The Miss Elaine-ous Life

random acts of life, family and photos

So many animals (and kids!), yet so little time…

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As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, one of the highlights of our Thanksgiving travels was meeting up with my cousin and her family.

We decided to meet at the San Antonio zoo on Friday and it turned out to be a perfect day for it.  It was a tad crowded but manageable.

She has 6 (going on 7) children so most of the crowd was us… Oh, I tease (and she doesn’t mind!). I did feel like we were counting heads the ENTIRE time.  And making sure we had the right children with us.  (NINE children to keep track of in a busy zoo.  Basically, my brain hurt hard after.  I have NO idea how she and her husband do it.)

Despite all the counting, we had a great time and I was SO happy to meet her two “baby” girls that I had not seen before.  And to hug her and catch up a bit.  Our time together was WAY too short but at least it was some.

LYLAS, sweet Misty.

Okay, now some photos.

P.S. Two tries to get a decent pic of all the kids together and both were mostly fails.  Oh well, we have the memories and bribe material for later in their lives… 

Monkeys by the monkey cage. 😉

First try. Oh my. 
K was a bit obsessed with this bird.  She talked to it for about 10 minutes.
She also carried around left-over tickets from the TX state fair almost the entire time, saying 
“My tickets!!!” 

Really close to this hippo, in water.  Very cool. 

Me and my cousins, Misty, a year older than me and Amanda, a year younger. (they are sisters, as if you couldn’t tell.) 🙂  And also sisters to me. 

Hollis (Misty’s 3rd child) and B and G hung out the entire time together… 

Feeding time at the zoo… hardee har har! 
K gave up the tickets and became obsessed with the zoo map after that…
Another attempt.  And why yes, my daughter does have her hands down her pants. Arghh. 

Someone’s legs got tired. 

parenting BY dummies

Comments

  2. So fun but gosh, so many kids!
    I have so many favorite pictures here:
    – The first one with all the kids, and K is looking down, like she lost something, heh.
    – The 2nd picture with all the kids, and one has his hand on his little sister’s head. Also, K’s pants hands.
    – The hippo!
    – The one of you and your cousins. You’re so pretty.

  9. Great photos. And we also have a VERY hard time getting a good photo of all of us. As I was making our Xmas card, I realized, there is NO good family photo of us from this year. Yikes.

    Something to think about for 2013…

  13. 7?
    Does she have to drive a bus?
    You don’t hear of many families having that many children anymore.
    I’m glad that you had fun! I love that you’re all wearing t-shirts because we’ve been wearing winter coats since 2010 I think…LOL

  14. I only have two girls and I make them dress in the same colored top and bottoms. I get all kinds of crazy if I can’t spot them in a crowd. I would’ve rather fed myself to that tiger than keep track of all of those kids. You’re cousin is amazing! Wish I had it in me! 🙂

  18. Looks fun! Although further proof that anyone who can snag a photo of a kid group where all of them are looking without crying or having their dress over their head should be paid a healthy sum of dinero!

  19. You know, it’s funny, but I never saw the appeal of a zoo when I was a kid. But now that I have two of my own, I am suddenly drawn to them. Maybe seeing things through our kids’ eyes instantly brightens things. They’re good filters, don’t you think?