As much as it seems that title can be referring to any day around the house with these two little ones, the truth is we did actually spend the day at the zoo again yesterday. There was a base-wide power outage scheduled yesterday from 7am-2pm so everyone was finding things to do out in town, we opted for the zoo. Though the power was actually only out from 7-9am and we didn't even make it out of bed until 9am. Still, I figured Clara would enjoy going to say goodbye to the stingrays since they'll be closing that exhibit for the winter at the end of this month.
Here's the kids as we started our trek into the zoo with hats and matching shirts. Clara was excited to have her camera along for the trip!
Most of the animals were sleeping during our visit -- in some far off hidden corner of their cage, but we caught the prairie dogs eating lunch....
...and the camel taking a bath. Clara found it interesting to note, "He sure does splash a lot in HIS bath."
The anteater has a baby again, and was carrying it around on her back.
Here's the kids checking out the anteater.
This orangutan was kind enough to teach the kids the art of nose picking, complete with eating the tasty snack!
I even let the kids feed the giraffes. I had to hold Jonathan up, so I didn't get a picture of him feeding the giraffe, but here's Clara feeding Holly.
At some point in the afternoon, the kids decided to trade hats. Oh, and you can see I also finally found some cowboy boots for Jonathan - just $20! They've only been somewhat successful in stopping the fights over getting shoes on and his love for his sister's shoes. Most days they work, but there's still days (like this morning) when only Clara's shoes will do.
My two gorillas!
Jonathan was making his 'mean gorilla face'
We did stop by to see the stingrays, but I didn't take any pics there. Clara was so happy to get the chance to say goodbye to them for the winter. Jonathan started getting REALLY cranky soon after that, so we skipped the petting zoo and headed home. Jonathan fell asleep after 5min in the car -- even Clara was asleep before we got home. All in all not a bad day!
What a Day!!!! Jonathan is not feeling well today. It's been a replay of that day a few months ago where he spent the whole day curled up in the fetal position sleeping. His fever broke late this evening and I was finally able to get him to eat a little bit, so hopefully he'll be back to himself tomorrow. Since he wasn't feeling well we took a full day off from potty training, but I got this video of him the other night and it's too cute not to share!
Clara is also a little congested, but other than that she's doing great. Her big goal right now is to learn to ride her bike without training wheels before Chris gets home in November. The part about this that's most impressive is that while we've had her bike since her birthday in March, she has really only recently started riding it in the last 2 weeks. Before now she's really had no interest in it, but she's determined -- and I really think there's a good chance that she'll get it in just another couple weeks. It all depends on how she'll handle it that first time she falls. Say a prayer that she stays tough and determined!
Guess who peed in the potty!!!!!!!!
You can see I loaded him with some juice so he'd be sure to go. He went one time kinda by accident (he was standing and I moved the potty to catch some) and then rewarded him for the peepee in the potty with a snack. Then I gave him a juice box in the hopes of getting him to pee in the potty intentionally and without him freaking out.
It worked!!!!!! He peed and was REALLY excited about it. I know this is just the beginning, but it's definitely a great start!!!!!
I took the kids to get new shoes today. They've both been wearing Crocs all summer and I thought Clara could use some tennis shoes, and was hoping to find some cowboy boots for Jonathan to take the place of the rain boots. I wasn't so successful with Jonathan's boots, thanks to his 'extra wide' feet, but we found the perfect shoes for Clara.
Clara decided that now that she knows how to tie, she needed tie shoes. I was skeptical, knowing that her ability to tie was still a little on the hit or miss side. We found some that she liked and I told her to put them on and tie them, because if she couldn't tie them in the store we weren't going to get them. I didn't care if it took her 5 minutes to do it, I just wanted to know she really could tie a real shoe, not just a lacing card with extra long laces. Much to my surprise, she tied it right -- the first time, and it didn't take 5 min. either. So then we began to explore all the options of shoes she could pick from, which prompted us to have her foot measured, to be sure we were looking for the correct size. The second big shocker of the day...Clara's feet have grown a size and a half just over the summer. That's right! She was in a 9 at the beginning of the summer and she is now in a 10.5!!! The down side to that is she had 6 pairs of brand new Stride Rite shoes in her closet just waiting for her to grow into, sizes 9.5 and 10. I buy ahead when I catch good deals at the Stride Rite outlet or at Marshalls/Ross. I hadn't paid more than $15 for any of them -- but we still can't use them regardless, so I passed them off regretfully to a neighbor :( The boots that I gave away were super cute too. That'll teach me to buy ahead!
Here's Clara tying her new shoes.
When I was making dinner today she just sat in her chair tying and untying her shoes to practice -- all on her own. She's so excited and has even told me she's going to teach all her friends that don't know how to tie...so they can get new shoes too! (I did have to explain to her that last part was up to their parents though.)
She got pretty good and even fast with all her practice. This girl amazes me every day.
The proud princess with her new shoes!
