It's a "full circle moment".
Making a stack of sandwiches and reinserting them into the bread bag. Grabbing a bag of chips, a bunch of grapes and a box of granola bars and heading out the door to find local adventure.
When I was a kid, it was Timpanogos Cave.
Now I'm a mom and I live in Kansas, so today it's Kansas City Zoo.
We decided to let our Union Station Passes go this year. We've done Science City. And done it, and done it and done it some more.....
We chose zoo passes this year.
And the polar bear alone makes it absolutely worth it.
He dives into the water....
Makes a graceful turn...
Gets into position....
Places his massive back paws right by your baby's face...
KICKS OFF!....
And does a perfect backflip!
Then we went all around and enjoyed all the fun things that the zoo had to offer.
Ethan got to participate in the Birds of Prey show and he was pretty cute....
Kansas City Zoo is fun, but very spread out. It takes a lot of walking to get from place to place. So we opted for the Platinum Family Pass (ooooh....so fancy!) Which gave us free rides on the train, tram, sky lift, boat and carousel.
So....
We rode the train to "Australia"....
We rode the tram out to "Africa"....
Giving us time to compare lollipops...
We rode the boat past....um....lots of tall grass.
(sorry, did not warrant pictures)
We rode the Sky Safari over the giraffes...
(Everly loved every minute).
Let's just take a minute here to recognize the evolution of my parenting. Up to this moment in time... there is not a chance in h*** I would ever let my children ride 30 feet in the air over the open pens of African animals without them all piled on or near my lap, arms clutching them all, singlehandedly saving them from falling into my own personal zoo nightmare. But....there was only room for 3 on each seat. So, I said a little prayer. Paired Laney with Ethan, Mat with Megan, and I took the two littles with me. I had a few minutes in line to impress upon my oldest children that absolutely no monkey business would be tolerated.
No "pretending to fall".
No swaying.
No unnecessary bouncing.
No "pretending to push the other person to their grisly death".
No dropping things into the exhibit.
Let's all survive.
Ethan and Laney hopped on.
Mathew and Megan hopped on.
Everly was already unconscious on my shoulder and I somehow grabbed Anna around the waist and we hopped on.
I uttered a continuous prayer as we inched over "Africa".
We reached the other side and I realized that I forgot to tell the kids not to get off! I couldn't get up because Everly was still asleep and I still had a deathgrip on Anna. So I had a loud conversation with the operator teens to get my four kids back on the ride and send them back. I admit, as I rode past my 14, 12, 10 and 7 year olds standing in a line as I went up up up and away....I thought to myself...."What in the world did I just do? I'm not sure how I will explain this decision to the police when my kids never return."
But they did.
And I feel like a highly evolved mother.
All in all, a pretty fun day and check off of the Summer Bucket List!
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