A Bunch of Wild Animals!

Recently, Makayla has developed a serious interest in ANIMALS, and LOVES for you to walk her through her “inventory” so she can "name them" and tell you what each animal says. She also LOVES reading her various animal books and being tested on her knowledge for every animal that she finds…ironically enough, one of her favorite places to pick them out is in their Bible…Noah’s Ark provides a lot of good material, and the Manger scene always has a good cow, at least, and that is her running favorite! :)

Off the top of my head, she’s quickest with:  Cows, Pigs, Sheep, Horses, Ducks, Lions, and Cats.  She also has a version of the word "Turtle" that cracks us up every time!

Macy knows Ducks and Cows, but is still just not ready to talk to us all that much. You can see in her eyes that she’s thinking about it all…I’m sure she’ll tell us more than we need to know once she’s ready! :)

Both girls definitely recognize dogs, too, but usually, instead of barking, they just wave and say “Hi”, since they love saying Hi to Marley!

Anyway, to embrace this newfound interest in animals, we started the day on Saturday with a trip to Chic-fil-a, where the girls love the chicken nuggets, and we were SURE Makayla would love a visit from the cow…unfortunately, we were WRONG! We learned that she loves cows from a DISTANCE, but don’t let one stand on 2 legs and walk up to her, whatever you do! :)

After lunch, we took a trip to the “Lazy 5 Ranch” so that the girls could get a REAL first-hand look at all of these things we keep talking about! It was a cold day, but the ranch is set up so that you drive through the animals in your car, and it was perfect! We cranked up the heat and started our journey!

I was a little bit freaked out, especially at first, because, believe me, these animals are NOT afraid to stick their heads in your car to find food. Unfortunately, to keep them from getting too close, I used up our entire container of food in a few short minutes, but I was happy to be rid of the mess and to be a little less alluring to those dirty llamas! :)  Makayla was a little bit intimidated at first too, but ended up hanging out the window waving "Hi" to anything she could lay eyes on!

Gary was probably as amazed as the girls…where else can you find Llamas, Zebra, Deer, Ducks, Goats, Bulls, Water Buffalo, Sheep, Horses, Cows, Pigs, AND a GIRAFFE, and a RHINOCEROUS…without leaving Mooresville!!  It really is a cool place!

After our trip, the girls were POOPED, so we turned on their favorite “Old MacDonald” Baby Einstein DVD and let them catch a quick nap on the way home!  What a fun day on the farm!