Miami zoo

Hey Little Sister!

I hope you are having a fabulous week!  I am excited to hear how your first week in Cali is going, and all about your companion. 

We have done some fun things the past week.  I hosted my first book club.  We read the Ruby Red series.  For the discussion, I did a Ruby Red Tea Party.   I had a variety of herbal teas, hot chocolate, fruit, cupcakes, nuts, and raspberry sweet rolls.  It was a fun girls night. 

Last Saturday we had a family day at the Miami Zoo!  This was our first time attending,  we loved it so much we ended up just getting a year membership.  The Zoo is enormous!  There is a large variety of animals and they are all really spread out.  So there is quite a bit of walking in between exhibits.  It was the perfect weather, high 60's to low 70's.  

I really liked the open feeling of this zoo.  Most of the animal cages are separated by a canal of water with only a short 2-3 foot fence on the other side.  It gives the feeling of actually seeing the animals out in the wild since you aren't peering through a fence but can actually easily see over the fence.

They had a giraffe feeding exhibit! It was so cool!  We got to feed the giraffes a bowl of lettuce.  They will eat the lettuce right out of your hand with there big black tongues.

Ayla fed them one piece but I think the big tongue freaked her out, because she didn't want to do it again after that.

That gorilla with his back to us, it is totally is taking a big dump right there!

 I told Ayla I wanted to take her picture and this is what she did.  Haha.  Little poser.

 Ayla loved the petting zoo section.  There was a basket of brushes so you could walk around and brush the goats and the big huge pig!  Ayla was in heaven.  She loved brushing the animals.  She walked around and made sure she got to brush every single goat multiple times, shouting BAAA, over and over as she did it.  It was pretty adorable.

 Ayla also tried feeding this little monkey a few rocks.  He was a cute little guy.

Confession time.  Get this, they give camel rides at the zoo!  I have always thought is would be so cool to ride a camel (elephants too, I would love to ride an elephant someday).  Anyway, I knew Ayla would be too scared to ride the camel, she will barely sit on a horse for 5 seconds, and I felt silly riding the camel by myself.  But we have a year membership so gosh darn it, I will ride a camel at the Zoo by the end of the year, even if I have to do it alone.  Haha.  

Last Sunday the 49ers played in the playoffs.  We all sported Chris's team in our 49er fan wear.  Mean game faces and all!

Too bad they still lost. 

Chris had to travel on business this week for a few days, so we kept busy taking Zuri for walks, playing with sidewalk chalk, and going to the park by our house.

I aslo signed Ayla up for another session of Mommy and Me Gymnastics.  We had our first class on Wednesday.  Ayla loves the trampolines and walking on the balance beams.  She hates the bars, and cries when I try to make her hang from them so we just observe the other kids during that part.  She is getting really good at her forward roll and can almost do it perfectly by herself now.  The teacher is really amazing with little kids!  There are two other little girls that are in our ward and in nursery with Ayla in the class so that is fun as well.

Ayla still insists on throwing majority of her food on the floor and to Zuri, which really makes me want to scream!  I have tried everything I can think of, besides beating her, and for the life of me I can not get her to stop!  

 I will say it is pretty cute how she eats cereal, even though it is super messy.  She eats it normal at first with her spoon, then she starts taking handfuls of cereal out of her bowl and setting it on her tray so she can drink the milk from the bowl, and then she will shove handfuls of the soggy cereal off her tray and into her mouth.  She eats it like this every time, throwing half of it on the floor as well of course. 

She can say turtle.  She pronounces it tootal.  We stopped by the library so I could grab my new book for book club (we are readying The Shoemakers Wife) and they asked me to fill out a survey, so I obliged, and then Ayla got to pick out a prize.  She chose a little stuffed turtle, and she has been saying "tootal" ever since. 

Week two of the yearly meal planning has gone great.  This week I made, Turkey Casserole, Apple Pork Chops, Spaghetti with Zucchini Parmesan and  Chicken taco soup.  (For others reading this, I made a goal this year to cook dinner at least 4 times a week. I have always struggled with figuring out what to make for dinner.  So I bought a meal planner, it has as all the meals planned out for the whole year along with corresponding grocery lists for each week.  I must say I really love it!  Everything we have been made has been healthy, delicious and simple to make.  And it has been really fun to try new recipes.) 

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Check out this House! WOWZA!!!

Here is a pic taken from the third floor.  Amazing right?!

Chris had a conference with the Promotional Cruise Ship companies and their Port Lectures.  This is where the port lectures are put up for the week by the cruise ship promotional companies for the conferences.   There were only 15 people staying here, that is a lot of house for only 15 people.  It is also right on the water with a beautiful sun balcony on the roof!  Anyway, when Chis showed me the pictures I was so jealous.  I would give my big toe to be able to walk through this house.  

This Saturday Chris gave me a day to myself!  It was so nice!  I went to the Aventura Mall which is AMAZING!  Love that place!  It was so great to be able to go shopping and take my time and browse and try on whatever I wanted because I was alone!

 New Sunnies!  Shopping bags! and Couscous Salad!

  As a mom alone time is scared and precious.  I was gone all day, like 6 hours.  Chris watched Ayla the whole time by himself, he doesn't get to do that enough, I have decided.  When I got back he was so exhausted.  Haha!  I think he appreciated a taste of what it is like in the day of me.  

This weekend was our district stake conference.  Saturday night was the adult session and then the normal 2 hour session on Sunday.  I went to the adult only session alone, I had tried to get a babysitter but the youth 12 and older were invited to go as well so Chris sat this one out since he was so exhausted from watching Ayla all day. ;)  It was really good!  They talked about using social  media as a missionary tool which was very revolutionary in my opinion.  I was really inspired.  Are you using Facebook to teach in your area Chelacie?  I think it is a great idea and I remember Chandler talking about using it in certain areas during his mission.  I also think that is pretty sweet that you are using iPads to teach.  

The Sunday Conference session was good, but Ayla was not so good.  Chris and I basically took turns walking with her in the halls the whole time.  

I hope you are having a fabulous week!  I love you and I am so proud of you!