Who knew? But we went from car to car to car.  And there was even a curious bicycle made by John Deere, the front wheel replaced by the rotating blades of a hand lawn mower.  How hard would it be to peddle back and forth on the lawn to mow it, I wonder?