Another Weekend in Pictures

We had all kinds of crazy plans to do with the kids this weekend but after having something going on M, T, W, and Th night kid-related, and then I volunteer as a teacher's aide Friday morning, I opted for us to stay home for once. We are constantly running around and I think we all needed a break. Thankfully there were no soccer games this Saturday so that was nice!
We'll start with Mia Friday afternoon sitting up playing with her Leap Frog Gym. Her favorite toy as she loves turning the world a zillion mph as it says "Gutentag!" and "Kineetchiwah!" And a loving brother holding his bewildered sissy.
Saturday I did alot of cleaning since we didn't have the Soccer games. The kids did their chores helping me out as best as they could. I had a mess of recycle ables in the house that I had the kids separate. This is one of their favorite jobs because it requires sorting into piles. (Paper, Plastic, Glass, Cardboard, Aluminum) They also love smashing the cans.
This is 1 week of recycle able stuff! Not pictured: Box a newspapers. lol This is why EVERYONE should recycle. There's about 5 milk containers and about 5-6 juicy juice containers along with everything else plastic. Then Sunday after Church we went to the free zoo we have in town with my dad and his wife. It's mainly animals native to the Midwest, a sanctuary for them.
Of course as soon as we got there, Dominic had to ride the train and the engineer was nice enough to let him borrow his sweaty filthy hat (eww!) and check out the train. He examined the wheels, the engine, the rails, the seat, the foot petal whistle, and the lights.
I had to take a shot of this alligator who ate the rat's head but left the body. It smelt oh so fresh let me tell ya! lol At least 20-30 flies swarming around in there too. Yummy! Pronghorn checkin himself out.
The meanest and butt ugliest Llama ever right before he spit at this little girl trying to pet him.
Possessed Chicken Hawk with his head backwards.
Alex peering out of the prairie dog exhibit.
Checking out the ducks and buffalo from the water.
These pelicans are usually not nice but pleasantly, they did not try to eat Dominic like they tried eating Alex on her field trip.

The otters put on one heck of a show for us doing all sorts of back flips and jumping off objects.
And the kids played on the turtle and I got a shot with 3 this time. I have tons of pics like this and every year or so we add a new kiddo on the turtles back.
Mia made a new friend although I think he was more interested in trying to eat the stroller fabric.
My dad feeding the Swan who chases all the geese away by biting their wings if they get near someone who has food.

So Alex would run on the other side and throw them a ton of food when the swan wasn't looking.Then after eating the swan ran over to the pop machine and started pressing the buttons for a pop to no avail. Are birds really that smart? Notice he's looking down where the pop comes out!
What am I staring at? Any guesses??? (I can't believe he took a pic of me, bleh!)
I was staring up at these fugly little monkeys. They've had these same monkeys since I was a kid!
Then they climbed all over the spiderweb. Well Damien didn't do much climbing but the other 2 did.

I think the best part of the day was watching my dad find the brick that his former company had got when it gave a large donation to the zoo. As soon as he found the brick saying the company name he worked for, he wiped his feet all over it like a doormat. Last week my dad lost his job of 28 years to a manufacturing company who decided that they (like every other American company) could save a butt load by sending all their work to China. Finally after the Chinese got their crap together and stopped messing up on parts to send to my dad to fix that he could have made in the first place, they let him go. Anyways- it was funny watching him rub his feet all over their name! lol
Alex in the minivan looking way to grown up and of course one more of Mia. In all the weekend was alot of fun! We don't really get out much with my dad so the kids really enjoyed dragging him everywhere and having him check out everything too.