Phoenix Zoo Animals

Today Caleb and I went to the Phoenix Zoo with our friends. The sole point to the trip was to take a picture of a tiger. My sister's planning the most amazing zoo party for her daughter's birthday next week and asked me if I had any pictures of animals on my computer. I didn't have much, but told her that I would gladly go to the zoo for her and take lots of pictures. Fortunately, our friends today were very understanding of my picture taking purpose and didn't complain about the almost four hundred pictures I took while at the zoo. (How we ever lived without digital cameras I just don't know.)

No, not all four hundred are of the animals. But here's a few of the ones that are, complete with names, just in case.

Giraffes



Tiger


Lion


Rhino


Mandrill



Baboon


Peacock



Flamingos




Squirrel Monkeys -- this was my favorite part of the whole zoo (because they let you walk through the monkeys' cage basically) so there are a lot more pictures






Galapagos Tortoise


Rhinoceros Iguana


Zebra

Drinking Root Beer

At the Park with Naomi

Saturday night, we babysat Naomi. She was a little sad that her parents were leaving to have fun without her, so we thought we ought to have some fun too. She really wanted to go outside (probably in hopes that she'd catch her parents before they left, but we stalled just long enough). Off to the park we went.

It was so fun having both Caleb and Naomi there. They love playing with one another. And they keep each other so occupied and entertained, that all I have to do is sit and take pictures of them. (In fact, a little before we left the park, it was starting to get dark, so I'd quit taking pictures and Caleb insisted that I needed to come take their picture.)

First up, Naomi wanted to swing. So then Caleb wanted to swing too. They thought it was especially funny when I stood in between the two of them and pretended like they were going to get me (which they never managed).









Caleb was done with swinging long before Naomi. So while she kept on, he found other things to play with.






Once Naomi was finally done swinging, they played together chasing dogs around, playing on the toys, and trying to capture Harley.




Naomi couldn't get up on the seesaw on her own, so Caleb helped her.




Harley was exhausted by the time the kids stopped chasing him. For a little guy, he runs really fast.

Devil Love

When Caleb was eleven months old, we went on a cruise to the Caribbean. One of our stops was the Cayman Islands where we visited the town of Hell and bought Caleb the smallest sized t-shirt we could find while we were there. The shirt seemed so huge, I thought our child would never fit it. Low and behold, never has arrived.


I wanted to take pictures for Valentine's Day. When I asked Caleb if we could go outside and take pictures, he said no. So I took Harley outside instead. Naturally, Caleb followed us out and when Harley proved to be a terrible model, Caleb jumped in to help him.


Caleb says all the time, "Harley, you're my best friend." Which makes me so glad we got a puppy.

My Little Slugger

Caleb's been taking a baseball class for about a month now. It's once a week, a little earlier in the morning than I would like, but he absolutely loves it. Whenever we remind him that he has his baseball class the next day, he says, "With my boys?"

Here they are sitting in the "dugout" doing their stretches. Caleb is sitting next to the coach. There's a lot of parent involvement in this class just because the kids are so young.



They run bases, do fielding drills, and practice throwing. It's a class of two year olds so it's basically semi-organized chaos. But Caleb has learned a lot.



Caleb bats left handed. He has since the very first day we put a bat in his hand and taught him to hit. (Well, we taught him right handed and he hit that way for maybe an hour of his life. But then that same day decided left handed was the way for him.) His swing is weird since taking baseball class. He does real good at getting his back elbow up, but then somehow, maybe he's trying too hard to remember what he was taught, but his swing just looks so unnatural now.



When all else fails and the kids are too distracted or just uninterested in playing anymore, the coach gets out the hula hoops. Every time Caleb sees the hula hoops, he always goes running back out to play. In fact, today, Brandon told Caleb to go get the very best toy from his room for them to play together. Caleb went running down the hall shouting behind him, "I'm gonna get my hula hoop."