The Zoo, one month later

Wow, it's amazing how quickly you can fall behind in uploading pictures from the digital camera.
Between sending the boys back to Utah, Jessica returning from Utah, getting Jessica ready for the start of a new school year and all around Juliana wrangling, I've just plain forgotten about the photos.

But they're uploaded now and now we can tell you all about our day at the zoo.

It's been years since I've been to the zoo (at least 7 years, if not more) and much longer since Derek and the older kids have been there. We loaded up the car and brought Mitch, Jonah and Juliana. We left Jessica at home, brooding in her own sorrow at being left behind. (Not really. She was still in Utah at this time) Derek invited his friend Matt (and his wife Tara and their daughter Nissa (NEE'-sah). They live down in Seattle, so they met us at the zoo. Nissa was born about 4 months before Juliana.

We arrived a little earlier than they did, so took a spin on the carousel while we waited. Juliana enjoyed her first ride on a carousel.

Hi, Daddy! Bye, Daddy! (x10)

Mitch, could you have picked a horse further from the camera that is behind even more bouncing horses?

Thank you, Jonah! A much better choice in horse placement. Although the horse itself looks a little spooked.

When we had finished with the carousel, Matt and his family had arrived, but they were parked outside the entrance on the far side of the zoo. Eventually, we connected and Juliana and Nissa were formally introduced.
Yes, our baby looks like a large-headed giant in this picture (Rarrr!), but it's the foreshortening. I promise.

See? Here they are side by side. Okay, Juliana still looks a little bigger compared to Nissa, but she's always been on the larger side of average for her age. I blame it on her Dad's genes. But next to her Dad, she looks positively tiny:

" Whoo! So tall! Hey, Daddy, I can see the Eiffel Tower from up here!"

While there, we saw a wide range of inhabitants. From the primates:

"I want to see the Eiffel Tower, too... Dangit!"

"Hmmph! No one wants to show me the Eiffel Tower!"

To rare breeds of butterflies:

I suspect this is what would happen if the kids went through the transporting machine from The Fly. Only with a butterfly instead of a fly.

We stopped by the reptile house and saw things like this Emerald Tree Boa:

It's amazing how they can curl up on a branch like this and just rest.

The bears were very active that day, so most of my pictures of them came out rather blurry, except this one. It's just a little smudged looking, because the glass between us was covered in little handprints and faceprints (ewww!).

There were a few creatures from Down Under, like this kookaburra: After seeing him (her?), I had that kookaburra sits in the old gum tree song going through my head for the next half hour. Ack! Now I'm going to have it in my head again...

Or these wild dingos:

Ok, so they aren't dingos, and they aren't from Australia as far as I know. They're wolf cub sculptures... but they've kidnapped Jonah and are going to raise him as one of their own. It didn't last very long. Jonah was hungry and most sculptures don't eat. These like to act like they do, though.

This pair of eagles watched intently the two-legged animals carrying the little metal boxes by their faces. Oh wait...
And somewhere in the midst of all this, a wild animal was roaming the zoo outside the confines of the animal enclosures. This squirrel was seen foraging among the contents of this baby stroller while the owners were walking through one of the enclosed exhibits.I don't know about you, but I'm on the fence as to whether squirrels are cute or evil. They're cute if you watch them scampering about with their cheeks stuffed with food, but I've also heard more than one story of people being attacked by squirrels. I wonder if there is a zoo somewhere where these squirrels are housed (not just the flying squirrels - i think i've actually seen those in some zoo somewhere).

It was a long day, and we didn't even get to see half of the zoo's exhibits. This snow leopard is demonstrating how we looked when we got home that evening:


We'll have to make a trek to see the other half, but this time we'll bring Jessica.

And she'll probably complain about having her picture taken.