LeMay Car Museum

We celebrated Daniel's 30th birthday at the end of February!

We purchased a Groupon awhile ago to the LeMay Car Museum in Tacoma. It was recently built and looked pretty fun. We had a busy morning so we were not able to get to the museum until almost 3 and it closed at 5. So we parked the car, got everyone out, put Dia in the carrier and went inside. Only to find out that the Groupon was for a different LeMay Car Museum! What?! We didn't even know there was another one! The admission to get in without the Groupon was a little steep so we walked back to the car, put everyone back in and drove 20 minutes to the other museum. By the time we got there we only had about an hour to walk around. It ended up not being enough time for Daniel to see all of the cars, but with kids it was perfect!

The entrance to the nice, new, non-groupon museum!

On our drive to the other museum, I got on the website and was reading the history on it. I think this one was actually cooler than the other one because it is old and has history! It was purchased in 1919 and used as a Military boy's school until 1975. Then it was used as a retirement home and convalescent center for the nuns until the late 1980's. After that it was sold. LeMay won the bid because he promised to reserve much of the property as it was!

When we walked in to the front desk area we were greeted by a lady with a familiar voice. After she said hello, she said we looked familiar. Turns out she babysat Addie over the summer when I was working at the Community College a few years ago! Such a small world! It was nice that she knew us though because then they were extra nice and didn't rush us even though we didn't have a lot of time.

So the first room we walked in to (pic. above) was the auditorium. The stage is even still there! We had a tour guide that gave us all kinds of information on the cars and the building.

Then we moved on to the pool area. The pool is under the flooring where Daniel and the kids are standing! In this area they even kept the original shower room (which had a cool pink car parked in it!). The kids liked this area because there were some really small cars, some wagons and boats!

Just their size.

After the pool area we moved on to another room. Here we saw lots of trucks. Daniel's favorites. The tour guide was explaining that this was where the boys would practice shooting! The gun racks were still there and he pointed out all the holes in the walls ans ceilings where the stray bullets went!

Of course Johnny and Addie had picked out their favorite cars. Johnny and a batman car.

Addie and a red high heel car. And Johnny with a creepy guy holding a gun.

I picked out a favorite too. I have no idea what this black car is but it was fancy! And I thought the gasoline sign was funny. How nice would it be if gas was only .33 cents!

By this point the kids were getting bored and there was still a whole other building to see! I sent Daniel off with the tour guide to look at more cars and the kids and I sat in the car.

The other building had rows and rows of cars!

After we left the museum we headed over to Red Robin for some birthday burgers! Yum!! I didn't get any pictures there though. I think Daniel had a good birthday and I am sure we will be visiting the car museum again when we have more time to look around.