Cincinnati Zoo.

I'm so so so so so so far behind.  I think I have at least 10 blog posts I need to do.  We've had such a busy Fall that it's been really rough trying to keep up the blog...especially since on top of fun family activities we've been doing on the weekends, I've been travelling during the week.  Now that I got that off my chest, I'll just dive in head first and begin digging my way out of the back log.

One of our Fall activities was hitting up the Cincinnati Zoo.  We had free tickets from Joel's work so combine that with a trip to Cincinnati for Audrey's first birthday and we had a full weekend!  

I don't think I blogged about it, but way back in September, we stayed in a hotel when we went to my cousin's wedding.  That wasn't as horrid an experience as I had anticipated at the time.  The kids slept sort of ok - except the part where Tyler fell out of the bed twice.  

Since that trip wasn't awful, we decided to stay in a hotel after the birthday party.  The kiddos thought it was pretty sweet.  Mostly the swimming part and the part where they got to eat pizza while watching a movie sitting on a couch in a hotel room.  

This time, since Tyler was so keen on falling out of bed, we got smarter in our room layout choice.  We opted for a king bed with a sofa pull out.  This was brilliant for several reasons:  1) Joel and I got a king bed and 2) the sofabed worked out awesome for the kids - we turned them crosswise and put Tyler toward the back of the couch.  Then we brought along his "bed bumpers" and put them in between Lily and Tyler.  This pretty much blocked Tyler in and prevented him from being able to fall out anywhere.  Also prevented the kids from rolling all over each other - Tyler tends to steamroll whoever he's in bed with and Lily will kick the snot out of who she sleeps with.  They  are wild sleepers.  

The next morning we headed on over to the zoo.  It was "HallZOOween" so the kiddos got to wear their costumes.  They were adorable.  And I think I'll just let the pictures tell the rest of the story.  Bottom line:  we had a great time.