Riverbanks Zoo

We were so excited to make a day trip to the Riverbanks Zoo in Columbia a couple weeks ago. A really great zoo with lots of fun things for little kids. It was such a hot day but the zoo has lots of shaded winding paths which made it tolerable. This picture of all of us on the elephant statue was my favorite of the day.



The gorilla was right up against the observation glass. I'm sure he was trying to stay cool but it provided us a good look of him. We just heard yesterday that this gorilla escaped his enclosure after the park was closed and the worker that was feeding him was injured. The funny thing is about 5 minutes after he escaped he just walked back in and went back to his favorite spot to take a nap. I guess he realized he had it pretty good in there!

Michael and Mary Ellen loved the farm area. Of course those are the animals they know best. They had goats and cows that you could feed and lots of chickens and a turkey.

But hands-down our favorite thing at the zoo was the bird sanctuary. This enclosed area had dozens of colorful birds, we think they were parrots, that would sit on your arm and you could feed them. Mary Ellen's favorite thing lately is birds of any kind so this was by far her favorite part of the day. I have to admit it was pretty cool...as you can tell by one of the pictures above, I was truly awe-struck :-)

We LOVE the zoo! And because M&M get in free it's a pretty inexpensive day trip, even without buying a yearly pass. We are looking forward to going again before the summer is out!

Beach Fun!

We were able to spend a few days in Florida as a family before we made the trip back to South Carolina last month. We needed to get back to get started on the house build process but couldn't resist the free babysitter, thanks Mom, and the beautiful weather! We were able to take M&M to the beach for the first time. It was a perfect day and we had great fun even though we only spent about an hour there. Poor Mary Ellen is so fair skinned...sunscreen is going to be her best friend!

We stopped in Floyd's at the Boardwalk to have some oysters...well, Andrew and I did and M&M had juice and crackers. Then, we set up behind the Boardwalk to enjoy the sand and water.

Mary Ellen's favorite new thing is birds. She loves looking for them and exclaiming with out-stretched pointer finger, "buds". So needless-to-say the seagulls were her favorite part.

Michael, as you can see was headed straight for the sand toys. He loved playing in the sand with his shovel and bucket. He also loved the water, which freaked Mary Ellen out a bit. She just didn't like the feeling of the waves pulling her out.

Two great pictures of M&M with Daddy. Andrew helped them with their first steps into the Gulf of Mexico!

Such a fun day...and M&M loved it! We're looking forward to another trip to Florida in July and more time at the beach!