Divide and Conquer

We found out we could get a good deal on a zoo membership and my sister figured out if we split it between me and her, then each of our families could go separately or together and either way everyone could get in on the pass. If we go once a month, it ends up being about $4.50 a trip for all 4 of us to go. Since we're only 20 minutes away, we decided it was a good deal. This was our first attempt.

As you can see, Gus enjoyed the dirt and rocks. A lot. He liked the animals ok, but was much more interested in touching stuff and moving, whether that meant walking on his own or in the wagon - either way it had to be going for him to be happy. So if we needed to move from one place to the other and he wanted to walk, I'd grab him and put him in the wagon as Bryan was starting to pull it, so it'd be moving when he sat down.

The otters was the only exhibit he really stood still for. By the end of the hour and a half we spent at the zoo, I was exhausted from chasing him around. We realized our mistake was we had the mindset that we had to see a bunch of stuff because we only go to the zoo every once in a while - I think this is Jacob's second trip to any zoo. Now that we have a membership, we just need to decide on 2 or 3 exhibits, meander over to them, spend as much time as the kids want to and then go home, then see different exhibits the next time. And one of us will be in charge of Gus and the other in charge of Jacob and if we have to divide to conquer, that's just fine as long as the one with the keys doesn't stay in the park while the other is on their way to the parking lot. 

I'm thinking I'll wait until October or November to try to take the boys by myself - I'm assuming the crowds die down by then and Gus won't be constantly getting in other people's way.

Sorry this picture is so dark. I was cutting a watermelon and had cut it into 4ths, then set one of the slices I guess close to Jacob - he reached over and took a big ol' bite. I let him keep it.

There's a couple of places we keep meaning to try out now that we're closer to them and Wheeler Farms was at the top of the list. We LOVED it. The boys liked Thanksgiving Point Farms the one time we went and we talked about going back, but when we went I was a little disappointed it wasn't more of a petting zoo and I didn't really like how it was set up - I felt like you couldn't really stand in front of one place for more than a few minutes without people coming up behind you forcing you to go to the next animal.
When we went to Wheeler Farms I knew it was similar to Thanksgiving Point in that you couldn't really pet the animals. I wasn't planning on spending more than a half hour to an hour there - once we got there I realized we could spend a couple of hours and the boys would be fine. We only brought a couple of drinks for the boys and it was almost 100 degrees so we had to leave after about an hour, but I loved that this was the kind of place I could bring the boys by myself and not feel like I'd be chasing them in different directions the whole time.  I also loved that instead of machines that dole out bird food for a quarter, you buy a bag for 50 cents and no machines that eat your quarters are involved  - I hate machines that eat quarters.

 Jacob wanted to touch the ducks, but we protected the poor little birds from Jacob until they could get into the water. He did chase a pigeon around, though, and thought it was the best day ever. I was protecting the ducks from Gus so I didn't get a picture. I was bummed.

 Bryan was scared of the geese. He claims they were hissing at him. (I'm doubtful, as this farm has been around for a while and the geese are around people all day. Plus we weren't doing anything to provoke them - as soon as Bryan noticed them he immediately walked away. And I don't think they'd keep them around if they attacked people, nor have I heard about massive geese attacks at Wheeler Farms on the news. Bryan doesn't know I doubted him, though, so don't tell him.) I had Gus by me when I took this picture, so I grabbed Gus and he picked up Jacob and we slowly walked away before they could "attack". You can see they've divided forces - the first wave comes up and eats the bird food you drop to keep them calm, then the second wave comes up behind the first wave and gets mad because all the food is gone, so they eat your kids. So we had to leave before the second wave realized all the food was gone....at least that's the "theory" floating around.