No matter if you’re 5 or 85, everybody loves ice cream—especially soft-serve. Los Angeles has a new crop of soft-serve shops combining the familiar with some exciting, new flavors and textures, not to mention some very snazzy looks. We decided to take a soft-serve tour of Los Angeles to compare old classics to what's new and trendy. Check out what a long way soft serve has come since we were kids.

Few things are more universal than cute panda videos. Even people who can resist the internet's most infectious silly cat videos melt in the face of an insanely cute panda bear rolling around hugging himself in a Facebook share. The California Science Center embraces this inescapable truth with a full-on bear hug. This past weekend the museum's IMAX theater debuted the movie Pandas, a nature documentary for the whole family. Imagine the cutest collection of baby panda clips ever made. Now imagine them in 3D on a screen seven stories tall. It's a level of cute few people can handle, but we all should try.

Attention social media mavens and budding Instagram stars, The Egg House, an interactive pop-up with a funky story has just opened on the Lower East Side. Photo-ops abound as you wind your way through the fantastical wonderland that is Ellis the Egg's fictional New York City pad.

It's part playground, part museum, part snackbar—all served with a healthy side of one of our favorite proteins...eggs.

Have a baby on the way? You may already be planning big adventures but haven't yet sorted out the sleep situation. Never fear—help is here. The Baby Box Company is now offering California parents a free parenting package that includes curated products and Baby Boxes, which offer little ones a safe place to sleep.

Family trips to the local farmers' market are the best. There's just nothing that quite compares to walking past stands stocked with colorful produce and local treasures and knowing that whatever you bring home is going to be fresh, seasonal, and bursting with flavor. It's also a great way to encourage healthy eating with your kids; I know mine loves to pick out fresh fruits and vegetables to bring home each week!

No matter where you live in the greater Houston area, there's a farmers' market nearby. The city is also home to several farms where you can pick your own produce! Now, what are you waiting for - check out these local gems.

Catch 'em before they disappear again! For the first time since 2012, an animatronic dinosaur exhibit will be on loan to the Franklin Park Zoo. Destination Dino will feature more than a dozen moving, roaring, life-sized dinos, on display from May 26 through December 3. It's like Dino Dan or Dana come to life...right here in Boston.

Kids ages 3 and up can fly like their favorite superheroes at iFLY, New Jersey's first indoor skydiving center. iFLY Paramus, which opened its Route 4 facility on March 30, a couple of weeks head of schedule, offers kids and grown-ups alike a chance to experience the sensation of skydiving—no plane or parachute required.

The City of Angels is all about highbrow food in casual, comfortable settings, and nowhere is that more evident than the food truck scene. LA's food trucks offer up every cuisine mash-up imaginable, and between the trucks' websites, Twitter, and Instagram, it's easy to track down your favorites. A truck at a festival can be a little culinary surprise, but there's also a thriving, family-friendly, deliciously casual scene that pops up at regular local gatherings like the Santa Monica Food truck lot, Abbot Kinney’s First Fridays, Natural History Museum First Fridays, and others. A bonus for us with food trucks is no worrying about the inevitable mess left behind by my little whirlwind, or trying to keep her butt in a high chair.

Here are the LA trucks I most enjoy tracking down with my tiny food critic.