The Dallas Zoo

Or: How "What a waste of money!" turned into "I need a season pass!!!"

Every good mother of a young child knows that there will probably be at least one day each week that neither of you will get out of your pajamas, and there will also be at least one day that you reserve completely for fun times. That is how things run at my house at least. Today I took Augie to the Dallas Zoo and we had quite a day. It didn't start out that way; I don't know if it was the wrong time of day or what, but it seemed like hardly ANY animals could be seen. Then we got to the snake area, and Augie got to pet one!

That was super cool, but wasn't enough to make the $8 parking and $15 ticket worth it. We also saw some penguins...

Once again, cool but I was still miffed. Then, it happened. Right when I was about to leave this sad excuse for a "zoo", we found the The Stream. Seriously, look it up-- it is named "The Stream". It is inside the Children's Area and is was *amazing*. 

Needless to say, we were completely unprepared for this and Augie just played in his regular clothes. I wanted to let him swim naked, but I am not sure everyone else there shared my hippie mentality. 

This kid loved it and when I finally had to take him away he was arching his back and crying. My stoic little Augie-bear threw a fit. It was adorable. I couldn't stop giggling at how badly he wanted to stay. I love water too, Augie. I get it.

I mean, look at that face! "Mama!! Is this heaven?"

But alas, we did have to leave and since this unprepared mama had no change of clothes we just went to the car like this. No pants. I literally got laughed at by one lady. She spoke Spanish, but so do I. Also, it doesn't take foreign language skills to understand what pointing and laughing means. Estupida mujer. 

So, I loveloveloveloveloved the water feature, and I will someday go back, pay $8 for parking and $15 for a ticket and head STRAIGHT to The Stream/Children's petting area and make a day of it. Or maybe I will try and go on a half-price admission day. Ooo, lala.

Garden Update

My little pretties seem to be finally making so progress. One of my zucchini has a flower! 

And my sloooowwww growing little tomatoes are making progress, too...

Even my teensy little onion sprigs are looking peppier. This photo is blurry because I can't figure out how to get a close up of small things without blur. Sarah?

I have also noticed some lovely things growing on my porch. Check out this little jewel. What it that?!?! I have never seen such a lovely "weed" but I have also never seen a tiny miniature pansy. Anyone know?

And finally, I am in LOVELOVELOVE with the moss that is growing between the stones. It makes me feel like I have entered an English garden or something whenever I step outside. I thought only really old places were graced with such ...je ne se quois.

I <3 my backyard, and Augie is starting to look a little tan! I guess hope he has his papa's skin genetics?

Wheat Grass

This week I have been growing wheat grass and documenting its growth every couple of days. It is basically "full grown" as of today, and it has only been 6 days!

Crazy fast progress, if you ask me...

I bought the bag of seeds for $11 and did the actual planting on some wet paper towels layered on top of a meat roasting pan. Check out the root system!

And in case you are thinking "ELEVEN DOLLARS FOR A LITTLE TRAY OF WHEAT GRASS?!?!" Oh, no, no, no, honey-- there is more where that came from! I only used about two cups of seed for this first tray. 

Forrest and I agree this grass is so lovely and soft we want to plant it in the yard...I wonder how it does with mowing?  : P

FUN PROJECT!

Urban Hiking

     Since finishing Augie's year of pictures I have been blogging a lot less. Sort of a relaxing "phew" month, but lately I have been missing it a little. Here is funny (at least I hope so) post about the adventure Augie and I had today. Enjoy.

