Backseat Antics

Recently, we switched Noah to a forward facing car seat. Now he can reach Nathan easily. Before, Nathan used to reach over and bug Noah by taking his toy or just by putting his hand over there in his space. Reciprocal action has ensued.


It's amazing how quickly fun and fussing can morph into the other. For example, you're having a great time smacking each other with the giant ball when all of a sudden your playmate stops playing that game without informing you. There is crying and yelling as, suddenly, the same thing that was fun a minute ago now hurts. Someone is in trouble and it's usually the one with the "weapon." Thanks a lot, punk.

Thankfully, this time the direction went from fussing to fun, from yelling to laughter, from (fake) tears to smiles, from hitting to playing. Fun is so much better! I'm a big fan of fun.

Exposed?

This is my dad. He went to the zoo with us and then took us to Taco Bell for lunch. What a nice dad!

So .... as we're sitting in Taco Bell, Josiah looks at Grandpa and asks, "Why are you wearing those pants with your peepee showing?" *snicker* Grandpa first had to look down to make sure his fly wasn't open or something. *I'm still snickering* Grandpa told Josiah that they're called chaps and they protect his legs when he rides the motorcycle. I told Josiah that Grandpa has jeans like Daddy's underneath the chaps. Then there were the multiple questions about how they work and how they fasten and what they're made of.....

If Josiah tries to make his own chaps with scissors, someone's going to be in trouble!

Taco Bell Time

And now a word from our sponsor.....

Well, even though Taco Bell won't acknowledge the advertisement, I'll write about our lunch there anyway.

Hathead here loves the cheesy double beef burrito. I open it up and feed the filling to him by the forkful. More please.

Nathan likes to eat a hard taco as well as some of my nachos and some of Noah's burrito.

Josiah likes the soft tacos. Today, he put two hot sauce packets and one fire sauce packet on his taco. After 2 bites, he gave it to Grandpa because "it's too spicy." Go figure. Even my dad couldn't finish it. He started sneezing and his nose began running...

Josiah and Noah reaching for whatever John's passing out.

When Josiah started laying around, I asked him if he was tired and maybe needed a nap too. "I'm just recharging my engine", he whispered to me.

Noah lets us know that he's done with things by throwing them on the floor. This cup is about to take a dive. We're working on better communication methods.

That engine must have gotten recharged. Josiah started swinging himself around after a few minutes.

Mmm .... yummy lunch. Thanks!

Hello Zoo!

Saturday was a beautiful, sunny, non-cold day. The temperature reached into the 50's. We took full advantage of the wonderful Spring day and went to the zoo for the first time this year.

The boys took time to spot the birds and turtles around the waterfall. You have to look close to notice Josiah, after all, he's in camouflage.

Here are the tigers .. er, um ... the leopards. It didn't seem to matter how many times we told Nathan that these are leopards. "Leopards have spots and tigers have stripes." According to him, they're tigers.

Noah and John, checking out the new polar bears.

Meet Nortan. He's new to our zoo.

This is "little" Patches. She was new last year.

We saw the warthogs and discussed how much they look like that one pig that farts all the time in that one movie with the king lion....

There they are! Gorgeous! Well, someone surely thinks they are. Maybe their mothers.

Hissing cockroaches. Josiah studied these guys for quite awhile. I usually walk right by this exhibit. This girl's face says it all for me! We got up close to try to hear them hiss. We even hissed at them but they didn't respond. So they are either shy or snobs.

John and Noah waited on the path for the rest of us to go up on the deck. I got to see a rhinoceros pee. To quote the safari log, "it was a fine mist of urine."

The jail horses! Nathan saw them. He let us know that he did. "See. One. Two. I see them!"

We've come to the boardwalk. We've always let the boys get down and walk here. Today was Noah's first time.

Noah did just fine after adjusting to the degree of the ramp.

Noah seems to get the attention of all the girls. Come on, Noah. We're here to have family time.

I could have touched this guy if I had wanted to get my hand bitten.

Nathan and Grandpa. Nathan sometimes calls him "Grandma" much to my dad's frustration. Heh heh heh.

"Come here. Come here." The black swan didn't come any closer. I wonder what Nathan would have done if he had.....

We got to ride the carousel .... twice!

This is Josiah's favorite seat. It's the snake bench. From the look on his face, you would think he's on a roller coaster. Today, he claimed that Grandpa made him make that face. Some days it's just tough to be natural in front of a camera.

Who's this woman? Right. That's me with Josiah. Nathan is riding the "tiger."

Nathan, Josiah and Grandpa all rode on the snake bench the second time.

Noah was going to ride another animal but changed his mind and wanted to be held.

Some day I'd like to get Josiah to ride that Sea Serpent... maybe if they take out the snake bench.

John, Noah, and me. I got to ride the turkey. I would have liked to ride the giraffe but it doesn't go up and down. If I'm going to ride the carousel, I may as well go up and down.

Aw. The miniature zebu. This one posed for me. They're very considerate animals. They didn't rush me or anything. We even pet them.

Mystery Mountain, here we come!

Noah conquered the mountain.

Josiah and Nathan love playing on this "mountain." The rope bridge is great fun to jump on.

Noah walked along the "mountain path" until he got to the bridge. It looked like crawling time to him.

Penguins! They walked around for awhile, went into the "tunnels", played follow the leader ....

... then they went for a swim! Hurray! I love watching them swim.

All that swimming made Josiah work up an appetite.

We stopped by to see the orangutan family before we left the zoo. We've seen the young one grow up over the years. She's just a few months younger than Josiah. When she was a baby, her mama would proudly show her off to all the visitors. Joseph, the father, is a flirt. He's always making kissy faces at me.

Nathan took notice every time the zoo train passed us. We didn't ride it this time since we were all getting hungry and it was past Noah's nap time. It's a good thing Grandpa came with us to the zoo. Nathan didn't want to leave and was on the verge of throwing a fit until I told him that we were going to go with Grandpa to lunch and then go to Grandma and Grandpa's house to visit. Suddenly his world was okay again. Bye, zoo!