Zoo Trip

On the last day of our spring break, we met some friends at the St. Louis Zoo. The zoo here has free admission and on top of that, the first hour the zoo is open, the carousel and Children's Zoo are also free! Is St. Louis awesome, or what?!

Holy Hippo! Anna and Janae have been swallowed alive!!! The Children's Zoo has a great playground with a slide that goes underwater through the otter pond.

Daila kinda liked looking at the bugs with her cousin Corey in the Insectarium. She HATES bugs so I was a little surprised. But I guess the little glass wall between her and the insects makes a HUGE difference. She even looked at the giant Brazillian spider. She didn't get too close to that one, but she did look at it and pretend to scream. We all laughed. I texted Ben to tell her how great she did just as we passed from the Insectarium into the butterfly house. Well . . . I had to text him right back and say, "Nevermind." You see, the butterfly house has beautiful flowers and pleasant climate . . . and thousands of butterflies fluttering around . . . absolutely free of any glass partitions. As soon as we walked in a butterfly flew up to tell Daila hello and she freaked out, ran behind my legs, and tried to cover her face, all in one very awkward motion. So apparently butterflies can be more terrifying than a giant spider . . . sort of. We made it through by putting her in the stroller with her coat over her so her body was covered and it would be easy for her to cover her face. Silly girl. :)

Daila liked brushing the goats. She knew just what to do and she liked making them pretty. She would brush for a while and then say, "Okaaay . . . that's enough!" As if the goat wanted more and didn't realize he was gorgeous. :)

Anna is brushing a goat who was standing ready on a bench. I guess this one knew it was gorgeous because she just hopped down when she was done. It looked kinda funny so I chuckled and said, "Next!" And would you believe it?! . . . Another goat just hopped right up on the bench for his turn.

Daila got to ride the Carousel twice! She loved it. But it was a bit chilly that day. (So please ignore the slightly runny nose. ) :)Daila's favorite was the snake!

Anna is riding a leopard. :) What a pretty young lady.

And Janae . . . Janae is riding a baribusa. Yep . . . a baribusa. When she told me she was riding a baribusa, I thought, "What the heck is a baribusa?"

This is a baribusa. Ugly, huh. So I said, "Wow, Janae! How did you know that was a baribusa?!" (My girls are getting older and its not unusual for them to come home from school smarter than me, spouting off cool, amazing, and interesting facts.) But Janae said, "It says so right there." Yeah, apparently they wrote the names of the animals at the top of the pole. See . . . they are smarter than me.

Our Voelkel Zoo Trip Bunch! Pictured here are Daila (with her back to us), Anna, Corey, Lindsey, Janae, Josh, and Holland. We had such a fun day with Aunt Lindsey, Uncle Josh, and our cousins. Daila and Corey had a blast playing together at our house. We'll have to do it again soon. :)