CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas — The first thing soon-to-be third-grader Vivian Rios does when a storm is approaching is grab her tablet.
"(I go to) the weather app," she said.
Vivian was in the audience for one of the 3NEWS meteorologists' three Q&A panels at Weather Fest at the Corpus Christi Museum of Science and History on Saturday in which people at the festival were encouraged to ask everything they've always wondered about the weather and meteorology.
Vivian, who home schools and says she would like to be a meteorologist when she grows up, was there with her mom and dad, Hector and Raquel.
Raquel said the family was most looking forward to seeing the experiments being done -- both 3NEWS meteorologists and the museum staff were doing demonstrations throughout the day -- and to seeing the "celebrities": Alan Holt, Carly Smith, Kristin Walla and Faith Colbert.
"I kinda watch weather news," Vivian said.
She got to speak with Meteorologists Faith Colbert and Carly Smith about how their love for the weather began at a young age, too.
"The whole purpose of coming here was because she loves weather, so when we heard that there was a Weather Fest, we were like, 'Let's go!' " Raquel said.
Curt and Sonia heard about Weather Fest by watching First Edition.
"We saw the Weather Fest advertisements by Carly and we said, 'Yeah let's go out to the museum,'" Curt said.
The couple who also act as foster parents said the museum is one of their favorite places.
"We get to see the demonstrations -- we hadn't been to the museum for a while," Curt said.
When Nolan and Faith Trevino realized 3NEWS was putting on Saturday's event at the museum, for them, the morning planned itself. They loaded up their son Levi and his friend Nadiaa and headed down.
"When we found out you guys where coming here we were like, 'Our two favorite things,'" Nolan said.
Weather Fest may have brought them to Saturday's event, but they said the museum teaches them something new every time.
"We learned about the railroad systems from people who work here, you know in full dress from the 1800s," he said. "I learned way more about Corpus Christi railroads than in school."
The museum's permanent exhibits were available to Weather Fest visitors as well as special weather-focused programs.
The 3NEWS Weather Team brought tools to demonstrate what they do and study every day. The green screen showed kids how maps are projected behind them on TV, and kids were able to create a "tornado in a bottle" by shaking up two 2-liter bottles with water, glitter and food dye.
Meteorologist Kristin Walla demonstrated how clouds form with a small-scale experiment using a mason jar, hot water, ice and hairspray, and Meteorologist Carly Smith and Chief Meteorologist Alan Holt gave a presentation on how they come up with their daily forecasts.