Voting for the Best Museums and Art Destinations

US Today is asking the public to vote for the Readers' Choice 10 Best across a series of travel-related categories. I'm never shy about sharing my opinion and I have strong ones when it comes to travel. So I thought I'd share my thoughts with not only US Today, but with you, my readers. The categories currently open for voting fall under the headings of Alaska, Art, and Museums. Voting is open until February 9 (Museums) and February 16 (Alaska and Art). You can vote once per day. 

I've been to Alaska, of course, but I haven't been to enough places on the lists to have an informed vote. So I'm not going to be discussing those here. It's a totally different story when it comes to Art and Museums. Art + Museums + Travel? That pretty much defines who I am! I don't know that I'm an expert, but I'm pretty close. 

I'm going to start with museums. I love museums and I have visited a lot of them. I know what separates the best museums from the rest. There are 10 categories up for voting; for each, I thought about what museum I would name as the winner before I looked at the nominees. In every case, my winner was among the top 20. Incidentally, the images below are not links - they're screenshots of my votes. To vote, go to Museums.

Best Children's Museum

No question, it's the Strong National Museum of Play. It is my all-time favorite museum. And unlike many other children's museums, it's a teenager and adult museum as well. No other museum comes close in this category. 

Best Free Museum

There are some really strong museums in this category, but there's no question to me that the best free museum in the US is the National Museum of American History. I've been there 4 times, but not since I've been blogging. I'm overdue to visit!

Best History Museum

The National Museum of American History isn't a nominee in this category, but a lot of really strong museums are. I really agonized over this one. If I were choosing the one I enjoyed the most, it would be Mill City Museum, but for overall best, I'm going with the Legacy Museum. It is incredibly powerful and important. 

Best Maritime Museum

The National Museum of the Great Lakes exceeded my expectations in every way. I'm not usually all that interested in maritime museums because they all start to feel the same to me, but this one was totally unique. I loved all the hands-on elements.  

Best Music Museum

I've written a whole post about my favorite music museums! There are so many great ones, but the National Museum of African American Music is my top choice. 

Best Open Air Museum

It's been 25 years since I've been there, but Colonial Williamsburg gets my vote for the Best Open Air Museum. It's enormous and immersive and a really cool place to visit. 

Best Pop Culture Museum

I wanted to vote for The Strong again because it is my favorite museum and packed with tons of pop culture in the form of toys and games, but I decided instead to vote for the Museum of Pop Culture since it covers a broader swath of pop culture. 

Best Science Museum

I'm going to have to go with the Exploratorium for Best Science Museum. It was the first museum I loved as a child. It was a magical place and I have so many fond memories of visiting there. It's in a new location now, covering nine acres, with three times the exhibit space than when I was a kid. I have been twice since I started blogging, but not since I started blogging about travel destinations, so sadly I don't have a link to a visit. 

There are two categories remaining: Best Planetarium and Best Small Town Museum. I don't feel like I've been to enough of the nominees in either category to vote. 

Time to move on to the Art categories. I voted in four of the six categories. I skipped Best Art District and Best Immersive Art Experience, again because I wasn't familiar with enough of the nominees. As for the rest, let's take a look. 

Best Art Museum

I've been to a lot of art museums, but one that stands out to me above the rest is the Joslyn. This is probably a controversial opinion, because it isn't the largest art museum nor the one with the most significant holdings. It stands out because it is free, in an unexpected location (Omaha), in a stunning building with beautiful grounds, and offers great hands-on activities for kids.  

Best City for Street Art

I love how many cities are embracing street art. It's becoming more and more common, which is fantastic. I voted for Denver as the best city for Street Art. 

Best Sculpture Park

I highly recommend a visit to Grounds for Sculpture. It's the best sculpture park I've visited. 

Best Small Town Arts Scene

Healdsburg is an art-lover's paradise. There are so many galleries surrounding the town square. It's an adorable town. Not to mention, it's home to the largest moss wall in the US!

I can't wait to see which museums and art destinations get the top spots! 

Year of the Horse Craft for Chinese New Year

February 17 marks the start of the Year of the Horse. This stylized horse is a fun project for kids to do to celebrate Chinese New Year. Affiliate links below.

