08/13/2026
Today’s adventure took us wandering through the Orlando Museum of Art, and this was definitely not a boring walk around looking at paintings.
Every room was basically, “Okay… what are we going to find NEXT?”
There were giant paintings, tiny treasures, photography, sculptures, yarn, paracord, colorful installations, strange creatures, ancient artifacts and, yes, even statues casually hanging out with body parts.
Everyone ended up finding something completely different that they loved.
Ian’s favorite was absolutely the pink room.
Pink carpet? Check.
Cool patterned walls? Check.
Statues sitting around holding random body parts? ALSO CHECK.
It was weird, slightly creepy and completely fascinating. We definitely spent some time trying to figure out exactly what was going on in there.
Aaron’s favorite was much smaller and much shinier: THE GOLD FROG.
The little Botanical Frog Bead is actually from the Moche culture of Peru and dates all the way back to around 700 to 1000 CE. It is a hollow gold frog with a manioc plant on its back and was probably once part of a necklace. The museum even says the necklace may have included several identical little gold frogs.
More than 1,000 years old and about a gazillion times smaller than most of the artwork around it, and THAT was the thing Aaron found most interesting.
Honestly, good choice.
Mommy's happy place was all the black and white paintings and photographs.
While everyone else was being distracted by giant colorful installations and strange sculptures, she could have happily wandered through the black and white pieces forever. There is something about taking away the color that makes you notice all the little details you might otherwise miss.
And then there was Sissy's favorite: ALL THE STRING THINGS.
Yarn, paracord, fiber, woven pieces, hanging pieces, knotted pieces. If someone figured out how to turn string into art, Sissy wanted to see it.
Some of the pieces were especially cool because from across the room they looked almost like paintings. Then you walked closer and realized the entire thing was created with layers of fiber and cord.
One of the most impressive was the huge textile portrait of a woman wearing a flowing red, white and blue dress. The closer we got, the more you could see how all those individual pieces of fiber came together to create the image.
We also found “Antigone’s Colors” by Titus Kaphar, showing a mother holding a child represented by a dark silhouette. That was one of the pieces that made us stop for a little longer and really look.
Then we walked into another gallery and it felt like somebody's imagination had exploded.
Fabric stretched from floor to ceiling. Giant colorful shapes covered the walls. Sculptures were everywhere. Lines ran across the floor. There was something to look at in every direction.
And just when you thought you had figured out what kind of museum you were visiting, you'd turn the corner and find a giant canvas that was basically one enormous field of color.
Naturally, this required standing in front of it and pretending we were extremely serious art critics.
The best part was realizing that all four of us walked through the exact same museum and somehow came away with completely different favorites.
Ian found the weird stuff.
Aaron found the tiny gold frog.
Mommy found the black and white art.
Sissy found ALL THE YARN.
And somewhere along the way we found ourselves stopping, pointing, laughing, asking questions and repeatedly saying some version of:
“Wait. What IS that?”
Which might actually be the perfect way to spend an afternoon at an art museum.
We didn't understand everything we saw.
We definitely didn't agree on our favorites.
But we looked.
We wondered.
We laughed.
And we had a pretty great little adventure doing it.
