Too Tired to Blog?!

Above: the peacocks were busy showing off and screeching at one and other. I loved it! I'd have one if Husband would let me...& if there wasn't a minimum order of 8 in a straight run from the hatchery.

Above: Wild Child with Ophelia the S.A. porcupine.

Below: QB, Austin, BabyGirl & Best Friend climbing through the kiddy land play area.

Yes, as a matter of fact, I was...still am, but I may be getting my second wind. Yesterday was the big trip to the zoo. It was overcast all day & sprinkled on us a few times, but the showers were short & very scattered...not enough to really get wet. I think we may have walked 5 miles all told & I'm feeling it in my legs today. The zoo isn't a big one at all & I was glad after our 3 hours there.

Miss A (Best Friend's mom), Nana (Miss A's mom), and I had a group of 5 kids. There was BabyGirl & Best Friend (BF), Austin (the boy BabyGirl plans on marrying but isn't telling anything until 3rd grade), Quiet Boy (QB), and Wild Child (WC). Austin & Quiet Boy are both normally laid back & make little fuss. Neither one talks much at all. Wild Child goes 90 to nothing all day long & thinks because he's the oldest kid in the class (at the ripe age of 7), he's as capable as any adult in the area.

Mrs. G (the teacher) gave us instructions & then turned us loose in the zoo with our groups. That worked much better than attempting to keep 28 kids together. We hadn't been there 20 minutes when BF hit her head in the gopher tunnels. Mid forehead to concrete wall. Not fun. She ended up with a little bruise & knot on her head.

We found out very quickly that WC didn't feel the need to stick close to the group. Miss A finally informed him if he took off again, he'd spend the rest of the day holding her hand. He decided he'd rather stick close than be humiliated. We also discovered that QB was not as quiet as formerly believed. He began screaming when we saw the first monkey & didn't stop until we got on the bus to go home. He was so very excited about the entire experience that he couldn't contain himself. "LOOK AT THE MONKEY! THE MONKEY! MONKEY! OH, OH, ZEBRA!!! LOOK AT THE ZEBRA! ZEBRA! ZEBRA! HEY, ZEBRA, LOOK UP HERE, ZEBRA!" It was actually pretty funny. Mrs. G's group & ours kept running into each other & she was shocked by how loud QB was & how much he was talking. I got the feeling he'd never been to a zoo before.

At the Zebra enclosure, BF pulled the side of her mouth open with her finger & said, "Hey, FarmWife, look!" I didn't see anything & was quickly distracted by QB's insistence that a peacock come closer to him. A few minutes later I realized Miss A & Nana were checking out BF's mouth & exchanging odd looks. BF had broken a tooth. Part of her tooth just came off in her mouth...no explanation, no pain.

Before the day was over BF put her hand in porcupine poop (so did BabyGirl), hit her head on a bathroom door, fell down and skinned her knee & elbow just a bit, nearly got bit by a Canadian Goose (that she almost ran into while walking backwards), and got elbowed in the eye while waiting for the bus. I told her we weren't taking her on another field trip without clothing her in bubble wrap & making her wear a helmet. Poor kid.


In all it was a good day (despite BF's injuries) and included seeing an ostrich egg, petting & feeding a South American Prehensile tailed porcupine, avoiding the giant hissing cockroaches on my part, seeing a baby zebra, petting the Pygmy goats (BabyGirl was unimpressed with the petting zoo since we have most of those animals at our house), watching peacocks in full strut, hearing the lions roar (which I've never heard in real life...much more impressive than on Jeff Corwin), and watching 8 turtles swim up to us expecting a meal.


WC asked for a Coke every time we passed a drink machine (I'm sorry, but paying $2 per Coke for 5 kids is a little much, don't you think?), a snack every time we passed a vendor (including the first time which was 10 minutes after lunch), and begged to go into the gift shop. Mrs.G had sent a note home that no money was to be sent with the kids so I nipped that in the bud every time.

In all it was a good trip...even though BabyGirl told me she wished we'd never come as we struggled up one last hill to leave the zoo. She was about 25 yards behind everyone else & was dragging...but her mom was dragging right along with her. Can someone explain to me why you always have to walk up hill to leave the zoo? Always. Any zoo. Without fail. Even if you've walked up hill all day in an attempt to make the final trip an easy one.

My favorite part of the trip was the hour plus ride home with my daughter curled up against me on the school bus...my arm around her shoulders, her head & hand on my belly feeling Bitsy roll, whispering all her secrets to me despite the noise & chaos around us. Good Trip.