Year of the Horse Craft

Materials: 

• chipboard
• binder clips
• scissors
• Folk Art paint
• gold Sharpie

Steps: 

Draw or print a pattern of a horse head. I found a stylized horse on PicMonkey that I really liked, so I printed it at the size I wanted. 

I used binder clips to attach the pattern to the chipboard, then cut out the horse.  

I used the pattern to help with where to put the eyes and nose, using the gold Sharpie. Then I outlined the shape. 

Finally, I used the Sharpie to doodle lines, dots, and flowers onto the horse. Obviously, you can use whatever patterns or designs you want. 

Rookie move - I didn't work from right to left and dragged my hand through the wet ink. Argh. Not a big deal though. Did you ever notice the smears in the final project? 

This horse was a lot of fun to make. I love how it coordinates with last year's snake. If you're looking for other Chinese New Year crafts, you can find a few on my Winter Crafts page. I'll be adding more ideas soon!

Clothespin Horse

Last week, I shared a standing horse craft, perfect for tweens and teens who are horse lovers or who live in one of the 17 states that have named a horse as one of their state symbols. Today I'm sharing a much easier version, better suited for younger fans of equines who need a simpler project. Affiliate links below. 

Clothespin Horse

Materials:

• lightweight chipboard
• scissors
• 2 clothespins
• Folk Art paint
• Sharpie

Steps: 

Use a pencil to draw a rough outline of a horse's head (including ears), body, and tail on the chipboard. Make sure the size of your drawing is proportionate with the clothespins, since they will be the legs. Cut outside of your lines to get a rough shape. Put the clothespins in place. 

Now it's time to make modifications. I trimmed down the nose and belly of my horse. I also removed the mane. 

When you are satisfied, paint the chipboard and the clothespins. I chose brown, but obviously horses come in other colors. 

When the paint is completely dry, add an eye, nostril, and ear definition using the Sharpie. Draw in the mane. I opted the snip slits into the tail to make it more hair-like, then colored it.  

Attach the clothespins and the horse is done!

You can use this same technique to make a bunch of different 4-legged animals. Give it a try!

Bunny Binkies

There are many joys to having house rabbits, but one of the most fun is seeing binkies. A binky is a happy dance that a rabbit does, a high, twisting leap often featuring leg kicks. Rabbits binky when they are feeling playful and full of joy. Rabbits who binky are healthy and feel safe in their environment. 

I get to see bunny binkies often, but they're really difficult to catch on camera since I never know when they're coming.... with one exception. When I clean the bunny area each week and move everything out of the way to vacuum, Tulip and Brayden are almost guaranteed to binky like crazy on the empty carpet. 

This week, I pulled out my phone and recorded video. I got four minutes' worth of bunny antics, which Steve cut down to just under a minute of binkies. Sorry for the vertical video - I wasn't thinking. Enjoy the binkies!

Trying a Cookie Kit from 'Because Carbs'

I love decorating cookies. I've taken two in-person beginner classes, used a commercial kit from the grocery store, and tried two at-home kits from Color My Cookie and one from Baketini. I loved it all. Neither Color My Cookie nor Baketini are in business anymore, so I was thrilled to find a local cookie artist who sells (and hand-delivers!) cookie kits. Alli of Because Carbs has appeared on Christmas Cookie Challenge on the Food Network, so she's the real deal. 

 

Here's what came in the 6-cookie kit I ordered:

I like when kits have duplicate cookies so that I can do a practice cookie and then learn from my mistakes on the second one. I didn't allow enough time for the icing to crust over on my first donut or coffee cup, so I allowed a lot more drying time for my future cookies. 

One of the things that appealed to me most about this particular kit was that it would allow me to try a technique I'd never used: breaking the icing on the ice cream cookie using the back of the scribe tool. It also gave me the chance to practice making royal icing transfers. I played around with a lot of sizes of red hearts and even tried doing some swirled designs. 

Ready to see my finished cookies? In each picture, the first cookie I made is on the left. 

First up are the donuts. I didn't allow enough drying time for the tan on the first cookie, so the pink settled right into it. By letting the tan dry completely on the second cookie, the pink sits on top, just like it really would on a donut. 

Here are the ice cream cookies. 

And finally, the coffee cups. They were the most difficult by far. 

I had so much fun with this kit! And I'm happy to report that the cookies were delicious. I'll definitely be getting another kit from Because Carbs sometime in the near future.