Since we are planning on going to America next summer, we are saving up and not going on any European trips this year. But we still have 2 weeks of vacation from school every 6 to 8 weeks, and we need to find at least a few activities to do during that time. So, during fall vacation, I scheduled a trip to the Victorinox Museum, also known as the Swiss Army Knife Museum. It was so much fun and now I feel bad I didn’t know about it before to take all our visitors here. It is seriously so cool!
There is tons of history all about pocketknives in general, and then of course, the Swiss Army Knife. There were displays set up with some rather interesting knives, including the world’s smallest functioning pocketknife. 
There was also a time line of the development of the company, with different highlights mentioned. And the kids favorite part was the little mini theater.
Two people could sit in this chair and you close the curtain in front of you. Then you push a button, the chair spins around, and you are in front of a giant screen. There are about 6 different little films, in at least 4 different languages, of real life situations where people used their Swiss Army Knives to save the lives of themselves, or others. Fascinating, really, really interesting. An astronaut on the international space station used one to open the hatch so a docking space shuttle full of astronauts could unload. (The tool provided by NASA didn’t work…) Or the guy who got in a car accident, was suspended upside down by his seatbelt in a ditch, and the car was rapidly filling up with water. Used his knife to cut the seatbelt, since the release switch had been damaged in the crash, and then escaped out the window.
But the main reason we came was so that the kids could each assemble their very own knife. Yes, for a nominal fee, which is not much more than what normal knives cost in the store, you can build your own, under guidance of course. It comes with a specially engraved blade that tells everyone it was self-assembled and they engrave your name on it. 
Urs , the professional knife assembler, is giving the kids a basic overview of what they will be doing.
Noah got to build his first.
It takes about 15 minutes to build one knife, but the museum was so full of cool stuff to look at, the kids didn’t mind waiting around for each other one bit.
There was a picture tutorial to follow, in case you got lost, but Urs was also right there to show you what to do next.
When each knife was finished, Urs took the child over to the engraving computer and let them choose a font and type in whatever name they wanted. 
Then the machine scratched it into the side, Urs filled it with white paint, then carefully wiped off the excess and wrapped it all up in an official box. 
The kids use their knives for everything, and are so happy whenever they go on a school outing where they are allowed to bring them and use them. And there is never any confusion about who’s is who’s because they have their name on them.
Such a fun family outing. We can’t wait until the next visitors come so we can take them to get their own knives!