trip to John Ball Zoo

We surprised the kids with a trip to the zoo this summer.  We didn't tell them where we were going until we were already in the parking lot. 

It was so funny because the second we got out of the car (and the kids still didn't know where we were) a squirrel ran across the parking lot... Kendyl yells, "Look, a squirrel!" with a ridiculous amount of excitement.  Hehehe, a squirrel is cool, but we were at the zoo. :)

Riding the Camel.

Petting the Sting Rays.

The bears were pretty cool.

Playing on the John Ball statue.

We happened to go on the day they were releasing hundreds of monarch butterflies!  And there was a news reporter to capture the event.  The kids entered their name, along with about a hundred other kids, to 'win' a chance to release a butterfly or get to take home a caterpillar.

Aden was called to release a butterfly!  Awesome!

Then Kendyl was called -- she got to take 3 little caterpillars home!! She was SO excited!!!

John Ball Zoo is not that exciting of a zoo, but the kids enjoyed it, and we did too.

     Our favorite thing was the        

Budgie cage!        

    

                                                        All in all, it was a great family day! 

(side note... all 3 caterpillars died... and another one we found on some milkweed plants in the backyard... lots of tears...)  maybe next year we'll try that again!