On Wednesday, we took the day off of the beach and went to the San Diego Zoo with Travis, Lorraine, Sarah, and Garrett.
The BEST part of the zoo, BY FAR, was the gorillas. The Boss gorilla had his rear right against the glass display when we first walked up to it, but Stella was too busy looking far into the habitat for the other gorillas that she didn't see him 1 foot away from her. I wish I would have had video of when she finally did see him as she walked along the glass case because it was quite the shock and hilarious.
The Boss gorilla moved to a better seat to observe 2 other gorillas totally wrestling. Stella was concerned for a little bit because of the bearing of teeth, the smacking of their heads against the glass, and the sudden attacks . . . but when I pointed out that she does the same things to us at home, she was like, "Oh." Then she was fine and thought it was hilarious.
The gorillas wrestled for quite some time until the little gorilla won by sitting on the bigger gorilla's head. So entertaining.
Stella would totally ride a gorilla.
We stuck around some of the animals a little longer than we needed just so see if they were real . . .
. . . like this alligator . . . it never moved . . .
. . . and this hippo . . . also, never moved. Travis is still convinced that they were statues.
The Pandas had their very own private display where we were instructed to whisper even though there was a zoo lady using a microphone to describe Panda behavior and these specific pandas.
Interesting facts:
1) These pandas only weigh about 120 pounds (the zoo lady was very defensive of his size and said at least 3 times that size does not matter),
2) they are vegetarians and only eat cold/moist bamboo or leaves so the zoo has to refrigerate their foliage,
3) the girl panda is only fertile 2 days out of the year,
4) me too,
5) if she is pregnant, she's due in August,
6) me too,
7) once again in defense of the boy panda's size, the zoo lady said, "he hasn't ever missed those 2 days."
8) neither has Elliot.
After the San Diego Zoo took Beth's life savings to pay for lunch, we headed over to the Polar Bears.
This one was cooling his uma-goolies.
Did you know that polar bears can be 10 feet tall? Stella wanted to climb the bigger one, but I wouldn't let her.
My favorite zoo sign of the day was at the lion cage. We needed one of those at our house when my cousins would teach us how to do blue darts.
The best quote of the day, even though I didn't get it, came with observing the camels when Elliot said something about this pathetic looking creature listening to Bob Marley and not being able to give up the ganja.
We made it around to most of the rest of the zoo, including the petting zoo (which I avoided), until the kids decided they were done (I was sort of done too . . . but not until I got my giant over-priced chocolate ice cream cone).
. . . guaranteed that Stella's favorite part of the zoo didn't have anything to do with the animals.
It was a lot of walking, but it was an absolutely beautiful day and the animals were out where we could see them . . . that's a successful zoo trip. I was excited for a little nap when we got back to camp because of the massive headache I was working on, but what we were really excited about was this bowl of goodness. . .
Lorraine makes the best guacamole!
It was good for the kids to spend the day apart because they played so nicely together when we got back.
Marshmallow face.
Elliot had his annual company conference at the Four Seasons Resort in Scottsdale this year. I seem to recall taking Stella for a night last year and vowing never to bring her again, but there she is. She gets so incredibly excited about staying at hotels and resorts that she is even more impossible to get to bed. She finally zonked out after 11 p.m. and many, many threats on her life, but not before she knocked a Heineken out of the fridge and broke it. Luckily we didn't have to pay for it.
The next morning I got a prenatal massage. Holy moly. Wow. Amazing. I should get one every week! Elliot is so wonderful for signing me up! Elliot was also able to finally enjoy his very first massage while he was at the resort. He's never wanted one (or had time), so when someone else canceled and he had a morning free of meetings, he got one and LOVED IT!
Elliot and Stella went swimming during my massage and I joined them a little later. We went to eat lunch at the President's suite and Stella go to hold Elliot's coworker's new baby girl. She was in heaven! I had to laugh because as I was talking to the mother of the wee babe about her birth story, suddenly I looked up and noticed that EVERYONE in the room had shifted from the seating area to standing in the dining area. What? Have you never heard a birth story or do you just not like hearing about placentas?
The night we got there, we joined Elliot in his schmoozing of the clients. I guess in previous years, everyone had been a little rowdy meeting in just one suite, so they split it up into 4 suites that everyone could rotate to throughout the evening. Stella acted all shy when we first got there, but within a minute, we looked over in the corner where we heard laughing and saw her sitting there with some clients chatting it up and making them laugh. It's still a mystery how she is my child. She talked to everyone and told them ridiculous stories until Elliot got embarrassed and sent us back to our room.
I was able to join Elliot again on Friday night (thank you Grandma for watching Stella). He was in meetings most of the day, so I got to spend a little bit of time at the pool and take a soak in the tub. He let me join him in his evening rotation of chatting with clients at different suites and didn't even send me back to the room because I didn't embarrass him with stories like Stella does. However, he may have been embarrassed by my size because apparently I'm huge. For as I walked into one of the suites, someone took one look at me, gasped over-dramatically, and said, "Do you need a wheelchair? You're HUGE!" Seriously people . . . have you never seen a pregnant person?!
