A trip to the zoo & the village

As I mentioned in my post from yesterday, we spent Easter weekend in Boise/Meridian with my family and I took so many pictures that I thought I would split up the days a bit. Here's what we did on SATURDAY ...

Unlike the torrential rain we drove through on Friday morning, we woke up to a beautiful sunny day on Saturday so my mom, brother, Nic, and I decided to take Liam to the zoo. I was bummed at first to see that we missed their annual Easter egg hunt by a week but ended up being thankful that it wasn't crowded at all. It was so fun to reminisce all morning about the first time we took Liam there! He was only 11 months old and just learning to walk in that adorable arms up in the air at all times stumble way! So much has changed since then. This time he was running around everywhere he went and mimicking animal sounds. The first animals we came across were the monkeys and Liam was hysterically belly laughing every time one would leap from a ledge and swing by its tail across a rope to get to the other side. We (including everyone around us) were in a fit of giggles just listening to his contagious laughter. It was by far one of the highlight moments of our time there!

If you look closely at this silly monkey, he is trying to eat a bug that is on the other side of the glass window haha ...

Another entertaining animal was this crane. My brother (who you see in the background) had his hand leaning against one of a few layers of caged fence and the crane immediately whipped its head around and began pecking through the mesh. He jerked his hand away and goes, "Oh, that's why they hung this sign that says not to put your hands near the mesh." Leave it to him to live on the wild side! 

Even though it is pretty blurry I had to include this next picture too to show you how concerned Liam was after the bird attacked the fence. haha It also wasn't our only crazy bird story from the day ... Liam was walking beside us and we were all looking up at monkeys one last time as we passed by and all of a sudden I see Liam slowly approaching a goose with his hand outstretched and the biggest smile on his face. When he was within inches of the goose's face it started hissing at him and Liam booked it out of there and into my arms! haha

There were literally geese EVERYWHERE you looked throughout the zoo and after the hissing experience, Liam was so fascinated with watching them but only from a FAR and protected distance.

Like from this hut for example ;) ...

Driving the jeep with Sita just like a much tinier version of himself did two years ago!

It is kind of hard to tell in this picture but the reason why Liam is so slumped down while driving with me is because there wasn't enough room between the steering wheel and my growing belly for him to fit. haha

Another pretty grainy iPhone picture but a priceless moment caught when he went down this giraffe slide for the first time. It was SUPER steep and it took all four of us encouraging him to go down it while he remained frozen at the top for a good 20 seconds. His face looked terrified the whole way down and then of course the second his toes touched the ground he yells "MORE!" haha And down it he went about 3 more times before we finally had to pry him away to see the rest of the zoo. 

Most of the animals were sleeping or too far off in the distance to see while we were there. Like these missing in action prairie dogs for example that you are supposed to be able to see up close from the tunnel that Liam and Nic are in together. "Hi, Liam!"

As soon as the carousel came into view Liam started begging to go on it so we let his uncle take him for a spin! He originally let Liam pick which animal he wanted to ride but out of all of them Liam chose this boring white bench that you see behind them. Who is this kid?! So we encouraged my brother to plop him up on top of Rue and the Easter Bunny's twin to commemorate the holiday weekend instead. ;) He was a happy camper after that!

After our morning at the zoo we went back to my mom's to put Liam down for his nap and then she sweetly babysat while Nic and I went on a long overdue date! We went to the Village Theatre in Meridian and saw Beauty and the Beast. It was even better than I hoped it would be, we both LOVED it!! The whole time I kind of felt like I was at a Broadway play and you can never go wrong with Emma Watson in my opinion. It was so much fun spending time together, just the two of us. 

We went back to my mom's house after the movie and had dinner before coming right back to the Village again to let Liam ride the slide and play near the fountain. 

We got back home just in time for Liam to go to bed. We all had a bite of this amazing egg-shaped fruit pizza my mom made for dessert while watching the movie Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them. I had such high hopes for this movie (haven't read the book though). Mostly because I love the Harry Potter series so much but the movie was sometimes hard to follow and felt really drawn out (it is 3 hours long!). My mom and I didn't love it but I was glad that Nic did because he is often roped into sitting through chick flicks whenever he is with us. haha 

 I think it's safe to say I could spend every Saturday like this one!