Summer - Visiting Grandma and Grandpa (Lincoln Park Zoo & Butterfly Exhibit)

I'm going to try to catch up on all the fun things we did this summer, even though the summer is almost over.  (I can't believe the girls are still wearing sundresses in Wisconsin in October!)

The girls and I visited Mom and Dad the week of the 4th of July, which was the perfect time to help pick and eat raspberries!  This year, a few raspberries actually ended up in the bowl, but most of them got eaten during picking.  Grandpa wanted Amelia to feed him raspberries like she did in previous years, but this year she thought it was funnier to pretend to feed Grandpa a berry and then eat it herself.

One day we took the L and a bus to the Lincoln Park Zoo with Natalie, Noah, Becky and Brian.  As always, the kids had a great time riding public transportation.  I think getting to ride the bus (twice!) was probably the highlight of the day for my girls!

This was the first time my kids had been to the Lincoln Park Zoo, and they really enjoyed it.  They liked pretending to be ants in an anthill and climbing up this random display of sticks:

We got to see a lot of animals, including polar bears, zebras and gorillas, although I don't think I took any pictures of the animals.  Unfortunately, what I remember most was that Megan was going through a temper tantrum stage at the time, and was pretty stubborn and difficult at the zoo.  I am so thankful that she has (mostly) grown out of that stage now.  Becky and Brian took charge of the three older kids most of the time (thanks, guys!) while I dealt with Megan.

The kids had fun trying to step on Aunt Becky's shadow and then running away when she tried to step on their shadows.  This was a great way to distract Megan during her grumpy times.  The girls still love to play the "don't catch my shadow" game.

Another day, the girls and I went with Mom and Dad to the Botanic Garden to see the butterfly exhibit.  The girls discovered that they could play under the bike racks at the entrance.

We walked around a little to see the fountains and the water lilies in the circle garden, but we didn't explore too far.

Then Dad helped Amelia walk up the railing of the stairs, which she thought was hilarious. 

The butterfly exhibit was just amazing!  Amelia and Megan loved to use the guide to try to identify the different types of butterflies, but unfortunately, the guide was out of date.  Regardless, they had fun trying to find all the different kinds of butterflies, and counting how many were hiding on one of the trees.  Their favorite butterfly was the blue morpho.

A butterfly even landed on Grandma's shoulder, and stayed for quite a while!  Amelia tried standing very still for a while to see if a butterfly would land on her, but I guess she was wearing the wrong color.  Megan was glad that a butterfly didn't land on her.

The girls enjoyed playing with Grandma's fairy garden on the side of the house.  In addition to hiding the little animals and fairies under the plants, the girls picked flowers from Grandma's garden and used the flowers to decorate the houses, paths and ponds in the garden.  They loved it!

We spent some time coloring with chalk on the driveway, but the best artwork was Megan herself.  This time, she and Amelia used the chalk to intentionally color on Megan's face.  What goofy girls!