Family date day!

Jeff and I really want to take the kids places this winter. This is because a) both of them really enjoy it now; b) in a few months we will be taking a hiatus from going ANYWHERE but the grocery; and c) Andrew has made me realize that going to new places really makes an impression on him. Our computer is set up so the screen saver just pulls random pictures from our memory. This is enjoyable for all, and we find ourselves sitting in front of the computer saying, "Oh! There's Andrew at 3 weeks old! And now! There's Lily learning to roll over! Hey! There's our old dog Ginger." And on and on in a strange time warp-ish experience. The other day we were watching the slide show and there was a picture of Andrew sitting on a public bench in July '07. I'm wracking my brain trying to think where in the world we were...I'm sure we weren't on vacation. Andrew pipes in, "That's when we went to the museum with dinosaur bones, Mom." He's right. Amazing, that kid's memory.

Anyhoo, we decided to visit the zoo again today. I don't know why. We've been there once last April, but Lily didn't get much out of it. So after her morning nap, we got all packed up and drove there.

Holy, cow, it was fun! Andrew loved it, as he always does. It was a pleasant day (sunny, no wind, upper 40's) and not crowded at all. Lily was a BLAST. She was frantically pointing to show us everything. Her new word as of yesterday is, "duck", so she was especially excited to see the ducks. We paid $50 for her to see a duck. Good going. Also cute, at the cat house it was a small enough crowd that we could put her right up to the glass and let her stand. A female lion was lounging up against the same glass, so Lily was inches from this HUGE wildcat. And she kept pointing and saying, "Meow! Meow!" Gotta teach her to roar...it was so cute. She also (and we also) enjoyed the primate house. The lemurs were bouncing around like crazy, wrestling and leaping.

Anyway, it was great to take the kids somewhere that they both enjoy so much. So we got a season's pass. We are such sucker's. We only have to visit one more time by December 2008 to pay it off. How could we not? And Jeff was super cute. You had to indicate how many children on the pass...and he picked 3. Even though children under 2 are free anyway. And you had to put the names of the children down. He put down the name we've picked for #3. Not that he needed to...he's just excited about it, I think. Cute, eh? I guess we're really committed to this name now. ;) And it breaks one of our rules...how will I cope?!?

Nice day. Nice fun family day. Let's hope that #3 turns out as nerdy as the rest of us, so he'll enjoy just standing and admiring the animals like everyone else!