Two posts in one day? Is that legal?

It's another trip to the zoo! We bought a membership when we went a couple of weeks ago, since it was exactly twice the cost of a single day's admission for our family to buy a whole year's membership. Therefore, we can now zoom off to the zoo whenever the mood strikes! The kids and I went on Friday and had a lovely time. We arrived early, stopped for a nice snack, and stayed a long time till a *very* late lunch.

















Henry loved these "big big fish" in the aquarium. On the right, you can see Lily and Gregory feeding the hoardes of ducks and geese at the pond outside the zoo. A kind man on a park bench there shared some pieces of bread with the kids, so that they could feed the birds. The same man also (in all seriousness, folks - he was NOT joking!) informed us that the ducks learn to talk when they spend enough time around people. He pointed out a particular bird and told us that it had just told him "Merry Christmas". *O-K*




















The Africa portion of the zoo has these nice bongos mounted along a walkway. The kids could probably be happy with a zoo trip that involved nothing more than getting to play the bongos uninterrupted for a couple hours. It is BIG FUN. Also ... silly, goofy mommy. I saw the sign about the bird called a Crested Screamer ... and as Henry had just been expressing his opinion about something in a typically toddlerish fashion, I spiked his sweaty hear into a "crest" and took his pictures with his namesake of the moment.




















Ah, the summertime zoo. The kids get to feed the budgies and ride the camel. This was Henry's first-ever camel ride, and he shrieked with joy and excitement THE ENTIRE TIME. It was way more than worth the cost of the camel ride tickets to hear him enjoying it that much. Not shown here is the stingray exhibit. You can touch and feed stingrays in a little shallow tank. The stingers are removed, so no scary or risky stuff ... just really interesting creatures, up close and personal. Gregory fed them, Lily touched them, and Henry talked to them a lot.