I was there! I was there!
Sherrie and I just came home from a trip in Ohio, to see Dr. Phil speak :' ) and on the way home, took a pre-planned detour in Pittsburgh, at the Children's Museum to see the Sesame Street travelling exhibit.
It was so cute! I've read how "huge" it is, and it *is* pretty darn big, but unless you're a toddler, it's most definitely not "huge". The mini-sets were great. If you're a kid, life-size-feeling, for sure. The 123 brownstone steps (with the tops of Ernie and Bert's apartment window, to boot), Gina's daycare, a bus stop (not familiar with this), Big Bird's nest (!). Inanimate Muppets hanging out randomly throughout the exhibit. Ernie and Bert, Rosita, Big Bird, Zoe...
If you walk around and look carefully, you'll see a small writeup about each year, 1969 through 2000 (didn't notice beyond that). Both world and Sesame Street history.
The things that stood out most for me and Sherrie were...
...the original episode that ran over and over again in the "bus stop". We watched a lot of this; the re-ocurring "dots" thing was especially funny. Sherrie noted how much longer the sketches were.
...the complete curriculum binders you find sitting around in random places in the exhibit. Wow.
...the binder full of magazine/newspaper articles about the show.
A costumed Elmo happened to be visiting today, and it was funny to see some little girl follow him all around the museum.
The nicest surprise of all was to be in the main museum itself (the Sesame Street exhibit is in a separate building, being almost as large as the entire museum proper). On the third floor is a--permanent, it seems--exhibit on puppetry. There's a great section on Jim Henson and also Mr. Rogers, who's from Pittsburgh, I understand. It was nice to see Mr. Rogers and Sesame Street so closely associated, both in the main museum, and in the Sesame Street exhibit. In the exhibit, it was just some souvenirs, but it still felt good.
In the Jim Henson exhibit there are real--I think--Pigs In Space, although they both resemble the doctor character, not Hearthrob or Piggy. Also a real Skeksis (the bad one's--I think "Skeksis") puppet, and even some vegetable Muppets and Anything Muppets. Behind the same glass is a TV looping the fifteen minute making-of documentary you can find at the end of the Dark Crystal. On the other side of this small room (maybe 15x15) was a small puppeteering television setup. Pick some generic puppets, go behind a counter, and look in the television monitors behind the counter, and give your very own puppet show. Cute, but I felt too subconcious, as soon as a little girl walked in, I blushed and stopped :' )
Not to mention, it all cost us exactly ten bucks total! :' ) We were only there for two hours, but it was worth it! And beyond the Muppet stuff, the museum itself is perfect and cheap, if you happen to need to occupy your kids for a day.
(If I had hours more, I would have read everything in the articles binder. But alas.)
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