Turtleback Zoo!

While Andy spent his last day (for a while) in Germany, I took the kids to Turtleback Zoo in West Orange, NJ for the first time ever - what a great day! We have a regular Friday playdate with Ryan and Addie, and being with them (and their mom, Carol, of course!) made it even more fun. We've taken the kids to the Bronx Zoo several times, but Turtleback is only 25 or 30 minutes away, and very sweet - it even has a fantastic little train ride that goes along a nature preserve and a lovely lake and is - miraculously - included in the cost of admission.

Ollie took his very first ride ever on a horse... he really liked it! He shared a "seed stick" with Ryan in the "birdhouse," where zillions of birds swoop around and land right on your stick to eat the seeds - Maddie and Addie were transfixed! The only real mishap of the day (besides nearly losing Oliver a couple of times, and almost letting Maddie roll down a hill in her stroller) was when Ollie fell on the pavement (tripped in his new crocs, I think) and scraped his knee badly. He spent the next hour holding up his shorts so they wouldn't rub against his ouchy knee (see last photo). Poor little guy!

They both slept all the way home, which was a much longer "way" than usual, as we hit pretty bad Friday afternoon westbound traffic... I didn't mind, though, it just meant they both got decent naps. We look forward to visiting Turtleback often!