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This guest blog post was written by Max Hopkins with help from mom, Charity Counts, The Children's Museum's Associate VP of Exhibits.
Hi, I’m Max and I am the number 4 (4 years old). My momma works at The Children’s Museum of Indianapolis and has the coolest job ever. Sometimes she goes on trips for work and I miss her. Last weekend, she went to the Kid’s Choice Awards in California and Daddy and I finally got to go with her.
I was excited for the trip because I wanted to go to parties with the Ninja Turtles and SpongeBob. I was also a little bit scared because I had never been on an airplane before. I was worried that it would be too high for me and I am so small. Momma said that flying in airplanes is fun and it was!
I flew on 4 airplanes. On the first one, I met the pilot and he let me say "welcome aboard" to all of the people on the airplane with his microphone. It was awesome! Everyone on the plane laughed and gave me high fives.
I decided that flying was a great idea – I love riding in airplanes now! When we were up in the air, it felt like when Mr. Fantastic and Captain America go skydiving in the LEGO games I play at home. On the plane, I wore Turtle green shades and watched the Nickelodeon channel. I even saw a commercial for the Kid’s Choice Awards and someone got slimed.
I thought, “Will that happen to me?! Will everyone get slimed?”
When we arrived in California on Friday, a Nickelodeon Kid’s Choice Awards person greeted us and took us to our hotel where we lived during the weekend. The hotel was on the beach and it had a special game and snack room for kids like me.
But I didn't get to play right away because I had a party to go to. They called it The Big Bash. It was in a big, old airplane hangar. I saw a HUGE orange Nickelodeon blimp and car that looked like SpongeBob, went down a big slide, and danced, danced, danced to music. When I got tired, we rode a big bus back to our hotel. I never rode in a bus before. I liked it!
During breakfast on Saturday, I saw SpongeBob, Patrick Star, Dora, Paw Patrol pups, and (yes!) the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. I even saw my favorite Turtle - Raphael, the red one. He's so awesome. Even more awesome than my waffles with sprinkles!
After a short beach break, it was time to get ready for the big show. Kid’s Choice Awards staff painted a cool Raphael tattoo on my arm in red – my FAVORITE color. I wore a cool shirt and tie that I picked out. The shirt was green....not quite as green as slime!
I really hoped I wouldn't get slimed.
We were rooting for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (TMNT) to win the award for Best Cartoon. But SpongeBob won again! That's ok. I like SpongeBob too. Just not as much as I like TMNT! Momma said that she wishes they would have won too. Our whole family loves the Turtles.In the bus to the Awards, I got to watch funny episodes of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Mikey makes me laugh so much! We watched the one where he names the Shellraiser. Usually he's bad at naming things, but this time everyone was like "whoaaa." I heard Momma laugh out loud too.
At the Awards, I saw the guy who is Emmet's voice from The Lego Movie get pie all over himself. I wanted pie after that. I also saw the "Loco Legs" guy from The Fresh Beat Band.
But the best part of all was watching the whole stage turn to green when 5 Seconds of Summer rocked out on stage.
So much slime! But none of it got on me!
Momma said that she is happy that Nickelodeon still slimes people. It’s something she remembers from when she was little.
Did you see Adam Sandler spray slime on the Olaf guy? I’m so glad that wasn’t me!
It takes forever to clean up slime, by the way. Sometimes, they would start the show again even when the slime was being cleaned. We could see lots of crew members with brooms and rags ALL THE TIME, but those of you watching from home couldn't. Now we know why they move the guest presenters around to different areas!
I had a really great time on my family trip. I went to 3 parties. I didn’t get slime on me. I saw so many awesome people and things. Plus, I learned that the world is big and it has a lot of stuff. Like Indiana and Ohio. And California.
Thank you, Nickelodeon, for letting me and my family come and play. We’ll never forget it!
See Max's entire adventure in this Facebook Photo Album.
