Smithsonian.com

Faith Asleep (1923) by Harold Weston. Image courtesy of the American Art Museum.

You don’t have to be someone like Luca Brasi to sleep with the fishes anymore because the Resident Associates Program is offering sleepover parties in the Natural History Museum’s Sant Ocean Hall! That’s right kids, for $125 you and a chaperone can have an evening full of edutainment that kicks off with a screening of the IMAX film Wild Ocean 3D after which you’ll enjoy a scavenger hunt, arts and craft activities, a visit to the forensics lab and flashlight tours of the museum. After that, hunker down in the Ocean Hall and fall asleep to the sight of the 45-foot full scale model of Phoenix the Whale gracefully hovering above your head. (Tip: bring a well-padded sleeping bag—remember those floors are marble!) Check out the Resident Associates site for more details. And if you can’t make the March 6 sleepover date, worry not—this event is currently slated to repeat on April 24 and May 15.

Sadly, I doubt that any after-dark shenanigans on par with what you saw in last year’s Night at the Museum movie, but hey, it never hurts to let the imagination wander, right? By comparison, the events detailed in a book like From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler are much more plausible, but still improbable. So if you can’t make the sleepover, try taking in the aforementioned movie and book for some good museums-at-night fun.