What will we see at the zoo?

The title is the name of a Barney song, and I thought that would be the appropriate name for a post about taking McKinley to the zoo! My friend Holly and I decided to take our little girls to the Omaha Zoo! I'd heard many great things about the Omaha zoo, but had not had the chance to go there yet. They were all right, we loved it there!


When we went, they had just recently renovated the Aquarium. It was so neat to see! They had a glass room where you were surrounded on all sides by sea creatures. There were a ton of sharks and fish swimming all around you. It was so neat to see the sharks, and a little creepy as the picture below of the shark headed right for McKinley shows! McKinley loves fish, or "ish" as she calls them, and loved seeing them swimming all around her! She kept making her fish face and saying, "ish, ish!"







We saw lots of lions, tigers, bears, some penguins, rhinos, alligators, monkeys, peacocks, giraffes... just to name a few! McKinley learned how to say the words, "animals and bears" on the trip! One of our books has a picture of a zoo in it and every time we read that book she points to the picture and says, "animals!"




Funny story about the giraffe picture below, when I was looking back through the pictures with McKinley, she saw this picture and said "giraffe". I had no idea she knew what kind of animal that was nor how to say it's name! I was pretty impressed!

McKinley liked to wave and say, "Hi" to the animals behind the glass. She was very friendly and seemed to love all the animals she got to see! We had a fun time at the zoo!

Easter

We had a great Easter this year! It was so fun for McKinley to be old enough to enjoy the festivities! I made some cute Easter decorations to make our apartment feel more festive while my mom was in town visiting in March!



To start off the Easter holiday, McKinley had her first Easter egg hunt at a park with some friends. She was good at finding the eggs and picking them up, but once she realized they opened, and what was inside she was no longer interested in finding more eggs, she wanted to find out what was inside of the ones she already had!


She quite enjoyed the candy!

The next day, we had an Easter egg hunt with our ward! McKinley was more excited to see her cousins than she was about the egg hunt!


And she got to see Zoey too! Life is good for a 1 and a 1/2 year old when candy and her 3 favorite friends are involved!



Zoey was happy to see me :) She's my little buddy and loves to see me! She always wants me to hold her when she sees me. It's quite cute, so here we are doing the baby swap.

I don't think McKinley was too sure about the baby swapping going on!

We got to go outside and find some eggs and then enjoy a breakfast. It was a great way to celebrate Easter!




That afternoon we went over to the mall and McKinley was able to meet the Easter Bunny. McKinley wasn't sure about the Easter Bunny and didn't want her to hold her. She was ok with her as long as I was still holding her. Hence this picture...

On actual Easter Sunday, we woke up to find out the Easter Bunny had visited everyone in the Hulse Family!

McKinley was excited to wake up and go check out what the Easter Bunny had brought her!

Shortly after seeing what the Bunny had brought we got ready to go to church. Here is McKinley in her Easter dress not wanting to smile.


I got a few better pictures of her in her cute dress after church, and a nap of course!



That afternoon, we went over to the Oxford's house with Brad and Emily for Easter lunch and another Egg hunt! Here's the cake I made for dessert...

McKinley ready for the hunt, knowing what to do this time!

All the kiddos after the hunt!


We had a wonderful Easter with family and friends! We most importantly enjoyed celebrating our Savior the wonderful blessing of his atonement in our lives! Here's a silly picture of me to leave with. I don't think I can quite pull off the bunny ears like McKinley can, what do you think? :)

Picnic at Pioneers Park

We had nice spring weather in March here in Lincoln. We took advantage of the nice weather and headed out to Pioneers Park for a picnic. McKinley had a great time playing while Travis and I ate. She isn't very interested in food, especially when there's a park in sight!






Here's how McKinley ate her dinner :)


After dinner, we took some of our leftovers and fed the ducks in the pond. McKinley loves ducks and said, "quack, quack" the whole time we were feeding them.




I think she liked it!


It was perfect to enjoy a warm spring day at a beautiful park with my favorite people :)


Oh and a stop at a ice cream store after the park makes the day even more perfect!