The ZOO!!!

We've been talking about taking a trip to the zoo since I was pregnant with Ella three years ago. The first summer after she was born, she was still a bit young for it. By the following summer, we had Amelia and she was even younger. So we decided this summer would be the time to do it. They both know some of the animals and they'd be old enough to enjoy. So would Chloe. Of course, now Tracy and Donovan also have Haylie, who wasn't even a month old at that point, but the rate we were going, there was always going to be an infant in the family. Plus kids are free until they turn three, which Ella does in November. And my parents now live in GR, about 15 minutes from the John Ball Park Zoo. We were planning to be there during the day on Friday anyhow, so it worked out wonderfully.

As it turned out, Leslie had to work over the weekend (and pick up Paul) and Reid only took a half day on Firday. Mom had a meeting in Reed City so she couldn't go either. So it ended up being Dad, Steve, Ella, Amelia, Tracy, Donovan, Chloe, Haylie, me, and three strollers (two singles and one double). Pretty early on, Chloe rebelled against the stroller, so she walked or Donovan carried her. Ella wanted to walk then too. I wasn't sure about it, especially when Ella refused to hold my hand, but she let Chloe hold her hand and they walked along together, albeit very slowly.

Shortly after this we found the petting zoo. The only animals to pet were goats. Ella didn't touch the goats much, but chattered continuously to whichever one was closest. The one in the picture gently headbutted Ella in the belly. She kinda fake laughed and said, "that tickles." Steve brought Amelia in too, but I'm not sure she touched any of them or even let him put her down. She seems to be deathly afraid of animals, even my parents' 16 year old cat.


Ella kept asking about the lions. When we got to them, she didn't seem very interested. Of course, they were pretty far back in the habitat so she couldn't see them very well. I did get this great picture though.
She did like the tiger though.


Shortly after looking at the lions, we ran into Cameron Hoover, who is one of Evart's former band directors. Unfortunately, Tracy wasn't with us then and the rest of us didn't really know him well.
Next up were the monkeys, which Ella LOVED. The one in the picture was just hanging out with his back to the glass. Then he turned around and I got a picture. Shortly after that, he swung away to the other side of the habitat. Ella started clapping and shouting, "Look at the wunkey go! Go wunkey! Good job wunkey!" It was hilarious and she was SO excited. Some of the other parents there got a good laugh out of it too. :)


We also saw this monkey. It's a howler monkey and I caught it mid-howl in the picture. I saw wild ones in Guatemala.
And because they're cute, here's a picture of the girls in the stroller. This one was mid-trip. The one at the end did not turn out well. We had a diaper mishap with Ella and Mia was just tired. So here's the funny face picture. I'm not sure what either of them was doing in the picture but it makes me smile. :)
I'll post more pictures from the weekend later, since I took a lot at the Atherton reunion the next day. But this post is already pretty long. We'll probably make zoo trips a yearly thing since it's so close to Mom and Dad. Considering we made the trip with four girls under three, it went pretty smoothly. Btw, there were a lot of other animals that I either didn't take pictures of or didn't post pictures of. The zoo's website has a map posted and all the other info you'd need to know. Hope you enjoyed the pictures!