My Mother's Day

Today I got to celebrate my second Mother's Day, and it was awesome! The first thing I heard this morning was Todd rummaging around in our living room. Then he got Evie and the two of them came in to bring me into the living room, where Todd had set up my presents. I've been talking about wanting to grow some plants for a little while now, so my cute little family obliged me!

It was a very thoughtful and appreciated gift, and I'm so excited to plant my herbs and flowers and see if I can actually grow plants without killing them.
After much "oohing" and "ahhing" (by both me and Evie; she seemed to have just as much fun as I was!), it was time to get ready for church. There wasn't much seating left in the chapel, so we sat out in the foyer and Evie wandered all over the place during the meeting. When sacrament meeting was over, I received my traditional Mother's Day flower:

I have to say, I'm not usually much of a fan of roses, but this one is really pretty. We'd originally planned on staying for the entire 3 hour block for once, but Sunday School and Relief Society are both right in the middle of Evie's nap time, so we snuck out as usual so we could put our cranky baby down for her nap. We had lunch and then I called my wonderful mom to wish her a happy Mother's Day and to tell her I love her. She's down in Arizona for her sister's wedding, but it was good to talk to her. 
When Evie woke up, we packed up the diaper bag for another trip to the zoo! I know that I talk about the zoo a lot on this blog, but our family loves going to the zoo, and this was our best zoo trip ever!!
As usual, our first stop was Predator Ridge, home to the lions. (I took tons of pictures, but am only posting the best ones and eliminating the duplicates.) For the first time ever, we saw some lionesses--3 of them! The male sat on top of his rock for most of the time, surveying his herd, although he did turn around at one point. 

I finally dragged myself--and my daughter--away from the lions, and was ready to head for the zebras. Then Todd suggested we go up a little dead-end path first, just to see what was up there. I wasn't too optimistic because the place is called "Pahali Ya Mwana" which means "Place of the Young," and I didn't think there were any new baby animals at the zoo. He said there was no harm in looking anyway, though, so I shrugged and pushed the stroller up the path. By the end of the path, I was running! There was a whole den right up against the glass that I'd never seen before or even known was there! The two male lions who are usually in the main exhibit were lounging lazily right next to the glass, so Evie finally got to see her lions up close and personal:

Notice the half-eaten banana lying on the rock. Apparently, my little girl really is a lion after all; she certainly loves growling like one! And the one lion on the rock kept gazing at Evie like he recognized a kindred spirit. In my head, I named him "Aslan."

I turned around and came face to face with that first male lion we'd seen today. There were windows in that little place that looked into the main exhibit, and he'd descended from his rock to come stand it front of it and stare at me:

Then he turned around and walked back towards one of his lionesses who kept pacing in front of the rock.

When I turned back around to return to my family, I found that the second male had crawled up onto the rock and snuggled next to his buddy.

I finally, and reluctantly, declared that we needed to move on from the lions if we were going to see anything else in the zoo today, and we headed back down the path to the main track. I have to say, though, that I'm a little irked that I've been missing the best part of the zoo all this time, and I greatly look forward to going there during every future trip! It was awesome, and we all loved it!!
It wasn't the only awesome part of our trip, though. The next exhibit on our journey was the zebras, and for the first time, they actually came over to our side of the enclosure instead of hanging out in the back corner like they usually do. In fact, they got into a line, and headed straight for us, then turned and walked along the fence in front of us. Evie was thrilled!

 How many can you count? Bonus points if you find all four!

They walked back into the shade, so we turned around to continue our journey. Waiting for us was a peacock strutting his stuff in all his glory:

On our next stop, we were looking forward to seeing the tigers, but they weren't in their enclosure, and their entire building was blocked off. We really hope that they're okay; maybe they're having more little cubs soon! I sure hope so! We did get to see the other felines, though.

The second snow leopard kept pacing back and forth. When they looked our way, though, you could see the absolute beauty of these giant cats. Such gorgeous eyes! 
Then I stepped over to the regular leopard, who was lounging on a platform right above my head. 

The idiots standing next to me kept chortling about how this was "obviously a dude" leopard until I wanted to sock them in the face and tell them to grow up. Apparently, I wasn't the only one who was getting disgusted, because the leopard suddenly got up and jumped down. I was lucky enough to catch a picture mid-leap, which is really pretty cool:

Once we finished with the felines, we moved on to the giraffes, but instead of being outside as usual, they were in the Giraffe House.

I accidentally left my flash on, and the resulting picture reminds me of that scene in "The Emperor's New Groove"--"Aah! Demon llama!" Hee hee!

Evie finally made the connection between her stuffed giraffe and the real thing.

She thought they were fascinating. Our favorite part was the mommy giraffe with the two babies. I even got a picture of her kissing one on the head!

Then I realized, "Hey, I'm a Mommy with two babies, too!" So I asked Todd to take a picture of me and my girls. I meant in front of the giraffe family, but this one worked out, too. 

We left out the back entrance to the building so we could see the hoofed animals on the other side of the loop that we never see. I don't feel bad about never traveling that side of the loop, though, because we saw only a single antelope.

We were decidedly underwhelmed.
On our way back around to the front of the loop, we discovered that Evie was soaked through, so Todd ran with her at arm's length to the nearest bathroom. I waddled as fast as I could after him until I saw these cute little goslings.

There were signs everywhere that said "Do NOT chase the baby geese. Adult geese will attack." When I stopped to snap these adorable pictures, there was a goose nearby that kept edging closer and closer to me. When I was done and started walking away, it visibly relaxed. I hurried to catch up to Todd and Evie. He'd changed her diaper and outfit, but she'd leaked on him and since the zoo was closing soon anyway, we decided to just head home.
We came home, tossed a frozen pizza into the oven, and watched Sense and Sensibility while Evie took her second nap. Halfway through, my dad called me to wish me a happy Mother's Day. It was good to talk to him, too. I have the best parents in the world, and can only hope to be as awesome for my own kids one day! Today was pretty great, and I thoroughly enjoyed my second Mother's Day!