The St. Louis Zoo

We didn't get to the zoo as early as we wanted to. Between a breakfast room full of Lacrosse players, needing to buy clothes at Target, and almost running out of gas, we were way behind the crowd. We chose not to pay the $11 for private parking and parked in the street with the normal people. When we went to the zoo in Houston over Christmas, we were literally like the third group to walk through the gate. This was not the case here. It was crazy crowded even 30 minutes after the gates opened.We bought a Safari Pass, which gave us access to the Children's Zoo, carousel, train, and some motion simulator that we didn't do. Our first stop was the Children's Zoo. They had this big building with all kind of things for kids to do that I was really excited about Marley seeing. They had the exhibits lower so the kids could see, rabbits to pet, things to crawl through, a kid's kitchen where they could pretend to make the animals' food, and play equipment to crawl on to get a good view of a sloth. Did Marley like any of it? No, in fact she was in a terrible mood. But, Asa and I enjoyed it!
Our next stop was the butterfly dome, and since we broke out the Milano cookies, Marley was in a good mood again. We didn't have any butterflies land on us, but she had a blast watching them fly all around her. She did freak out when one got close, but at a distance they were great!
The zoo was very crowded since it was such a beautiful Saturday, so it was hard to get close to anything. The highlight of the trip for me was the elephant exhibit. There was many different points where you could stop and see different elephants, and they were all really active! Here are a momma and baby elephant playing.
And here are two sisters playing. I'm not sure which one, but one of them had a baby elephant 6 or 7 years ago. The other elephant treated the baby like her own, so the baby pretty much grew up with two full-time mommies! That's a lucky elephant!
After we navigated our way through a few more areas (it seemed like we were ALWAYS going the opposite way that everyone else was!), we stopped for lunch. The most expensive fast food lunch I have ever eaten. But it was so nice to sit outside over a little lake and eat with the sun on our skin.
Did anyone know that a bear's tongue is that long and disgusting?!
Here is a family picture we took in front of some pretty flowers. This zoo really was beautiful. The more spring comes in Missouri, the more I like it. Everything is so green now! (By the way, do you know how annoying it is to always have to take our family pictures myself? My fat arms always ends up in the picture!)
After looking through the monkey and reptiles houses, we stopped for ice cream and then the camera battery decided to die. But not before I got pictures of Marley enjoying her Daddy's ice cream!
After our ice cream stop, Marley got in the stroller and took a 30 minute nap while Asa and I looked at a few more animals. We ended up not doing the carousel ride because there were so many people, and we also didn't get to do the penguin experience because the line was unbearably long. But, we will save it for next time. The last thing we did was ride the train. We had been seeing it pass by us all day and Marley would do the sign for train and say "Mimi!" She remembered riding a trolley in Branson with my mom the week before. It broke my heart, but I had to tell her every time that Mimi wouldn't be there, because I didn't want to be getting her hopes up. But it didn't help. She spent most of the train ride asking where her Mimi was.

We visited the gift shop once our train ride was over, and bought Marley a shirt. And then we hit the road back home. It was a fun little weekend getaway, and definitely needed after all of our moving stress!