Pigs, Ponies, and Poop!

One morning last week my neighbor Wynne came running over with the little boy she nannies and proclaimed- "Free petting zoo in downtown! It only lasts 2 hours, you wanna go??" Of course I was still in my PJs and still attempting to down my coffee (despite already being awake for several hours), but a free petting zoo just blocks from my house? I was in. However, in the mad rush to get out of the house, (considering it was already 30 minutes into the event) I still pondered the possibility that this 'petting zoo' may not be as cool as I was envisioning. I mean... it was in downtown Baltimore, maybe they just corralled up some stray kitties and street kitties (aka rats) and threw them in a gated area. Well, only one way to find out!

So we get there. And it was great! (So grateful:)) There was a little band, a station to paint pumpkins, the petting zoo, and even ponies! So we went to the petting zoo immediately (of course) and there was quite the variety considering we were stationed in a plaza a midst office buildings and homeless shelters. There were goats, a sheep, a few bunnies, a couple of handsome white geese, a pot belly pig (I think), chickens, a duck with a mohawk, some baby ducks, and an awesomely ugly turkey. Now occasionally when I go to these types of 'attractions' I worry about the animals etc.; but they actually all seemed very used to kids- and relatively happy unless there was some toddler chasing it around the pen (aka my second born). And even then, they just scooted away and the kid lost interest. There was even a calf named Bambo.

 Stella petting the bunny (finally after it had run from her for so long); and Lucy with the gobbler

So after we spent a fair amount of time co-mingling with all the farmer's friends we painted some pumpkins and then got in the (long) line for the pony rides. The girls (plus Wynne's little pal) all waited like champs for a solid 20+ minutes to get in the saddle. I wasn't sure how my little ladies would react, being that they have never ridden an animal (with the exception of Penny and their father:))- but they loved it! The pony's name was Snowball.

So the last exciting occurrence of this outing was the amount of pooping going on. The girls were very interested in all the different shapes and sizes of poop that was in the petting zoo (but still very quickly cleaned up I might add). In addition, the pig was all about everyone else's pooh which the ladies found hilarious... 'he's eating poop!'. Yes he was indeed. And it topped off the afternoon when Snowball had to stop a couple times while they were on board to lighten her load; and of course once again this was quite the topic of conversation. Well, just a life lesson (as we don't have the book)- everyone does poop indeed!)

So it was a great spontaneous afternoon! Thanks to friends in the know!!