Family Fun Day; The Zoo

At the beginning of the summer we set up some Family Fun Days.  We are doing a lot of things this summer and not all of them include the kids.  We wanted to make sure that their summer was going to be as fun as the adults.  For our first planned day we went to the zoo.

We picked a good day to go.  It was overcast and there was a nice breeze for most of the day.  It even rained a little bit.  We got a ton of pictures of the kids!  Yay!

First real animals we saw was the elephants.  It was so much fun because the mama and the baby were out and trying to cool off.  They were throwing mud up and over themselves, digging in a water hole to make more mud.  It was really cute.

This one was eating the trees.  He was all stretched out when I went to take the picture but it delayed and so you get one of him eating. :0)

 There were dinosaurs all over the zoo.  Some of them even spit at you.  This one was set up just for pictures.  The kids were excited to sit on it.  Kate, not so much.

Thadd is my camera happy child.  He thought it was hilarious that he could put his head in the dinosaurs mouth.  What a kid!

The gorilla statue was right next to the dinosaur so we let the kids climb all over him too.  Kate was a little happier being in Thadd's arms than the gorillas.

Kate finally liked standing with her brothers and sisters for pictures.  Here she is even saying "cheese".

We were lucky enough to get in the front of the line for the bird show and be on the front row.  Some of the birds where so noisy.  Norma liked the parrots.  I love the blue.  The bird was not happy that Norma and I had walked over to get his picture.  He kept yelling at us.

Kate was just happy she had her blanket.

This is a sea eagle.  He was huge!  I loved his legs.  They were about as big as Kate's waist.  And look at those claws!

 This is a "toasted marshmallow" owl. :0)

 We had a ton of birds that flew in right over our heads.  You could feel the wind that they moved as they went over our heads.  It was a little scary having them that close.  Here is a "Harry Potter" owl.

 I can't remember what bird this is but it moved my hair as he flew over.

 My favorite was the bald eagle.  We got some amazing pictures.  They had the flag down in the background and I love these shots that we got.

 So cool, huh!  I love them!

Here is another good one of Thadd.  The was in a really good mood and had fun pretending that the rhino had got him.

 Kate was starting to get into it too.

 Here are the real rhinos.

And a cool pink bird.  Tucker liked that it was called something spoon billed. :0)

Thadd was the most excited about the tigers.  He has decided that it is his new favorite animal.  They were all sleeping to we couldn't get a good look at them but I thought this sign was so funny.

 Thadd found the tiger statue and wanted to have his picture taken with it.

 We found a tiger that we could get a picture of.  His head was huge!

 We walked around and saw the giraffes.  There was one that if I reached out my hand I could have touched its head.

 When we went up the walk we got closer to the tigers and I love these pictures that Nate got of them.  Look at those teeth!

 And what would a trip to the zoo be without a picture of the sleeping gorilla.  We always have to take one of him.

 We left after this because it had gotten hot and the kids really wanted to go to Chuck-a-Rama for lunch.  They love that place and we had promised we would go out.

We loved spending the whole day together without having to be anywhere.  We love our family and we have the best time being together.  Now on to July and a whole lot of fun and exciting things going on. ;0)