Kaleidoscope

I have to give credit to the artist formerly known as Frau Lobster for reminding me that this existed. I mean, I knew about it, but she was the one that found out it's free and open every Saturday. You have to have tickets, but they just give them to you. I think they use the ticket system to track how many visitors they get and to avoid letting in more than capacity crowds.















When I was a kid and went to Kaleidoscope on a field trip, it was way different. White walls and floors, big open spaces. Very Science Fiction feeling as I recall, with brightly colored chairs at the craft tables and whatnot. Then, too, it seemed much, much bigger. I was smaller after all.



We were early, so we got to do some window shopping in Crown Center. Which, I have to say, is just a damned shopping mall but it proves that a shopping mall can be pretty cool if someone cares to design it well. The Crayola store is pretty awesome. And offers a certain amount of editorial opportunity: someone left this note about the Vols, and Mo sort of added a 5 to it.









We watched a dude making fudge. We saw a latte you could fall into. There were a bunch of dancer girls running around the place, apparently something called Jump was in town.









Anyway, when we finally got to go in at Kaleidoscope for our forty minute session, wow. As awesome as I remember it being, what I went to as a kiddo is shamed by comparison. All the sculptured decor, the colors, the fantastic furniture. It's just too cool.









They still have the same rotary die cutter for puzzles. Something Mo really gravitated to. She made about twenty of them. I made one. She wanted to help turn the wheel, which is fine when it's your puzzle. But she had to be dissuaded from helping turn the wheel with other kids' puzzles, too.