Saturday At The Zoo

As I said in my previous post, I have quite a few zoo pics so here they are.


David and the boys walked on in to the zoo to play on the rocks while I bought some rye crackers for the animals. One of the zoo keepers had an animal whose name I can't remember on a leash for people to see. Once I joined the fam the boys were off and running to the new wetlands exhibits - one of our new favorite places to be.

You gotta love scattering the waterfowl.

As we walked through the zoo these birds were walking along too. The boys wanted a closer look so they followed them for a little ways.

The turtles are always a big hit. We've read Dr. Suess's ABC's so many times that we really think they need a tuttle tuttle tree, if there were such a thing.

At this point in our journey through the zoo Benjamin and I needed to make a trip out to the van for a clean pull-up. (He is making good progress toward being in big boy underwear all the time but not quite ready to make big trips in them just yet.) I left the camera with Dad and he took this pic of Nathan...

and this video. Nathan is explaining that he is a bear and this is his habitat. (at leath that is what he was doing until he got distracted by a stick.) I'm not sure how many four-year-olds use the word 'habitat' but Nathan has watched enough Diego and Planet Earth that it is a regular part of his vocabulary.

The black bear was reaching through his fence to get crackers people would throw to him. The boys were in awe of his huge claws. I have to admit they were pretty impressive.

Here's my little monkey outside the Angolan Colobus cage.

Nathan and Benjamin both enjoyed climbing around on the roots of this big old tree.

We tried to get them to sit together for a quick photo opp but they were much too busy climbing around. David did get pics of them sitting one at a time - that's close enough.

When I was Nathan's age this little observatory deck was a great place to watch the seals swim around. Ah, those were the days. Now there are Angolan Colobus monkeys to look at. I guess they're pretty cool to watch too.

Just wandering around - sort of moseying over to the ducks.

Feeding the ducks and geese and fish and turtle is always a hit with the boys.

Ride 'em Benjamin!

Another zoo keeper had this kester to show people. He was a pretty kean looking bird.

This third kid in a maroon shirt and denim shirts feeding the giraffes looked like he belonged with us since he matched.

More wandering around.

My new camera has an aquarium setting that David tried out. I really like these pics of the boys inside the aquarium area - I would never have been able to take them with my old camera.

Here they are with the mere cat....

and here's Nathan checking out a snake. I like his faint reflection in the glass.

We're loving our zoo membership. The boys are at the perfect age to enjoy running around the zoo (no more pushing a double stroller or pulling a wagon) and our zoo is the perfect size to enjoy in just a couple of hours. We're looking forward to many happy returns.

Zoo School

This past Thursday the boys and I went to what we call "Zoo School." On the third Thursday of each month (except for the summer months due to camps) there is a class offered for preschool kids in the Education Center at the zoo where they get to learn about a certain animal. This month it was all about monkeys. I don't know how I had never heard of this before - I guess I'm out of the loop somehow - but I was very glad to learn about it on Amy's blog. I wish I'd known about the class in April because the boys would have loved to learn about turtles. Oh well.

Here are the boys outside of the Education Center. The classrooms have these huge windows on one wall that overlook Nelson Lake. The boys watched the ducks outside while we waited for the class to start.

This is one of the zookeepers, Ms. Joy, reading a book about monkeys and apes.

The boys got to use markers and googly eyes to decorate their own wooden cut-out monkeys.

Benjamin liked the black spider monkeys in the book Joy read and Nathan liked the orange faced monkeys so that's how they colored their monkeys.

Once everyone had completed their monkey masterpieces the kids got to sing the "Five Little Monkeys Jumping On The Bed" song and jump around with them.

There was just too much fun energetic jumping going on not to catch a little of it on video.

After singing and jumping we all made our way to the spider monkey's cage to learn more about them. We saw that they do not have thumbs, their tail has skin on the end of it to help grip like another finger, and they love to munch on the bamboo outside their cage. We went back in the area behind the gate to listen to Joy without being in the other zoo visitors' way.

We stopped and looked at the wetlands exhibit on our way out.

We also played on the rocks since we didn't get to do that yet either.

A Trip To The Zoo

Yesterday morning we made a trip to the zoo with my parents. As always it was great fun.

Here are the boys all ready to go.

We paused at these rocks for a minute on our way in. The boys enjoy running around and climbing on them... and of course sitting by Poppo.

Soon we were headed into the zoo and Nathan and Poppo were off in a flash while...

Grandma and Benjamin and I were bringing up the rear. David was somewhere in the middle taking pics (and I'm so glad he was - it's very blog worthy in my opinion).

I made sure I had a good hold on my wiggly Benjamin who kept trying to lean over to get a better look at the turtles.

Being able to feed the giraffes is one of the best things about our zoo. I've been feeding giraffes here since I was the boys age - long, long ago. It's so fun to share that experience with my sons now.

David even got some video of the feeding. It's great as long as you're not bothered by giraffe slobber.

My dad got plenty of exercise (as did David and I) picking up and setting down his grandsons so they could see the exhibits better. Here he's got Benjamin...

and then Nathan. They're looking at the hyenas I believe.

I don't normally put in pics of the animals in my posts about our trips to the zoo (I figure you can go see the animals for yourself plus it might make the post a too long - HA! - like I'm worried about that!) but I really like this shot David caught of this bird.
In the same area as the bird pictured above were these other smaller birds.

As we were watching the smaller birds and feeding them bits of our crackers, one of them puffed up and shook his feathers. The boys thought that looked really funny and tried to imitate it, Their replay was really REALLY funny.

As we headed off, Nathan was a nice big bro and pulled Benjamin along in the wagon.

Before too long though Benjamin had bailed out and everyone was running along ahead of Poppo and the rest of us.

I like this video because it shows just how much Benjamin walks like my dad. I think that's pretty neat. My dad walks just like his dad, my Poppop who passed away when I was five. That walk is definitely a generational thing.

Nathan and I had a nice stroll through the butterfly garden even though there weren't any butterflies around.

The boys tried to climb up on the caterpillar but were still a bit small to make it by themselves and they did not want any help so this was as close as they got to sitting on it this time around.

Benjamin did have a nice chat with the caterpillar before leaving though.

Our next stop was the duck/geese/fish feeding area which was another one of my childhood favorites.

David got some video of this as well.

I had a great idea that we could take a nice family shot with the lake behind us and everything. Well, that was only good in theory. In reality neither boy was too keen on the idea therefore this was as good as it got. Nathan stopped and watched the lion who was actually sitting up for a moment.

Poppo has a good hold on Benjamin here as he looks at the buffaloes. I like the giraffe over Benjamin's left shoulder

The boys also checked out the jaguars...

and the black bear...

and the monkeys.
I like the perspective on this pic as Benjamin looks down the stairs as Grandma and me.

Now here's both of my little cuties heading down the stairs.

I also like the indoor bird sanctuary area, which was added after my childhood years. There are so many different species of cute little birds flying around in there. The snake house was getting crowded so I didn't tarry long in there. Instead I headed out to this bench with the wagon. Grandma and Benjamin soon joined me.

We stopped at Fort Imagination for a little while after our zoo adventure so that will be the topic of my next post.