Mythbusters

My 5 year old is at the age where she no longer takes an afternoon nap unless she's very tired.  At the same time, getting through the day without a nap is sometimes difficult if there's a lot going on.  She can get cranky and whiny later in the day, especially when she's asked to help around the house.  Each afternoon my wife and I try to give her some quiet time where she plays by herself in her room, reads a few books, or watches 45 - 60 min of a children's movie.  Occasionally her Cool Science Dad (that's me!) let's her watch an episode of Mythbusters.  

If you haven't seen Mythbusters on the Discovery Channel, you should check it out.  It's a very cool science show.  I started watching it this spring and was immediately hooked.  Right now we have 27 episodes on the DVR.  The even cooler thing about this show is that my daughter loves to watch it too!  It melted my heart yesterday when at rest time she says "Daddy, can we watch a Mythbusters together?"  How could I possibly say no to that?  

The other awesome thing about my daughter and this show is that she cuddles up next to me when we watch it.  She doesn't do this with most children's movies, but for Mythbusters she always grabs a blanket, cuddles up next to me, and rests her head on my chest/shoulder.  What more could I possibly ask for?  Science combined with cuddle time with my daughter.  The perfect combo!  

The other thing I like about this show is the mixed gender cast.  It's important for me that my daughter sees other women participating in and excited about science.  Granted, the male to female ratio in this show is 4:1, but that's better than the no females you find in many science shows.  The female science person in Mythbusters is not there simply for eye candy.  She takes a very active role in building the experiments and discussing the science.  I hope that while watching Mythbusters my daughter notices this and it slowly builds in her that she can be anything she wants in the future and simply being a girl won't stop her.