Day at the Zoo

I was so excited to take Grant to the zoo this year.  I decided to get a zoo pass with some of our income tax refund and I think it's definately going to pay for itself.  Grant had a blast and even though the beginning of the day was rainy and cold, it turned out to be a perfect day.

I didn't prepare for it to be as cold as it was, so luckily we had a winter hat and blanket in the van.  I don't think Grant cared what the weather was like.  He was just excited to see everything.

 

It's amazing how much kids grow and change in such a short amount of time.  We were at the zoo in October of last year and he wasn't naming hardly any of the animals and now he wanted to know what every animals name was and was giddy at the sight of them.

 

With the way the day started I was afraid no one would actually get to see the zoo shirt I made for him.  Fortunately after about an hour the sun started shining and the temperature started rising.

 

 

We always take our own snacks,drinks, and lunch since I have no desire to pay $8 a piece for a meal and God knows how much for a drink and a little snack.  I made blueberry, apricot, and almond granola bars (recipe here), and packed Grant some trail mix of dried apricots, dried blueberries, peanut butter cheerios, pretzels, and quaker oatmeal square cereal.  He was all about it and surprisingly loved the dried apricots.  Who knew?  I can't normally get him to drink much water but with his new water bottle he didn't want anything else.

 

I think his favorite part was the aquarium.  He loved how close the fish were to him.

 

Growing up we never took big vacations to Disney World or the beach but every year we made it to the zoo and we loved it!  I know Grant will be just as excited as I used to be and I can't wait to take him again.

 

 

 

 

Wild Child Zoo Shirt and Water Bottle

I've been on the hunt for things to do with Grant this summer.  I desperately want to keep him busy and entertained, with the idea this will minimize the tantrums and fit throwings.

I know this is probably wishful thinking but a mama's gotta have hope.

We took him to the zoo last year for the first time and he loved it, we had a great time so I started looking into a membership.  Turns out they aren't too bad in price when you add in the parking fees and the fact that Grant is over the age of 2 which means we have to pay a whopping $10 admissions for him.

Which I personally think is a little crazy but whatever.

Naturally I figured if we would be going to the zoo Grant would need a zoo shirt (and since it's Kids Clothing Week I figured it's the perfect time to finish one).  I always go through the gift shops and see all these cute things I want to buy, you know as if Grant cares if he has a shirt that says zoo on it, but never want to pay the money for them.  Let's face it, most of the stuff they will never play with or only wear a short while.  And what kind of crafty Mama would I be if I didn't at least attempt to make him a shirt myself.

Since I have a new obsession with freezer paper stenciling I thought the zoo shirt was a great excuse to feed into that obsession.  I googled zoo animal silhouette and decided on a rhino.  Mainly because it seemed boyish, don't ask me why, it just did.

I printed the image in the size I wanted, traced it onto freezer paper, cut it out with an exacto knife, ironed and painted it onto the shirt.  Here was the end result:

 

I look at some blogs and they have the cutest pictures with their kids posing so nicely in the clothes they lovingly made.  It took me 10 minutes to get the picture you see above.  He kept turning to the side and turning his back to me.  Then wanted to look through all the pictures on my camera.

 

 

And it wouldn't be complete without throwing himself on the floor at least once, shouting "NO", when asked to show me his new shirt.

 

I thought "Wild Child" was the perfect  wording for the shirt.

 

 

I debated for awhile on whether or not to put the Columbus Zoo and the year on the back.  Why do I debate over such things?  In the end I decided if I were to buy one at the zoo gift shop it would have the year on it so mine should too.

 

No trip to the zoo would be complete without a water bottle.  Last year we had a regular old sippy cup but I have found I can actually get Grant to drink water if it's in a water bottle, he loves them.  I bought these at Hobby Lobby 40% off for $1.74. 

 

(please excuse the wrong turned picture, I can't for the life of me get it to upload in the right direction)

 

I used my Cricut and vinyl from Expressions Vinyl to decorate the outside with polka dots and their names.  I had to make one for my neice as well, since she will be with us on at least one trip to the zoo.

 

I'm in love with these bottles, they are too cute, and Grant carries his all over the house.

 

 

 

 

 

 

1st Trip to the Zoo

Over the weekend we took Grant to the zoo for the 1st time and I have to admit I think I was more excited than anyone.  I felt like I was a kid all over again, it was great.  Our zoo lets you bring in coolers, food, and drinks so naturally I wanted to take a picnic rather than spend a small fortune on their food.  I think my husband was even glad I brought stuff from home when he saw the price of a bottle of water was $2.75.  Craziness!
Our lunch menu consisted of tuna salad wraps, bacon ranch pasta salad, and brownie bites for dessert.  I threw the pasta salad together with no real recipe but my oh my it was so delish I could have finished the entire bowl.  Because I loved it so much I wanted to share my make-shift recipe.

Bacon Ranch Pasta Salad
1/2 box dry pasta (any kind you have in the pantry will do)
about 1/2c ranch dressing
4 strips of cooked bacon (I cooked mine on a baking sheet in a 350 degree oven for 15 minutes)
1/2 red pepper chopped
1/2 yellow pepper chopped
1/4c canned or frozen and thawed peas
1/4c shredded cheese
1/2 green pepper chopped

cook your pasta using the instructions on the side of the box, drain and cool by running under cold water.  Put pasta in a bowl along with the red, yellow, and green peppers, peas, and cheese, mix together.  Chop bacon into small pieces and add to mixture alond with ranch dressing, mix thoroughly and refrigerate before serving.  Just before you want to serve your pasta salad pour a small amount (a few tablespoon fulls) of ranch dressing on top and mix together one last time.
I promise you will be going back for seconds.

The brownie bites I made using a store bought brownie mix and my mini muffin tin.  I love white chocolate and a few months back my local grocery store had a sale on white chocolate chips and I got about 8 bags for $1 each, so I add them to everything, even brownies.  I threw in about 1c of the white chocolate chips into the brownie batter before baking and it gave them just the right stuff to satisfy my sweet tooth. 

I was really worried that my super energetic little man would throw quite a few fits throughout our trip because he can't stand to sit for very long and his attention span is about 3 minutes.  I decided I needed some new toys/occupyers (is that even a word?) that he had never seen that may ward off a tantrum or two.  The crafter in me didn't contemplate buying new toys, but of course immediately started thinking of what I could make in about 24 hours since our trip was only planned about 2 days in advance.  I decided on an ISpy bag, that has been on my to-do list forever, and a fabric zoo animal  photo book.  I have seen  many different ways to make ISpy bags over the last few years but of course didn't have time to find and follow one.  So I was just winging it along with the photo book.

(I ended up having to scale down the above ISpy bag when I realized it was a smidge too big but used the same fabric and same toys)

I was really excited with how they turned out but found quite a few problems with the photo book, which is why there is no tutorial for it.  I plan on making him another one with photos of our trip and including a tutorial without all my rookie mistakes.

I actually used pictures my mom had in photo albums from when I was a kid visitin the zoo.  As you can tell this book was a quickie project and no where near perfect but it was cute watching Grant look through it.