Let the family fun begin!

I had a rare day off on Friday. I don't take a whole lot of days off, and it's even rarer that both families I sit for have their kids gone on the same day and I have a furlough day so to speak. Anyway, we were planning to spend the weekend in the Dells with our friends the Lemms anyway, and had already planned to spend Friday night at my mom's to better facilitate the trip on Saturday, so the long and short of it is that Steve took Friday off to spend with us as a family. We talked about a few different activities, but when we realized that the day was due to be beautiful, we decided on the zoo.

Of course Thursday was the most beautiful day of last week with temperatures near 80 and loads of sun, so I didn't spend as much time preparing for the trip (and for leaving the house in some sort of acceptable state for our wonderful dog sitter) as I should have. As a result, my plans to have the car packed and ready to go for Friday morning didn't exactly work out. In the past, having a bunch (9 million) things to do and knowing that I wanted us out of the house by 9:30 would have thrown me into a tizzy and although we'd probably have left on time, I would have been stressed and probably crabby and maybe even snippy. Instead, we spent an extra hour and a half finishing up what we needed to get done and packing a lunch (which I did to be frugal but which turned out to be integral to the success of the rest of the day) and leaving with sanity and good mood intact. We wanted to stop at REI on the way and treat the kids to some water bottles they'd spotted when we went to buy our tent (big family camping outing coming up in June) recently. By the time we made it to REI both kids had fallen asleep (and subsequently woken up) and it was almost noon. Not a good combo. But if you've happened to have packed a lunch for the zoo, then you could get that right out and feed the kids in the car while your wonderful husband runs in to get the bottles. Then you have a sane husband (for not having had to drag the crabtastic kids into the store) and cheerful children as well. Double bonus. AND you don't have to stop to eat first thing when you arrive at the zoo. Chalk another one up in our favor.

We hadn't told the kids where we were going, but they both recognized the zoo entrance and were really excited (although it wasn't clear if Colby was more excited about seeing the zoo or seeing lots of buses...). We examined the flamingos at length and talked about how their knees bend opposite of ours, why they are pink, and how silly they look standing on one leg with their long necks bent backward and their heads on their backs. We toured the aviary and Kailin fell in love with the Kookaburra (and asked me to take a picture of it so that she can put it up near her bed). We made the day into a "yes day" and said yes when the kids wanted to ride on the "foot jiggler" and said yes to feeding the goats (although we later saw that the goat yard was closed), and yes to riding the train AND the carousel (IF they behaved - more on that later), and we'd already discussed getting them ice cream in the dairy complex. These family days are rare and will be rarer still come next fall when Kailin is in school M-F, so we do what we can to really enjoy them. We finally made it to the dairy complex (it's at the end of our normal route) and the kids got to see a cow being milked for the first time. Kailin was really intrigued. Colby was really not. He was far more interested in going to play in the play area. We managed both, and then trooped the kids off for ice cream. They have about 18 different flavors. Kailin was really taken with the rainbow sherbet, but chose chocolate with peanut butter cups in the end. Colby immediately chose blue moon and stuck with it.

They both enjoyed their ice cream and then it was off to ride the carousel and the train before we headed off to Nai Nai's for the night. Literally as we rounded the corner to the carousel they shut off the lights and put out the closed sign. A quick look across to the train station showed that it, too, was closed. Kailin wasn't being a brat - she was truly heartbroken and tears just streamed down her little face. It broke my heart that she was so sad and there was nothing at all I could do about it. Thankfully, she perked up when we told her we'd pay a visit to the gift shop. Although it could've been just a few degrees warmer and maybe less windy, it was a near perfect day at the zoo and full of fond memories. I was proud of both of my kids for being well behaved and very glad that we were able to get out and have some fun together.