A Day at the Zoo

We finally had a break in the humidity today so the boys and I took advantage of it and spent the day at the zoo.  We wish our Firefighter could have gone with us but he was on shift.  On the days that he is on shift I try to do something fun with the boys that gets us out of the house for a little while otherwise shift days can get very long with two preschoolers.

We met some friends at the zoo around lunchtime.  Once everyone got together we ate our lunches outside.  Fortunately, the bees that seem to always be at the Zoo in August were not bad today.  During lunch we did have to take two potty breaks because we are still potty training our littlest firefighter.  He is doing so well with the potty training but this was our first adventure out of the house for the day and he didn't do too bad.  After lunch and some potty training we headed off to see the animals.

The boys love to feed the nectar to the birds at the zoo so we did that first.  I take a lot of pictures so that my Firefighter can see what we did and feel involved.  I usually text him pictures too so that he feels more in touch with us when he is on his shift.  After we fed the birds we met up with our friends again and road the train around the zoo and went to the animal petting area.  The boys just love being at the zoo and seeing the animals and exploring the different areas of the zoo.

As the day progressed, so did potty training.  Our littlest firefighter had a couple of accidents and ended up going through both sets of extra clothes that I brought for him and ended the day wearing his big brother's extra clothes.  I think that part of the potty training issue at the zoo was the fact that they have very loud hand dryers in the bathrooms.  Both of my little firefighters dislike the loud noise and cover up their ears.  I brought the potty seat with us so that my littlest firefighter would feel more comfortable but I think that he was afraid of the hand dryers.  Finally, towards the end of the day, we found a bathroom that was very quiet, was empty and had no hand dryers.  Then he went potty with no problem.  Looking back on it, maybe I should have put him in a diaper for the day but he has been doing so well with the potty training that I really did not want to take the chance that he would regress during the day so we tried it.  Overall, he did very well and I am very proud of my little guy.

I find that we go to the zoo a lot when our Firefighter is on shift.  Sometimes we will go for a couple of hours or sometimes for the whole day.  It gives us a chance to go somewhere that will not cost a lot of money but gets us out of the house, is educational and totally fun.  We usually pack our lunch and then get a snack at the zoo before we leave.  The boys were totally worn out at bedtime today so they should sleep real well tonight!