4th of July - the Zoo

All those posts and that wasn't even the actual holiday. I promise to keep this one short and sweet. The 4 of us headed to the NC Zoo on our way home from Winston Salem. Best day of the year to go to the zoo... no one was there. We practically had the place to ourselves, which really came in handy when we got to meet this guy:



Had it been any other non-family kid, I totally would have pushed him out of the way, but alas it was my sweet little boy.

That same little boy got a big kick out of the zoo map. And the juice box.



The obligatory statue picture:



And OBVIOUSLY I had to take a picture of the Hen with the giraffes. Obviously. (PS Riverbanks has a 4 week old giraffe. This makes me so excited, I can hardly stand it)



The NC Zoo has about 5 miles of walking trails, and we saw all but one of the areas. I was amazed that John Dickson walked the majority of it, and I'd be shocked if he walked less than 2.5 miles. We had a busy weekend and we just knew, especially after the zoo, that the boys would just conk out in the car.

And so, naturally, they didn't.

We stopped for dinner and stopped again at the outlet mall. At this point it was after 9 and dark outside. We had pretty much given up on John Dickson sleeping, but Hen... The Hen always sleeps.

And so, naturally, he didn't.

That's ok though, because they never fussed, they just enjoyed each other's company. They played together (seriously, they throw blankets at each other and crack up) the whole way home. And at one point, they were laughing hysterically and when we turned to look at them, we saw this.



Melt. my. heart.

When we got home, Henry promptly passed out, and John Dickson stayed up another hour watching fireworks. His teacher told us the next day that he was just wandering around quietly all morning, not doing anything, until after his 2.5 hour nap (from which they had to wake him up) when he returned to his usual rowdy rambunctious self.

Happy 4th.