Freshman Year and a Zoo Trip!

We have alot of catching up to do! The last 2 weeks have been a flurry of "new school year" activities and squeezing the most of the wonderful break from the heat wave that cloaked St. Louis for most of the summer. Finally! We have been able to head outdoors once again without threat of serious health issues. It's still hot, mind you, but not 115-in-the-shade hot.

Lane began her Freshman year last week and no amount of "it will be fine, you will have fun" would ease her nervousness. Sunday night she was wreck - and remembering back to my first day of Freshman year...I felt for her. She wanted me to drive her the first day, begged and pleaded would be more like it. Even though she's almost 15 and more than able to ride the bus to school, if this small request would somehow help that hellish first day - well, I just couldn't say No.



We picked up her friends Brooke & Melissa along the way, stopping briefly for a quick-pic, and as I sat silently driving, listening to their "drama-chatter" about who's with who, who texted who, who has lunch with who (OMG!), I couldn't help laughing.



As we approached the High School, Lane eyed the camera still sitting on my lap and told me "you're absolutely not picking that up when you drop me off".....well, was that a dare? I snapped a few anyway...





With Lane back in school, Elise and I have been getting back into our Monday / Tuesday routine. Which is - doing whatever silly, fun stuff comes to mind...and lots of dress-up.





and just chillin'.



and more silliness.





A trip to the Zoo was in order this weekend - finally! Our little excursions to PetSmart to look at all the animals just wasn't cutting it anymore, so thanks to the break in the heat, we headed out early Sunday. It was a beautiful, sunny day (a little warm, but we survived) and we were ALL excited to be there. This was the first trip since I got my new camera and I wanted to get all Dana Brown safari-like and practice getting shots of the animals.









We walked slow, stopping often to really watch the animals (or try to find them hiding), so we ended up only hitting 3 small sections of the zoo, the Rivers Edge to see the hippo's and elephants (Elise's favorites), the Stingray Lagoon and the Children's Zoo.














Elise was not at all thrilled with the Stingrays.

We spent at least 2 hours in the Children's Zoo alone, feeding goats, petting guinea pigs, playing on the splash-pad and farming.



















Farming! The adorable new toddler area set up to resemble a working farm - farm house, chicken coop, sheep barn, vegetable garden and more rakes, shovels, baskets and wooden food than even 20 toddlers could handle! Complete with live chickens running around. ELise was very serious about farming! She had this look on her face almost the entire time - the "get out of my way - I have things to do" look. We had such fun just sitting back and watching her.





















It was a wonderful day, exhausting, but wonderful. After prying Elise away from "her farm" and splashing around to cool off - we called it a day and headed home. Maybe next time we'll venture to other parts of the zoo so I can "shoot" more animals - all Dana Brown safari like!