Art, an Ark, and Aquatics

Wow, what a week. We were on the go non stop this week, but we sure had a lot of fun. My lack of posting the past couple of days has been due to my sheer exhaustion at the days end. They wore me out, and I wore them out, mission accomplished. Let's start with Tuesday. This was Art project day, and as you can see below, its a good thing I moved it outside. We started with finger paints and paper, and ended up with an extremely colorful deck. Luckily, the finger paints were washable, and then deck came clean with a little bit of water, soap, and creativity (more on that later). This kept the boys busy for hours. Who knew that all it would take was a little bit of washable paint and a large deck?

Joe Finney hard at work. I wish I would have taken a wider picture to show the extent of the "canvas".

The next day we decided to take a trip to a little place called Henry's Ark. In my opinion, this little gem is better than the zoo by far. It is basically a petting zoo on a farm about 15 minutes from our house. But it does not have your typical petting zoo animals. For starters, we were greeted by a hungry looking ostrich as soon as we pulled in the parking lot. This guy was not stupid. He knew we were bringing carrots, and he was determined to get a couple.

The first animals you come to are the zebras. They didn't come too close to us this time, but the last time we went, the zebras ate the carrots right out of the boys hands. Henry's Ark also has llamas, sheep, goats, pigs, water buffalo, peacocks (even an albino peacock), donkeys, porcupine, and many other animals, all of which you can feed. The best part about this place; it is free. It runs solely off of donations. Also, unlike the zoo, it is never crowded, and you could get in and out in about 30 minutes if you really wanted too. That is what I call great entertainment value!

The boys warming up to a very hungry goat. I wonder if anyone else feeds these goats. All of the other animals would casually and gently take maybe one or two baby carrots. But these goats would have eaten the whole bag if we let them.

B5 attempting to feed a brown sheep. These guys weren't too interested in what we had.

This is the guy who greeted us in the parking lot. He also walked us to our car as we were leaving. Trying to get more carrots out of us, I'm sure.

On Thursday, we took a trip to Target to buy some scrub brushes and sponges. Then when we got home, I filled up a bucket with soap, and set the boys loose on the deck. This was our cleanup effort for the activities we enjoyed on Tuesday. They had a ball. If only they could clean up their toys as well as they scrubbed that deck. It was sparkling.

Finally, today we went to the Oldham County Aquatic Center. I forgot my camera, which was a shame, because there was some really great photo ops. B5 and Joe Finney spent a good hour (out of the 3 hours we were there) running in and out of a large mushroom waterfall. So cute. The other two hours were spent going from pool to pool (there are three), checking out the "big" kids going down the water slide, and checking out the "big" kids jumping off the diving board.

Maybe next year we will be ready for the diving board.

I have so enjoyed this past week being able to spend lots (and lots) of time with my precious little guys. It's nice to get some alone time with them before "baby sister" arrives. More adventures to come...

Emily