Morning at the Zoo

Marc was gone all week for a business trip out to San Diego so I called on my Mom for company with the kids on Friday night, all day Saturday, and Sunday morning. I had Bunco with my neighborhood Moms Friday night (and after the last couple of days beforehand, I needed to get out)! My Mom came up after work on Friday and spent the night at our house Fridays night. Marc was excited that Grandma was having a sleepover at his house. :) We got up Saturday morning and went to the John Ball Zoo.
On Saturday the zoo was having a big Monarch butterfly "thing". They had butterflies that the kids could pet. Marc wasn't soo sure about it.....
On the other hand, after a little coaxing, Samantha really got into it. She actually very quickly reached out and grabbed one of the butterflies and bent its wing...oops!Throughout the zoo there were butterfly development stations where the kids got to learn the life cycle of the butterfly.At the last station the kids could color a monarch butterfly. The outline was on an overhead and they colored with Sharpie markers (hence me helping Samantha, I didn't want permanent markers all over her clothes). They turned out really cool. When you hold them up to the light, the light shines through them. I am going to stick them on our living room window that gets lots of sun in the afternoon so we can enjoy their hard work.
This was the first time we have been at the zoo when Samantha was old enough to really watch the animals and enjoy it. :) The first animal we come across when we walk through the gate are the ducks. There were loud ducks so Samantha decided to talk to them in their own language. She kept saying "kack, kack, kack". :)
After the ducks were the fish. These were down low enough that Samantha could go up to the tank and look at them. She loved it!
Both kiddos liked watching the big brown bear. Brown Bear, Brown Bear, Who Do You See?.....I See Marc and Samantha looking at me.



While Marc was working very diligently on coloring his butterfly, Samantha had fun looking at and talking to the monkeys down below on monkey island.

Even though we were there in the middle of a gorgeous afternoon, not many animals were very active. The tiger was pacing back and forth in his area. When we walked up to the cage, I said that he looked like a big kitty. Samantha kept "yeow"ing at him the whole time we were there. :)

Since we took Grandma with us, the kids got spoiled while at the zoo. ;) Grandma splurged and let Marc get a spray on tattoo......
He chose the one with the zoo's logo. The whole time Marc was getting his tattoo, Samantha was holding her arm like she wanted one too. We told her maybe next year.
Outside the zoo gate is a park area. I saw some pretty flowers groupings. Flowers=photo opportunity. ;) Unfortunately, Samantha was tired and she didn't really want any part of posing for pictures, so we got the best we could.

We just plain tuckered Samantha out!