Once again, The Austin Children's Museum has teamed up with event organizers to let your inner child (or actual child) get messy at this year's Maker Faire. After all, who appreciates making things more than the young at heart? ACM's Maker's Kids Area will feature parachute and kite making, free form woodworking, Lego robots, and hands-on chemistry experiments. The Texas Association of Minority Engineers will help kids make rubber band and mousetrap powered cars to test potential and kinetic energy. On Saturday, kid makers from all over Austin will be showing off their creations at the MakerKids Showcase. The inventive youth in our area have designed a remote controlled cooler, intricate paper ships, and an invention to make homework more fun. Architect and artist Scott Specht will be in the Maker Kids area to help build a Mega Model City at fair grounds. ...

Searching for a generator in Houston. Haunting photo-set of Ike-affected areas. After slight delay, FEMA has set up distribution spots in Houston. The state is running distribution centers in harder hit areas of Texas. Galveston says that current conditions are reaching a public health crisis. Some Galveston evacuees in Austin won't go back. AISD trying to figure how many student evacuees will enroll into classes here, even temporarily. Austin Children's Museum headed to Mueller....

The Austin Children's Museum is inviting kids to let loose their inner engineer this Sunday....

Photos of The Electric Gong display, part of the Play it by Ear exhibit, at the Austin Children's Museum on January 18, 2008. Photos courtesy of Steve Hopson. If you can't view the Flash slideshow above, an alternate version appears after the jump.......