Willawong Station

The zoo was super fun the other day. We saw many fun things, starting off with the four new baby lions. Super cute. but despite the lions' cuteness, the highlight was willawong station, which is apparently one of the largest collections of free-flying parrots on the west coast. who knew? Anyways, enjoy the pics... (all pics by annemarie)

checkin' out the map of the zoo

waiting in line to see the lion cubs; a zoo employee brought around a lion pelt to pet and feel.

Willawong Station!

I bought three seed sticks to start and didn't even have a chance to hand them out or put my change away before I had company.

two visitors as I try to hand a stick off to blake and show the kids

Heidi did not care for this visitor on her head. :D

I removed it for her and another came to check out the seed stick she was holding.

Most of the birds are cockatiels, which I had as pets growing up. But there are other birds too.

Kaylee was not so sure about this bird on her seed stick.

It was a little safer on mommy's shoulder.

So, apparently preening each others feathers is part of the mating ritual for cockatiels and this bird's mate was a little overly enthusiastic (according to the seed-stick-seller). I had noticed its lack of feathers earlier and had explained to Kaylee how once mommy had a bird like that that needed to wear a special necklace so that its feathers would grow back. I assumed Heidi had also noticed the missing feathers and had heard me tell this story. But, apparently, she had not, and Annemarie caught her surprised look quite perfectly the moment she noticed. :)

o. m. g. there is a bird on your head mommy. is this okay?

oh $/*! that bird is on my head now. this is NOT okay.

it's okay kaylee, it's okay. it is just standing there, it wants to be your hat. (secretly I am wondering what the likelihood is that it will poop in her hair)

hrmph. I am not thrilled with this. but it's much better standing on my hood than on my hair where I could feel its little feet and nails. (secretly I am thinking, I can totally clean that off if it poops on her hood)

I suppose this is just how it is now, birds standing on your head and whatnot.

two new seed sticks...

and papa gets a little bird love.

daddy and ethan never got birds on their heads.

but everyone else did!

afterwards we rolled some change down one of those spinning change rolling thingies.

and then kaylee went potty in the big potty (so did ethan) so we just had to buy some kettlecorn which we ate for most of the rest of the trip. life is rough being 2.