Woodland Park Zoo

Today, the kids and I went up to Woodland Park Zoo. It ended up raining off and on and was a little cool but it was pretty empty!  The kids had a blast withall the sculptures and statues around the park.   We were able to see almost all the different animals.   Many of the animals were out walking around so we got a really good look.   The kids are old enough now that we were actually able to talk more about the animals!

 Of course we absolutely cannot pass up a carousel when we see one! 

 We were excited to see the little guy sticking out of the Wallaroo's pouch!

Kayda's favorite animal was the zebra. Dillon really wanted to see the ostrich but it didn't happen, so he was pretty bummed out. Carson would tell you his favorite was the lion but he was super excited about the tropical forest enclosure with the snakes, turtles and frogs.   He bounced from one display to the next in a terrible hurry.
Out of all the animals, we only missed 3, though there were quite a few birds we didn't identify.

Overall it was worth the drive and it was a great way to spend the day.

The creek again

Today we got to go to the creek with a couple buddies.   Ariana, who has been in Kayda's class for several years, and her younger brother Gibson.  I took way too many pictures but I wasn't busy so I went with it! 

Kayda, Ariana and Gibson went on the rope swing.   Dillon wasn't t interested in the cold dunk at the end.

Praying Mantis

So, this is random but yesterday Daddy and I were giving my car a good cleaning.  When Daddy lifted one of the seats to clean under it he found a praying mantis!  We had seen one at Kayda's riding lesson a couple of months ago but before that I have no memory of ever seeing one in this area,  including as I was growing up here.  We all thought it was pretty cool! 

Mt Vernon

We ended up going on an extra camping trip with Uncle Pat and Aunt Sarah's family and Grandma Peggy and Papa Mike.  We headed up to the Mt Vernon area.  The tent "camp sites" were essentially along the perimeter of a huge field which worked out really nicely for the kids to play.  

Of course the day we headed up a burn ban was put in place so we didn't get to have a fire but the boys had a great time with charcoal "chalk".

 There was a cedar tree right by where we set up camp and Dillon spent more time there than anywhere else around camp. It reminded me of climbing around in the tree in my back yard growing up.  I must say cedar trees make the best climbing trees!

 This little scooter was Baba's!  Daddy drove around on it when he was growing up.  Uncle Pat ended up with it and the kids had SO much fun riding it.  Carson and I rode around the campground, it was quite the job to keep him from flooring it!

 On Saturday we headed up to Newhalem and spent the afternoon seeing the Diablo dam and a few other goodies. Carson was REALLY nervous about going across the bridge to the power house.  On the way back he was determined to do it on his own though.

 We were able to walk out on to the dam.  When you look down it is quite the drop!

 One afternoon Dillon and I got some good time together while the others were going swimming.  He had cut his toe and he didn't want to swim because it stung.

The day we were leaving turned out to be misty, overcast and cold.  The kids didn't want to swim so we ended up leaving a lot earlier than we had intended.  Unfortunately, this picture is blurry because we were driving and I kept bouncing around.  I thought it was too sweet NOT to post though!