Child-friendly adventures in Los Angeles Area

• Eat a beignet and/or watch them decorate a birthday cake for you at the LA Farmers' Market. (It's not a FARMERS' farmers' market, not like the ones with lots of choices of affordable fruits and vegetables. But it's worth a trip.)
• Visit the Getty. (The children's tour is fun; the architecture tour is fantastic; the gardens are amazing; the art is ok too.)
• If you believe in evolution, or even if you don't, tour the La Brea Tar Pits
  Apparently, the phrase, "saber-toothed tiger" is no longer in vogue. It should, properly be called, a "saber-toothed cat". We heard a preacher on tv the other day talking about how all the dinosaurs and fossil animals lived in the Garden of Eden peacefully with Adam and Eve. No animals ate other animals. If God chose to give Tyrannosaurus Rex those big teeth, well, then that was what he chose to do. There's no proof, only theory that says that Tyrannosaurus Rex roamed the earth eating other animals that lived before man. "Yes," pipes up our 10 year old daughter. "And God put the fossilized remains of other animals in the stomachs of Tyrannosaurs too, right?" Not to mention those 9-inch long sabers of the saber-toothed cat. Which vegetables were those designed to eat? Coconut milk and pumpkins I'd guess. Please note that no dinosaur fossils are found at La Brea. (Sounds like folks there have just about had it with that question.)
• Take a guided tour of the fossil collection at the Natural History Museum of LA County. Then go back and walk through their amazing gem collection. (We avoid the stuffed animal dioramas like the plague, but some people really like them.) There is a fantastic butterfly pavillion (many real butterflies), usually there April to early September, we're told. A spider exhibit is coming in October. Sounds wonderful.
• Go listen to live music. It's free at the Getty or at the Fowler Museum at UCLA.
• Pay a visit to the Crafts And Folk Art Museum (CAFAM!) across from the La Brea Tar Pits. Their gift shop is remarkable. If the exhibits we've seen there are typical, then most exhibits they stage probably will be too. (They change frequently.)
• If you like New Jersey's diners, eat at the Galpin Ford Restaurant (and car dealership). But before you go in, remind the kids that you're not there to buy a car; only to look. (The food is good, plentiful, and not expensive, as food in LA goes anyway. (The restaurant is on the way to LAX. Probably not worth going out of your way for, now that gas costs over $3 a gallon.)
• See the bison (no, you're not supposed to call them buffaloes, although they don't tell you why) at the William S. Hart Ranch in Newhall. The guided tour of the house is interesting as well. (The guard seems to have special knowledge of and a zest for sharing information about the collection.) The petting zoo (no, you're not supposed to feed or pet the bison) there is downright depressing. There's a young reindeer who has worn his antler bloody by pressing against the fence. There's an annual cowboy poetry festival held there. Sounds interesting.
• Many folks we know really like Universal Studios and the Universal Studios walk. Guess it isn't our thing.
• Cook your own Korean Barbecue on your table in Koreatown. Dong II Jang has supervised parking.