Children's museums grow out, not up

— -- Museums for kids keep getting bigger and better.

The Brooklyn Children's Museum just reopened in a newly expanded, daffodil-yellow building that's about double its previous size. The museum in Crown Heights was closed for a year during the $80 million expansion.

Kids can play in a giant sandbox, get a bug's-eye view of a log, harvest toy vegetables in a garden and touch a 20-foot albino python.

Museum entrance will be free from 5 to 8 Friday nights, through Oct. 24. Special opening admission rates are $5 for adults and kids before Dec. 1; $7.50 a person after that. Information: 718-735-4400; brooklynkids.org.

Meanwhile, Philadelphia's Please Touch Museum opens renovated and enlarged quarters in Fairmount Park on Oct. 18. Young visitors can design their fantasy car, make and launch flying machines and build race boats. Admission is $15 for adults and children 1 and older. Information: 215-581-3181; pleasetouchmuseum.org.