First stop: a zoo Max knows, so he felt comfortable exploring. He made a beeline for the train—the one he wailed about getting on a couple of months ago.
He rode the merry go round! He's never wanted to do that before.
He pointed at three pigs and said "Ax! Ohhmmy! Addddy!" Which made Sabrina wail in despair, "I waaaaaaaaaaant to be a pig too!"
We were all charmed by the giraffes. Max told me this one's name was "Ax," too. Max's ego seems to be experiencing a growth spurt.
And then, two gigantic tortoises. "Ax!" said Max, pointing to both of them.
They soon confirmed that they were, in fact, a boy tortoise and a girl tortoise as a crowd of us stood there, gawking. "They're just playing," parents told their kids. It was totally bizarre, like watching Animal Planet live—except with the stuff they edit out.
In other news, this weekend Max floated by himself in a tube for the first time.
Sabrina went surfing...on her daddy. Just in case anyone needed further proof that he lets her walk all over him.
One night, we went to a fifties style ice-cream parlour, where Max ate two scoops of chocolate ice-cream and met Elvis. (This place specialized in The Elvis Pretzelly, ice-cream in a pretzel cone.)
The kids loved the car booths.
Tonight, Sabrina and I went for a walk together on the beach while Dave and Max hung out and ate yet more chocolate ice-cream.
She made me a sand cake.
But of course, there's nothing like riding the car shopping cart at Best Buy.
Gotta hand it to those turtles for overcoming all circumstances for love. That looks so incredibly inconvenient!
ReplyDeleteMy 3-year-old loves to go on merry-go-rounds but will only sit on a bench. She's so prim and proper sitting there on her bench and she truly enjoys herself, so I just let her be. But it cracks me up how different my 2 daughters are -- the oldest was riding on the animals since about 6 months of age and is so happy that she's now big enough to ride without an adult standing by.
I just hope you didn't name the girl tortoise Sabrina after establishing that it was a female...
ReplyDeleteI must be a fifth grader because I am totally giggling at the facial expression of the turtle on top's face.
ReplyDeleteCharlie's all-time favorite thing to do is to ride in the cart at Walmart. Does that make me a bad Mom?
What a fab weekend!! Such great firsts! Xxx
ReplyDeleteHow great that Max is dialing down the wailing and dialing up the vocalizing! And floating all by himself, too! AND trying new stuff!
ReplyDeleteAnd those giant TURTLES! No matter what the animal (dog, cat, pig, tortoise...!!!) the universal parentspeak for "Those animals are doing the nasty but we're gonna pretend not to notice" is "They're just playing!" Reminds me of the neighbor's dogs when I was a kid!
Looks like everone had a great time...especially the turtles. ;)
ReplyDeleteWow -- you managed that in one weekend?
ReplyDeleteSounds like a blast.
thank you for sharing, I'm all smiles! Not just because of the turtles either...
ReplyDeleteI didn't expect to see hot tortoise-on-tortoise action on your blog, lol. Your kiddos are so cute, thanks for sharing the pix!
ReplyDeleteTurtles humping?
ReplyDeleteGREATEST...BLOG...EVER!!!
Looks like the perfect end-of-summer trip!! I loved the zoo as a kid too...still do! :)
ReplyDeleteI have a similar shot on my camera phone of the tortoises at the San Diego Zoo. I guess that speaks volumes on the sex drive of turtles! Sounds like it was a great weekend...and look how far Max has come!
ReplyDeleteAww Looked like a Great Fun Weekend! :D
ReplyDeleteYou have the most beautiful kids!
ReplyDeleteI saw the giant land tortoise with 2 backs, too - at the Phoenix Zoo. The male was making this amazing sound "mooooooooooaaaaaaaaannnnnnn grunt grunt moooooooooooaaaaaaaan" and people could hear it all over that part of the zoo. So, of course, kids are running over to find out what's making that sound....
Turtle love. It's priceless.
We live on a farm so my kids are used to animals "just playing" or we say "wrasslin"
ReplyDeleteok so why is there not a huge overpopulation of giant tortoises because I also have seen them doing the nasty.
ReplyDeleteWow, now that looks like a fun weekend!!!
ReplyDelete