A Little Business and A Lot of Fun

Last week I had to meet my boss in Phoenix for work for a couple of days. As work trips go though, our schedule was fairly light with only two scheduled meetings. So Robin thought she'd bring her family and I brought Drew while Bill planned to join us on the weekend. As it turned out our work schedule ended up being even less than we thought (just Thursday morning), which paved the way for even more fun than we thought we'd have.

So Thursday morning the kids and John went to the park, while Robin and I went to our meeting. By early afternoon, we were strolling around Old Town Scottsdale looking at shops and having lunch. Drew was happy to report that they had fed his Nilla Wafers to the ducks and pigeons at the park that morning.

Robin's husband was able to get us discounted rates at a very nice resort with beautiful grounds and multiple pools, so Thursday afternoon we lounged by the pool. I'm not sure you can beat swimming in an outdoor pool in November. I love Arizona.

Drew had lots of fun in the water, and was quite content to swim on his own with his life jacket, telling me "I can do it by myself" one more than one occasion. At least that meant I was able to get pictures.

He especially enjoyed following after Robin & John's kids (Sammie & Nick) in jumping off John's shoulders.

Ready...

Set...

Go!

Relaxing in the small hot tub

Friday brought a trip to the Phoenix Zoo, rated one of the top 5 zoos in the country for kids. We started on the endangered species carousel. Though Drew doesn't look too upset in this picture, he screamed for at least half the time the ride was moving that he wanted to get off. He eventually calmed a little bit when we started holding hands and he seemed to get a kick out of Mommy repeatedly saying Up and Down in as silly a voice as I could manage.

The great thing about the zoo is that it is right in the desert, so you get to walk through all kinds of desert life. Here's Mommy & Drew with some cacti.

We saw all kinds of great animals, including baboons, which Drew laughed at because I kept telling him to look at their funny butts.

And squirrel monkeys, which I think were my favorite. If they weren't prone to biting I would have been tempted to put one in my pocket.

Sammie and Nick are quite the animal aficionados so Drew learned a lot from them at each exhibit.

We were a little disappointed that the petting zoo only had goats and no opportunities to feed the animals, but Drew happily pet one of the goats anyway.

Included in the children's area of the zoo was a Fisher Price Little People Discovery Farm that had all the characters, animals, and vehicles included in the Little People Farm set. We had to drag Drew away.

Then we saw the real thing--yes, a real old fashioned tractor. What more could a little boy ask for? He exclaimed "Mommy, the wheels bigger than me!"

We ended our trip to the zoo with a couple of very special experiences: camel rides and petting stingrays. Drew and I went on the camel first but Robin & John have those pictures, so here's Drew with John, Sammie, and Nick. I was shocked that Drew wasn't scared to get on the camel. I mean, this was the same boy who freaked out on the carousel. But he climbed right on with me and laughed the whole time. When we asked if he wanted to go again with John he couldn't have climbed the steps fast enough.

Here's Drew in Sting Ray Bay. Again, no fear from the child. I propped him up on his belly, showed him how to touch the rays and away he went. At first he was content to just pet them, but when Sammie bought little fishies to feed to the rays Drew was not to be left out.

Unfortunately, Drew didn't really grasp the idea of the rays' mouths being on the bottoms of their bodies. I tried to demonstrate how he should hold the fish, but I think he was reluctant to put his hand that deep into the water. Here one sting ray came up to the side of the pool to retrieve the goodies that were in Drew's hand. I don't know how many of you have fed stingrays but the vacuum-like method of eating they have is a very weird feeling in your hand.

On our way out we had to walk right past the carousel again, and in the 5 hours we spent at the zoo Drew must have forgotten that he was scared of it to start with, because he ran right after Sammie and Nick to get on a second time.

Before dinner on Friday night here's a couple pictures of Drew near the fishing lagoon on the resort property.

Again, find the boy some ducks, and he's a happy kid.

Daddy arrived late on Friday night and we spent a few hours on Saturday at one of the other resort pools, this one with a water slide. We were fortunate to be there on the weekend that this pool reopened after some renovation, because the slide couldn't have been a bigger hit. Bill and Drew must have gone down it at least a dozen times.

After a few trips down the slide, the sun and 2 straight days of no afternoon naps caught up to Drew and he snuggled up with Dad for a little pool-side snooze.

After naptime and a outrageously priced pool-side lunch, Drew and Nick headed for the sand box near the pool and proceeded to load up, dump, load up, and dump sand for about 20 happy minutes.

Then Drew decided it was time to get back in the pool. Here is his mid-air jumping in with Daddy at his side.

Drew and Dad enjoying a leisurely piggy back ride with the gorgeous palm trees in the background.

Robin and John really wanted to bring their kids to see an Old West kind of a town, so we drove about 45 minutes south of Scottsdale to Rawhide. One of the first things we went to was a "Tales of the Old West" show that included some pretend gun fights, unfortunately with not pretend loud sound effects. Drew was not a fan. So we left that part early. Fortunately he enjoyed the other exhibits/activities. Here he is in front of the stage coach ride we took. We were even lucky enough to sit up on top.

Here's Drew in front of the train ride. Drew and Nick decided it would be a great idea to sit near the front of the train, which sounded fine until the exhaust fumes came pouring into our faces. It didn't seem to faze his excitement level though. Along the train's tracks were several old wagons, some with all 4 wheels and standing up, and others which were broken. Drew pointed out each of the ones with broken wheels and said about the others "But that one not is broken."

Closing out the night before dinner was a sunset burro ride through one end of town.

It was a really fun few days and we'll likely head back to at least the zoo when Bill runs the Tempe marathon in January.