Unseasonably warm winter

Somehow, Kansas City still has yet to receive 1 inch of snow this year! With average January temps in the 40s and 50s,  not teens or 20s like usual, Joseph and I have been spending lots of time outside enjoying the great weather. We even made it to the zoo a few times... in January! Yesterday was no exception, as we've had highs in the low 60s all week. Bizarre!

Joseph made a beeline for the train station as soon as we got into the zoo. Of course, we had to wait a bit for it to arrive, and Joseph knew right where to wait. As if I could forget, he'd sign train repeatedly while watching down the tracks for it to appear.

After about 10 minutes, it arrived, and someone was thrilled! It's so nice to be able to go to the zoo during the weekdays off-season, as it's rather empty, and the rides never have lines. Joseph is getting spoiled by having lots of options in picking where we can sit.

The train runs by an outdoor bird exhibit, then past llamas and camels before entering the kangaroo area. The kangaroos were hopping around, and Joseph had fun watching them and pointing them out.

After we returned to the station, I asked Joseph what animals he wanted to go see, assuming he'd say Dumbo. Nope, apparently, he really only wanted to see birds and hippos. Umm, ok. We've only seen the hippos once at the zoo before, so not quite sure why he picked them, but we boarded the tram to Africa to try and check out the hippos!

On the way, the tram passes by the elephant pen, and all of the elephants were out. Of course, once he saw them, Joseph wanted to go see "more Dumbo" so we made sure to stop by before we were done.

Just before the hippo exhibit, Joseph discovered this stone hippo at the entrance to the boat ride. He was so excited! We spent a few minutes playing with the stone hippo before I could convince him to see if we could get a view of the real thing.

Boy was I glad we got there when we did. So was Joseph!

 Why, because both hippos decided it was time to get out of the water and take a stroll over to their ramp back to their housing area while we were standing there. I've never seen the hippos get out of the water before, so it was actually rather exciting. Joseph loved it!

We returned to the main part of the zoo after seeing the elephants, took a handful of rides on the carousel, checked out the snakes, deer and polar bear, before it was definitely time to head home for naptime.

I definitely miss the snow and being able to take Joseph out playing in it, but it is nice to be able to get out of the house and go to playgrounds, parks and do things we've never done in the middle of winter before!