Last Summer Hurrah: Part 2, Sammy the Seal Show at the Como Zoo

So the week before school started, my children began conjoling me about why they had never seen a seal show and why, o, why had they been deprived in this cruel and unusual way. Well, actually, I informed them, they had, indeed, seen a seal show but they were all fairly young and had forgotten it. Well, they informed me, that did not count in my good-parenting ledger. I looked at them. Hm. (Said with the expression and inflection of Nanny McPhee as played by Emma Thompson) Nevertheless in attempts to fill the last week with fun and outdoors, I took them over to the Como Zoo to see Sammy the Seal perform. We got there a bit early and so I thought, Hey, why not the carousel -- celebrating its 100th anniversary. My kids love the new one at the big Minnesota Zoo and have been talking about it ever since the beginning of the summer when we got to try that one out. So I purchased tickets and we waited. I would like to say that there were about 12 elderly women overseeing this ride. They seemed to take particular interest in preserving this restored historical artifact. This is a good thing. BUT. There was an air of danger around the whole thing. That children, possibly, shouldn't be riding such a thing. That they were sure to damage it. That these women were only allowing children near it under duress. One woman, in particular, who was actually more near my parents' age, was over-the-top, Flannery-O'Connor-style-caricature angry at my children. The strange thing was that they were behaving wonderfully and very in control of themselves as well as genuinely pleased with the carousel horses. They kept turning to look at this angry, intermittently barking woman and then to me wondering if they were doing something wrong. I kept smiling at them stage whispering, "It's okay. You're doing great. Have fun." all the while wondering what was wrong with the woman and her nervous and tense sentries stationed through-out the ride just barely keeping themselves from whisking the kids off the ride before it stopped. I honestly don't know what was going on. The kids meekly dismounted their wooden steeds and glued in close to my legs as we left the pavillion for the rest of the zoo. It was so so weird. Methinks, the carousel is made for the kids, not the kids for the carousel...or something more poetic and apt. Beautiful, though. And the one at the big zoo -- excellent.

The wait was too long...15 minutes...to be in the front row.

But poor Sammy is a rather aged seal and the show was only 15 minutes long...my children were not impressed and rather than look at me and admit that perhaps I had not been depriving them of the richest of childhood experiences, they were quite miffed that I used up part of their valuable childhood to disappoint them with this. It really feels like sometimes you can't win.

They requested this photo after watching an enormous immobile (except for his eyebrows) gorilla. Atticus and Dietrich spent the portrait session in various wrestling holds that devolved into a full-on fight with a dramatic fall from the metal gorilla statue. Lincoln's trying. Thea Belle is pose-ready.

I think cabbages are pretty.

Unidentified bugs always, always eat the ones I plant.

Water vegetation is also nice.

Staghorn ferns. I like them too.

The boys are just as cute but they move very fast and when they are near water, I am not using my camera, I am standing alert and ready to leap to their rescue...