The Lucases Do the Zoo

We (except for Ryan) had a Monday and Tuesday off in young October for fall break.  Ryan joined us that Tuesday for a trip to the zoo.  This is how we all felt about that:

Making our way from the van to the ZOO:)

And we all kept those smiles for the duration of the day.  Here's why...

First of all perfect, PERFECT, weather.  The first day of "cooler"...started in the upper 60s and leveled off at a lovely 72 degrees.

Getting a good look at the muddy elephants

Next, the price was right at FREE, well actually $4.  We checked out the Zoo Atlanta dvd from the library which gets you four free tickets into the zoo (Jack would have been free anyway).  Plus, no parking fee. Plus you can bring whatever food you want or need into the park so we took a picnic lunch from home.  So, the $4 came in when we rode the train at the end of our visit.  All of us rode for that price since both our kids are below the height where you can ride by yourself (if you have to ride as a parent cause your kids are below the limit you ride free).  So glad we sprang for that ride...you'll see from the pictures that Jack was thrilled to be a train passenger.

The parakeet aviary.  A Molly favorite this time around.

Jack pointed to every animal he spotted

The next wonderful part of our day was that the animals were out and active.  We watched the orangutans especially forever.  So many times on zoo trips you get to the exhibit and the animals are sleeping or hidden and it's hard for little ones to even spot them in their habitat.  Not the case this day...cooler weather perhaps?

Molly and Jack were so cooperative and happy all day.  Like this:

Except for when we made them take sibling pictures like this (side note: that makes Ryan cranky, too).

I just like this of the back of their heads...you can't really tell that the highest "rock" in the pic is a giant gorilla walking away after just sitting in the clearing while we stared at him:

The tiger was totally up for this photo op:

Two of God's beautiful creatures:)

Getting a closer look with his sister.

This tiger was fascinating and hung out for awhile as we gazed and talked about him and his stripes and how we bet he would make a lot of yummy butter if his friends were around to join him a la Little Black Sambo:

We were loving the tiger

Molly was most excited to see the pandas because they put on a great show for us the last time we were at the zoo (when I was 9 months pregnant:).  They didn't disappoint:

Molly was super excited about the petting zoo too.  She wasn't very confident last time we were here but she jumped in with both hands this time around.

Pensive Petting

Our last endeavor was a train ride.  Here we are at the station waiting for the train:

Train ride partners

My train buddy

I took Jack out of the ergo to sit on the bench next to me and he had a BLAST!  I'm thinking this boy may have a soft spot for trains.  Or maybe feeling the wind in his hair.

He "talked" the whole time

Taking it all in

Clapping and saying "Yay"!  periodically along the way

We left the zoo that day, went home, put Jack down for a nap, and Molly, Ryan, and I worked and played outside for the remainder of the perfect October day.  We're really loving this season of our little family.  Thank you, God, for days of enjoying each other.