farm day at the zoo

we went to church sunday morning because we had the block party saturday night. it was so beautiful sunday that i couldn't even think of keeping the kids inside. so i thought that the kids and i should go to the zoo to check out the family farm weekend for a little while before lunch. daddy had to work on getting the lawn mowed so he couldn't join us. (the last time he was mowing the yard one of the wheel bolts broke and he needed to get that resolved before our yard got too much more out of control.)

i fed the kids a quick snack, changed their clothes, and we were off. we were going to only have an hour or two but that is the beauty of the zoo pass, it didn't cost us anything. we rarely go into the farm portion of the zoo because that is where the playground is and i like to avoid it; we can go to the playground at home.

it was a beautiful day and not too crowded. we walked up right as they were giving an ice cream making demonstration. madelyn got to wait in line and take a turn at the crank before getting to sample the ice cream. after that we walked over to the bee exhibit and madelyn got a stamp on her hand (it was very exciting) and i bought a few honey sticks. madelyn and mason ended up sharing a stick of honey (essentially it was a plastic straw filled with honey and pinched closed at the ends). we sampled strawberry and chocolate milk and walked through the 'dairy barn'.

we stopped by the butterfly garden on our way out. i was surprised how many butterflies there were in the garden. the path was mulch so madelyn explored it on her own so that i didn't have to fight the stroller down the path. she was also delighted to find out that there was a bench just her size in the garden.

as part of the farm weekend they had the lady who raises the butterflies for the garden set up next to the garden with some monarch caterpillars and several chrysalises. i guess we had missed a new butterfly that came out an hour earlier. madelyn really liked looking at everything and hearing about the whole process.

i was glad that we made the trip out to the zoo. madelyn was a little disappointed that we didn't go see the rest of the zoo but i told her that we would be able to come back soon. love.