Black and White

When we saw the weather was going to be so beautiful this weekend, we decided to take Gracie to the Dallas Zoo. This morning we headed to gym class but told her that after class we were going to go straight to the zoo instead of coming back home. We asked her what kind of animals she thought she would see at the zoo. Her response: "Tigers, lions and Minnie Mouse!" Oh dear...

I tried to explain that Minnie Mouse is a character that lives at Disneyland, not in a zoo, without having her ask too much about Disney. The last thing we need is for her to realize how magical Disney is and ask us when we are going every day until we take her next year(which she doesn't currently know about). Thankfully she got over the fact that she wouldn't be seeing Minnie quite quickly and didn't ask a thing about Disneyland. So we talked about the animals she might see in the way down to Dallas.

This was out first trip to the Dallas Zoo, and we were thoroughly impressed! I honestly liked the smaller size and less-crowded atmosphere better than the Fort Worth Zoo. It was perfect for her age!

Since the weather was so amazing today, so I was very surprised that it wasn't crowded. We rarely had to wait our turn to get up close and personal with the animals, and we hopped right onto the monorail after eating our picnic lunch.

It was a fun monorail ride and allowed us to see parts of the zoo you can't get to by foot. I don't know if I'd do it more than once a year, but it was well worth the $3 per person ticket for our first visit. Gracie thought we were on a train and kept exclaiming, "Choo-choo train! Woot woot!" throughout the ride. It was just long enough for her to get bored as we pulled back into the rail station...perfect timing!

Of all the animals we saw, the (black and white) penguins, giraffes, and (black and white) zebras were the animals Grace loved best and kept talking about throughout the visit. Oh, and the turtles, which she told, "I miss you" as we walked away. :) We promised her that we would come back to visit "her" turtles.

I think my favorite part was Trinity and Grace hand-feeding the giraffes. For a $5 donation, we got three pieces of romaine lettuce to feed to them. There were several groups of people trying to get the giraffes' attention, and Trinity was the one who got the first bites! Grace was excited to see them so close to her, and she even fed them the last piece of lettuce we had.