Zoo Trip

The last time that Elena and I went to the zoo was a sometime in the early fall and Dan had never been, so it was a real treat to get to go on Friday with Dan and my mom -- who by the way avoided getting in any zoo pictures somehow. :) She was here all week while my dad was on a business trip in Utah.

Family pic:

The elephants were some of Elena's favorite animals. We were able to get close which was cool. If only they had trumpeted. That would have been great. We've been teaching Elena animal sounds for a long time and she knows tons of them. It was funny that we were seeing all these animals in real life, but they were totally silent. I guess we'll have to go on safari and see them in the wild in order to show her that lions really do roar, monkeys actually say, "oo-oo, ah-ah", etc.

My mom took this picture. She thinks that it would be great to have Elena twins in real life because then she could take one home with her. Sorry, mom!

Here we are on the carousel. She sat on an animal when Granny took her, but when it was my turn, she was happy to sit on the swan bench. She loved waving at her daddy each time we went around.

At the zoo playground:

This is the best picture of the day. We taught Elena the end of the BYU fight song: "Gooooooo Cougars!" She rolls her arms during "Gooooooo" and then raises her hand in the air when we say "Cougars!" We couldn't resist when we got to this majestic animal's pen. Dan threw his sweatshirt over her to the add to the effect.

Dan decided to imitate the sleeping geese in the background.

I forgot to edit this video when my mom was still here with her Flip, but I still wanted to post it. It's a great little camcorder, but you have to have it plugged in to edit the videos - I think.
Dan and Elena are watching some geese fly by and they look identical as they both squint in the sun and turn to reveal matching profiles. The video is way too long though. All you have to do is fast forward to 30 seconds and watch until 40 - feel free to ignore the rest.

Thanks for coming, Mom! We had so much fun and we miss you already. Come again soon. :)