Fort Worth Zoo Campout

Back in October, we spent an evening having a sleepover at the Fort Worth Zoo with Ryan and the Wolf scouts in our pack.

We had a great time, even if it was raining and cold in the evening, so our flashlight zoo tours were curtailed a bit. So we saw a lot of the "indoor" educational buildings around the Zoo on Saturday night.

By Sunday morning, however, the rain had stopped, and we had a wonderful personal tour of the Zoo before it opened.

This is a great zoo that we've never visited before. It has a lovely setting, and I think its my favorite in all of Texas. Houston's zoo is so crowded, and San Antonio's zoo is super-hot, without enough trees for shade. But my far, my favorite part of the zoo, are there adorable baby elephants.

They were just too cute!!

We were VERY happy to be 'camping' inside the educational building since it was raining so hard.

My other favorite part of the Zoo? Since it was a "Boo at the Zoo" time, these pumpkins were out and decorated so adorably. I totally want to make minion pumpkins next year.

Awesome Boys

I was sitting at my desk and heard the calm yet excited voices of young boys playing in the living room. They had an electronic version of battle ship ($3, thanks Goodwill!) and were excitedly playing. The game would say things like "impact at Juliet 3" for "J3" or "Bravo 2" for "B2".

This being new to my boys, they modified things unbeknownst to them and used their new version throughout the game.

It was awesome listening to them use their own version - and wonderful hearing them play with each other. They got a reward of an extremely rare TV watching during a school night.

Fall at the Dallas Arboretum

A few weeks back, we headed up to the Dallas-Fort Worth area to go camping with the Wolf scouts. I took advantage of us being somewhat in the vicinity of the Dallas Arboretum, and insisted we head there to see the pumpkins. I've wanted to do this for a few years, but between soccer and scouts, traveling weekends are few and far between.

The pumpkins were just amazing, every bit as fantastic as all the pictures I've seen in years past.

Even Carl, who very grudgingly went to the Arboretum, was impressed with the pumpkins.

I could have done without a few hundred of the people there, but I suppose I can't really blame everyone from wanting to come out and see the pumpkins, too.

The Pumpkin Village is possibly one of the coolest designed places I've ever seen.

All these little homes. Built by pumpkins.

Straight out of Fantasyland.

With pumpkins EVERYWHERE!

We spent the big part of our visit here, though, in the new Children's Adventure Garden. It just opened a few weeks before our visit, and its a very cool place to go.

It just opened a few weeks before our visit, and its a very cool place to go.

I tend to think this would be a big hit for some slightly younger kids than mine. Or with some slightly less boy-kids than mine. ;) But we still managed to find a few favorite places for Team Danger.

The "secret garden" was really a maze.

Complete with its own fairy garden, and dragons.

Even a sword to pull out of a stone.

The adventure gardens are beautifully designed.

Fun for the kids, and stunning for us parents.

The bottom of the garden focuses on wind and water energy. So its an educational garden, as well as an adventure garden.

By far, the boys' favorrite part of the garden was this wind machine they got locked up in.

It blows tornado-style winds at you.

And they LOVED it.

Just look at their gleeful faces.

Still.. the highlight of the visit, for me, was the pumpkins.