the zoo

Today B and I went to Niabi Zoo in Moline with our pals Suzanne and Alison. It was the perfect day to enjoy the outdoors, it was H.O.T HOT HOT and despite ending up drenched in sweat and we all had a great time.

New monkeys in the zoo:

Alison has a bum foot, so she and Braden got to sit back and relax as Suz and I pushed them around the zoo in their respective wheelchair and stroller. ;)

Niabi Zoo is perfect for littler zoo-goers . . . it's not too big (we saw everything in about 2 hours), and there are several animals that you can "pet"/touch. B was not too sure about getting up close and personal, though.

But he did seem to enjoy checking out all the animals from afar . . .

. . . and was also ok with the ones behind glass (this was some kind of reptile).

We were really lucky that most of the animals were "out" and about, and didn't just stay in their shady shelters where we wouldn't have been able to see them. Because you know, we picked the best day hottest. day. ever. (of this summer, anyway) to be at a zoo (seriously, it was not forecasted to be so hot).

We were a little surprised by these eager birds - we purchased cups of nectar and were told we could feed them - we didn't know they would aggressively flock to the little cup . . .

Braden was super excited to ride the little train . . . the rest of us were super excited to enjoy the slight breeze that we got to enjoy while riding it (this is gross, but can you see how the back/bottom of my hair is wet from sweat? ewwww!)

And, take a guess what B picked out at the souvenir shop?

. . . a stuffed monkey, and . . . ..

a tractor! (I need to do a post about his expanding vocab . . . his favorite word (by far!) these days is tractor. He loves tractors.)