A Bit of Zoo, Park, Science Center, and Ice Cream

This past weekend was a good one--we'd had plans to go out of town, but we ended up staying home and doing a few low-key things instead. It was good to regroup, get outdoors (thank goodness it was a little bit cooler), and I was blessed with/granted/given a nice break on Sunday (thanks to Kevin and his parents for hanging with Lew). 

[Lewis has been/is still a bit of a teething monster the past week, which has been a tad trying at times. I rushed him to the doctor the other day after nap when his fever spiked to 104.9(!), which totally scared me. Luckily, it went down quickly with Advil. He's been waking up from nap covered in sweat and having mouth pain. We've started giving Advil and Orajel at naptime and bedtime--nighttime is no problem (no wake-ups), but at naptime, he sweats and sweats for some reason (like a fever is breaking). He has had a low-grade fever the whole time, with a few spikes here and there, so I guess that is the cause of his profuse sweating. I've put a fan on him to see if that would help (hasn't so far). These two teeth have been working their way in for like a week and a half, now! I counted them as 'in' on his 17 month post because I could see them starting to emerge, but they're taking their sweet time.]

Friday afternoon, we stopped by the zoo for a quick once-around and a trip to the splash park. Then Saturday, we went to a park to go 'hiking' (which ended up not being as nature-y or wilderness-y as we're used to...the trails were paved sidewalks) and to the playground, and then to the Louisville Science Center later that afternoon/evening.

First, the zoo:

 Rhinos, up and about for a change

(usually they're sleeping/not moving)

 Grizzly bears!

 A beauty

 Saying hello

And zoo splash park time:

 I think I've mentioned that he loves steering wheels

 And drinking the water as it's being sprayed in his face

 Whee!

I love this one!

He's so happy right there!

 Attempting to climb up on the seal

A few from our trip to the park/playground at E.P. Tom Sawyer State Park on Saturday morning:

 Pretty fast slides, there

 Distracted swinging

There is a dog run next to the playground, and Lewis was definitely more interested in watching the dogs than he was in playing that day.

After nap on Saturday, we headed downtown to check out Smashburger (pretty yum) and the Louisville Science Center. He had such a great time in KidZone (geared toward the younger crowd, separate from the main exhibits)--it was a bit overwhelming, I think (like, Where do I begin? What do I do first? There's so much to see!), but he eventually got into a few areas and stayed put for awhile. Of course it was fun for us to see him get so excited about things, too:

 Driving the ambulance, pushing the buttons to turn on the light and siren

 Tried driving the bus, but preferred to stand on the ground so he could better reach all of the control buttons.

 A construction zone

He loved the blocks and trucks here--was hard to get him to leave

 Fun in the water table

 Splish Splash

We did go over to the special exhibit, Science in Play, for a little bit, and it was very nice/fun, but Lewis didn't 'get' the concepts as much he did in the other area. We didn't stay in there too long, but he did make a piece of art:

Stamping with a potato

 I added rolled corn below the two potato stamps.

 Looking out at the river

 Commander Lew

(piloting a fake airplane)

 Trying to take the phones with him

They're not cell phones/cordless phones, buddy! I don't think he understood why they were connected with cords.

On the way home, we stopped for ice cream. Here's how it played out with Kevin, Lewis, and Peter Dink, sharing Kevin's cone:

 Loving it

 It's oh-so-good.

Notice Peter starting to creep in.

 Peter, licking his chops

 Peter, sitting nicely and waiting for a bite while Lewis gives him the yeah-right-dog, this-ice-cream-is-mine look

 Peter nudging his way a little closer to the prize

 Finally, the competition is gone and Peter Dink can have a bite!