Another crazy zoo trip

We had my niece, Macy, over to spend the night last weekend. We decided to take her to the zoo, partly because they were having a new dinosaur exhibit and partly because it was absolutely beautiful outside that day. Every time we've been to the zoo lately, we've seen some really neat things. This time did not disappoint, and was just made even more fun since Macy was with us. This was the first dinosaur we walked up on. Gabriel is not convinced at this point that it's not real. They all moved and made noise, and were just so cool!

This guy was the biggest one. A little while after this was taken, we ended up at Gabriel's favorite spot - the birds of prey. (Which just happens to be mine too.) We always see something pretty amazing from these beautiful (and big) birds. And this time was no different. One of the Bataleur Eagles was sitting on a nest, and looked quite content to be there no matter how many visitors were staring at her. Then, we realized that one of the Harpy Eagles had landed just over the walkway and was causing quite a stir. He was literally two feet above our heads, but we were coming at him from behind. When I started winding around to try to take his picture from the front I overheard other zoo patrons saying something about being sorry for the mouse. I thought, uh-oh. And sure enough, he was clutching a little mouse between his gigantic talons. I tried to tell Macy and Gabriel to just walk on by and not look too close. But what does a little kid do when you tell him/her not to look at something. They gawked. And were so excited to see the mouse. Luckily, just after we all had cleared him and were looking for the Andean Condor, we heard the crowd go, "eeeeeeewwwwwwwww!!!!!" So I guess we just barely missed seeing him eat his dinner, which would have been a little too much nature, even for me.

This looks like a triceratops, but is something called a torosaurus.

I just love it when Gabriel can spend time with his cousins. These two aren't very far apart in age, but when Cade and Macy are both at our house they have a tendency to play with each other and sort of forget about Gabriel (which I totally understand!). But that's why I decided to start having them over one at a time, alternate months. Gabriel and Macy had a GREAT time together and really bonded this time.

My very cute chubby-cheeked men.

She is such a cutie! We had so much fun with her, and laughed so much our sides hurt during dinner. I love she and Cade SO MUCH and am so glad they are close enough to be able to see them so often. Next we'll get Cade in May. Yay!