What a wonderful long weekend at the zoo!
I took off from work Thursday and Friday afternoons heading into the weekend and just laid around the house reading. I think I read a total of 7 or 8 books between Thursday and yesterday afternoon. What a delight!
Friday afternoon, the Asst. Zookeeper and I took a quick road trip to Ebensburg to take care of some errands at the scout shop. It was really nice to be able to hold a conversation in the car without the Heathens screaming at each other in the background.
Friday evening, the Asst. Zookeeper had to go out to work at 2am, but he was back home by 8am. We both laid around the house all morning and part of the early afternoon. Around 3pm, the Asst. Zookeeper's father and younger brother brought the backhoe down to the zoo so that we could finish regrading the back yard. We spent the rest of the afternoon playing in the dirt, then cleaned up the Heathens and went to run errands for the evening. Saturday we spent the day playing in the dirt again - it's amazing how much work goes into moving it around!
Sunday, we slept through church (oops - we had every intention of going). After we finally got moving, we ran to the dollar store to get decorations for the Heathens bicycles. Every Memorial Day, our township has a parade and has a bicycle decorating contests for the kids. Our boys LOVE it. Sunday afternoon was spent decorating the bicycles with BIL#2 and his wife.
Monday morning - bright and early at 7:15am, we were up and packing up bicycles to get to the parade. They start off by judging the kids' decorations and they give $50 savings bonds to the winners in each age group. None of my Heathens got a prize this year, but both my niece and nephew did!
Then the parade started. It goes about a mile from our middle school and ending at the flag circle in Grandview Cemetery. It is a very slow mile that is spent dodging little kids who don't know how to ride a bicycle. Some of them need more help that training wheels can provide!
After we arrived at the flag circle, we rode another mile back to where we had parked the cars to un-decorate our bikes. Then it was back on and another mile of pedaling to our local Eat N' Park for the breakfast buffet. And then ANOTHER mile back to the cars. The Heathens love to go for bicycle rides and really do a great job (they only whined when they were hungry - which is understandable!).
The rest of Monday, I spent raking dirt and removing rocks from my newly leveled yard. And I removed 10 or 11 wheelbarrows FULL of rocks. It was really hot and sunny - and it was WONDERFUL! I even got a bit of a sunburn. Then the Asst. Zookeeper spread the grass seed and we covered it with hay. By 5pm, we were done! And at 5:01pm it started to rain - perfect!
We had a really great weekend and so did the Heathens. It was a fantastic start to summer!