     This morning during Augie's first nap I decided that I would surprise Forrest with a sweet act of service and mow the back yard for him. His free time is pretty precious, what with work and a masters degree program, so why not help the fellow out? After finishing up the yard (including seeding some new grass in bald spots and watering, what-what!) I felt pretty invigorated. I have to admit, that ever since I married my strapping young buck-of-a-husband I have had to do very little outdoor manual labor, and it felt pretty good! The sense of accomplishment as sweat covered my brow and the sun shone above got me thinking, "Why don't I do stuff like this more often?" I must have been high off grass fumes because this is where my judgement started getting a little questionable. After Augie woke up and I fed him lunch he started acting kinda snotty-- you know how kids do when they are bored and the same old toys just won't cut it? After soliciting any friends to come over and play to no avail I decided to take matters into my own mommy hands; I would take Augie to the park to feed the ducks! That extra bit of crazy that was still running through my blood from earlier precipitated my next decision; We would WALK to the park. This may not seem like a crazy idea, but there are no parks in my immediate neighborhood. I looked at Google maps and plotted the best ways to avoid the highway. The journey there would take 2.5 miles. No biggie, right?! I packed up some water, crackers, Augie, some dollars (I won't tell you how many, because I don't want the internet to know how rich/poor I am) and we were OFF! The journey there was not half-bad. There were a lot of forested areas in the route we took and sidewalks the whole way. Finally, after about 40 minutes, we made it. There was a moment in the middle of the journey there where my inner athlete who had told me to do this in the first place was being strangled violently by the lazy girl, who also lives inside me, who was awoken from her afternoon nap to find that she was stranded across town with no car. Augie had fun feeding the ducks crackers and when we were getting ready to head home I got my supidest idea thus far; Why don't we take the short way home instead?! You see, the shorter way (the way I go by car) is a highway access road. Although it doesn't have a sidewalk next to it, there is at least 100 yards of grass that lead into a woodsy area, so we were never in danger of being hit, but it was a dumb idea none-the-less. Did I mention the grass is in the form of hills? Well it is. In a car it is not hard to go up and down hills. On foot with a stroller it is. Super. Duper. Uggggggh. Hard. Anyway, we finally made it past the hills and into the shopping center right before my neighborhood. We passed by the "Planned Parenthood Express" (What!?!? Express? I have no idea either.) and I really considered going in and asking them what they could do about Augie. You know...really make them uncomfortable and maybe even use an accent to feign ignorance. Say something like, "I hear from friend you take away unwanted childrens, yes?" Basically my mind went down a whole rabbit hole from there, but you get the point. Finally, right before getting home I stopped at the sub-shop and got a chocolate ice cream cone to make up for all the weight I might have lost on my trek. It takes a lot of calories stay looking like I do. I shared with Augie but at this point he was pretty pissed at me and not even chocolate was going to win him over. I put him down for a nap right when we got home and he passed out like a ... fainting goat? We had fun but all in all we were out walking for TWO AND A HALF HOURS and about five miles.

Good to know I can live without a car, but I think that I just need to make Augie more friends so there is always one available. So I can avoid and unnecessary exercise next time.

*The stroller I own has a sun-visor, so no babies were burnt in the making of this adventure.

Garden Update

After the first couple weeks of fast sprouting my vegetable garden has been really taking it's time, hence the delay of photo-evidence. Here is where I am at now:

You may not be able to tell from this view, but this is a full garden. Four zucchini plants, three watermelon plants, around ten tomato plants and five pepper plants, and of course the ever growing collection of onions. Here are some close-ups:

Zucchini!

Tomato!

I bought a little tiny mint plant about a month and a half ago and it is going nuts. It really loves the little blue pot it is in and killed off the cilantro beside it, and is taking up full residence!

This seriously used to be one teeny little plant.

Last but not least, since I am on the subject of gardening, here are the three new Knockout Rose bushes I planted a couple of weeks ago. They already have a bunch of blooms! Forrest had torn out Holly bushes that I hated about a year ago and I finally did something with the ugly, grass-less spot. I even used leftover bricks we had to make them a little retaining wall.

Outside of the living-room window I scattered a packet of wildflower seeds! I will make sure to snap a picture of those if they end up pretty. There are already centimeter high sprouts all around, so I have high hopes!

Augie's Cake Smash!

Today we went to Aunt Tammy's house and she had a lovely little spread of circus themed goodies for Augie's first birthday!

She also made him an awesome cake...

That he had fun smooshing and smashing while he ate! It was such a great time and Aug kept looking at us like "Really?! I get to do this?!!? This WHOLE cake?!!?"

Thank you Aunt Tammy for an incredible afternoon!

Happy First Birthday, Aug!

//52//

Today is Augie's first birthday and I couldn't be more in love with my little man! Today he weighed in at 23lbs 8oz, which is the 61st percentile, and was 30.5 inches long, which is the 72nd percentile. 

Here is the video montage I have been working on: Augie's First Year!

Enjoy!