Mold-A-Rama baby!

When I was a little girl, we would go to Salt Lake City's Hogle Zoo. Around the zoo were these plastic mold machines, and by the monkey house you could get a monkey or a gorilla, by the big cats you could get a tiger or a lion. You get the idea. And so we would get to have one. A little sidenote: I have a thing for smells. Good smells, bad smells. I'm sensitive. So that being said, I could smell these things the minute we got off the bottom step in the hall they were in at the Field Museum. I *love* the smell these things emit. It is not something one can describe. Suffice it to say, it makes me happy and reminds me of my childhood. So of course I said they could get one. I ran out of time the first time we went, so we made it a priority.

So you put in your money.

Then hot plastic gets shot into this metal mold. (Smells soooo good!)

 
Then a bright plastic animal emerges (in our case a dinosaur).




Then that little spatula thing comes at it and pushes it off into the drop where you can reach in and grab it. Careful! It will burn you. (Last time I noticed at the zoo they didn't have these machines anywhere any more. I was sad. I suspect they got sued. )
 
 
Then you just hold it upside down for a bit and let it cool. (Didn't take long for us. It was snowing outside and we left right after this. :) )



I wish I could get in their heads sometimes. Doesn't she look baffled? Lost? Something? Give me and adjective here. 

4 comments:

Helena said...

I remember those at the L.A. zoo when I was little! (I don't remember the smell, but I imagine it would come back if I smelled it again.)

Marlene said...

She's saying: Now what the heck am I supposed to DO with this thing!?!"
Funny thing about smells and memories....I can smell the smell sitting here at my computer miles and miles ( and years and years) away from it! And I remember all the stepped on, broken critters I'd find weeks and sometimes years later! Such fun memories! But they only cost 50 cents then!
And I love the shot with the snowflakes! That is awesome! I love snow - at someone elses house!

Unknown said...

hmmm...how about nuts. As in... "My mother is nuts, why did she think we wanted these weird knick-knacks?"

Heidi said...

LOL Katie! They asked for them. Good grief you were there the first time! Can you imagine the begging that went on the second go-round! :)