Lots of Love: September 2010

Luke didn't have school on Friday, so I took the kids to the zoo that day. And since later that night was the Balloon Glow at Forest Park, I thought we would just make a day of it! So, I dropped Tyler off at work, since he works about 5 minutes from the zoo, and we headed off to see some animals.

I love the zoo! I especially love that it is free! And if you get there in the first hour, the things that normally cost money are free too!

The first thing we did was pet the sting rays. We did this last year too, and both of them have asked several times when we were going to do this again.

One of Luke's friends from school also happened to be there. That is him in the background.

They both got soaking wet because some the rays actually splashed us!

Then we rode the merry-go-round.

Say cheese!

One of their favorite things to do at the zoo is climb on the big bug.

Since we were going to be there ALL DAY, I brought some clip boards. I had Isaac draw pictures of some of the animals, and had Luke write where they were from, since he is always curious about that. They both enjoyed doing it, and it helped keep their attention.

Luke wanted to take some pictures too. This is one he took of me. I thought it turned out pretty cute. We also got some not so cute ones, like some of animals behinds, which Luke thought was hilarious. BOYS! :)

We also did the zoo-magination station. They spend the whole time making this forest with "an army of good guy animals." I was thinking maybe we should get them this for Christmas, but then I'm sure they wouldn't play with it at all!

Since we were there all day and still had the balloon thing to go to, I actually bought them some stuffed animals. I think this is the first time I have ever spent money at the zoo!

Luke loves his monkey! Isaac chose a baby leopard that, for the time being, as replaced good old Puppy Dog! He did name it Puppy Leopard though.

Around 4 we were done with the zoo, so we headed over to the area where the balloons were going to be to get a good parking spot. The kids just ran around in the grass and had a blast. I wanted to get a picture of them by the fountain, so I told them, one silly picture, then a normal one.

Here is the silly one...

and here is the normal one...

Both are cute, but I think I like the silly one best!

Then Tyler met us and we had dinner and waited for the balloons to start. They (meaning all three of my boys) were so excited when they started blowing up the balloons.

It was really cool! You could just walk around the balloons and watch them fill them up. Here are a bunch of pictures of balloons...

There were a lot of people there with their wine, fancy cheese and grapes making it a romantic night. Here is about as romantic as it got for us! :)

The coolest part was when every few minutes they would blow a horn and every balloon would fire up at once and you were surrounded by glowing balloons! It was so pretty!