Friday, April 4, 2014

Arizona Visit: More Pictures

We had such a great trip, here are some more pictures from random days throughout. 






Watching the sunset our last night there

Arizona Visit: Petting Zoo

We took one afternoon in Arizona and went to a Wild West Petting Zoo. Simon totally loved it. There were horses (of course), and pigs, and goats (or sheep?), and peacocks, and donkeys and I'm sure a few more animals that I've forgotten. Simon did a quick pony ride, patted all the animals and generally had a great time.


He has a little beard - so he's a GOAT!
You can touch them! See, it is okay. 
Ok, Grandma Kiki... I'll sneak up and touch this one.



Who is up there?

Arizona Visit: Stone Cold Simon

In the morning before we went to see the butterflies we went to Stone Cold Creamery's corporate headquarters to eat ice cream for a fundraiser for a charity that Grandpa Bart is involved with.  Also at the event were Miss Tempe and a couple of the Phoenix Coyotes cheerleaders, all of whom were super nice and even gave Simon a chance to show off his dance moves with a pom-pom. Though we asked the ice cream folks to give Simon the smallest ice cream, he got a normal serving and astounded us all by eating it and asking for bites of ours. In body to ice cream ratio that boy had about 7 gallons of ice cream. He was pretty happy.


All three look equally comfortable in front of the camera

The cheerleaders loved the baby

The baby loved the pom-poms

Simon gets a cheerleader tryout

Arizona Visit: Butterfly Wonderland

This series of posts were a long time coming! The pictures were worth waiting for at least.

We went to Butterfly Wonderland one afternoon while we were in Arizona. It was so much bigger than our local butterfly room - they even had a 3-D movie about butterflies before we went into the exhibit. It was the first time Simon had ever been in a movie in a theater! He totally loved it and asked a ton of questions. In the butterfly room we took lots of family pictures and looked at fish and of course saw lots of butterflies! As we walked out they had bees and ants and fish and, most amazingly, a sting ray touching pool. Simon and Alan spent about 30 minutes with two fingers in the water letting sting rays swim by and touch Simon's fingers. He was totally amazed. On our way out there was gift shop and Alan and I got Simon a stuffed sting ray to help remember the occasion. Simon named his stuffed-ray Luke-Luke and we spent the next couple days putting two fingers into an imaginary pool so Luke-Luke could swim over them.

Look at that Butterfly!
Best Simon Smile - but everyone else was making a funny face. 





Butterfly on her!
Touched a Sting Ray (Or as Simon called them Sting Rings)

Can I pick that flower?



Standing very still so butterflies would want to land on him like they did with Mama

Some other little kids there found pill bugs/roly polies in the dirt and Simon was super excited to hold them

Do you want to hold him?  He's so nice!

Thursday, April 3, 2014

Big morning

Through all the other activities Lillian also spent the week learning to sleep on her belly. Meant many angry wake ups and not much sleep for us. Hopefully she figures it out soon. Lack of sleep did not stop her from playing hard. 

High Stakes Game of Bingo