Flower's birthday at 2nd grade

flower requested my gluten free brownies for her class treat.  i was happy to oblige and the few kids in her class that are gluten free were thrilled to be able to eat the same thing as everyone else!  they all loved them and i guess the scraps that were left were evidence of that!  this is my own recipe that i developed and it's quite good. :)
ms. schmillen is great.  each kid sits in the hot seat for their birthday song and then at the end she puts her hands on their head and makes guesses on their age(obviously they are all turning 8) and goes around and around before finally saying 8 and the kids get the biggest kick out of it.  she's a good sport.
She had ms. schmillen last year, too,  but next year she moves on and she will miss her. 

preschool at the zoo

i got to go to the zoo today with river and her preschool class. what an adorable bunch of kids!  it was also a really nice day.  it was fun going through the photos with river once we got home. :)

we loved this guys tongue and super long fingers

we totally dig their 'fan' hair!

brady.gwen.river.mia.morgan.alex.teacher allison
we missed zach!

such cool red eyes

there were geese mama's laying on their eggs all throughout the zoo

i was in love with the lions today.  the male was posing so beautifully for me. ;)

river said her favorite part this time were the giraffe

i love that i caught the baby with his mouth open!  it's like he's yelling at the bird above his head that photo bombed the shot! ;)

this bird was awesome.  if i had been just a bit taller and tad quicker i'd have caught the whole thing, but the wings are still cool!

both of these birds are stunning!

the snow leopard was hilarious!  it chased it's tail before biting it and taking himself for a walk. 

it was pretty funny!

a very beautiful owl!

you can see his mouth open a bit.  this is right when he hissed and the gal said he wasn't quite ready to be pet by children. :)

all the kids loved the bunny and we they each got to pet it.

and you can't go to the zoo without going on the giraffe slide!

river calls brady her best buddy. they are so fun to watch together.  they make me laugh.  they are a lot a like in their silliness and constantly have each other laughing.

river had some allowance money so went in half for her giant sucker!  geez.  it's a jaw breaker kind.  i used to get them as a kid and forgot how much i like them!  we'd made a pretty good dent in that things.  it's gone from being green to having 10 stripes of white, yellow, green, pink, and orange.  kind of fun.  we also shared a cotton candy. it can never pass up cotton candy!  i would say it was a successful trip to the zoo!  especially because when we got in the car, river so sweetly said, "that was a nice day mom.  thanks for coming with me!"