Well today, Michael took a half day to come home to take the kids on our first trip to Kentucky Down Under. This was a special gift from our friends in Ohio from the Dayton Mother's of Twins Club... ok, not a gift from the club, by my friends. :-) It really made me a bit homesick for my friends today. 
KDU is about 40 minutes south and we didn't tell the kids where we were going. We just said, "it's a surprise." When we got there they still didn't know where we were because you go into this dinky little gift shop before you go in. Finally we told them that we were here to see Australian animals and they were excited. Little did we know that the first part of the adventure was a long hike up a slight incline. It was fine at first but by the top we were all a little tired and thirsty. We made our way through the birds and the kids loved them. Well they didn't love one bird because he was squawking really loud. The kids loved seeing the birds and listening to their names. We saw cockatoo, a kookaburro, a lory, and a lot of rainbow lorikeets. 
After the birds, we made our way to an open reserve. We sat down and waited just a few family and really lucked out. Our nice tour guide took us and one other family. It was a very small group and we got a lot more time with the animals. There were emus just walking around but we were excited about the kangaroos. There was a new baby joey that was peeking out of his momma's pouch. Then we all got to pet the kangaroos. Did you know kangaroos are so soft? Kind of like a kitten, that surprised me. They were so docile and gentle and the kids were impressed. Then we were told about all the uses for the kangaroos tail and the boys got to try and pick it up and they said it was very heavy. They don't use their tails for weapons, but they lean back on them so they can kick harder. When the tour was over, we went to get something to drink and decided to let the boys buy a bag of dirt... Ok, not ordinary dirt, it was filled with gem stones but you had to take it to the man made river box and sift through it to find them all. The boys thought that was great. We gave them all a baggie and they found their precious gems.
Soon after we found all our treasure, we sat down to wait on our cave tour. We were fortunate to be able to go on a tour a half hour before ours because there weren't many people. While I don't think caving is particularly hard, I will say it is tricky with three little boys that are clumsy and goofy. I had Sam and Drew and Michael was with Ethan. Trying to climb up wet rocks with two kids isn't something I look forward to doing anytime soon again. ;-) The boys loved it though. They were looking for bats and spiders but never found either one. They really were so good in the caves, we were pleased. After we made it up the last flight of stairs and back to the top of the earth's crust, the kids were exhausted and hungry. So we started our journey back to the car.
It was a great family day! I love taking pictures... almost to the point where I forget to be in the moment so I can get THE shot. The boys were better today about just smiling and getting it over with and moving on. They said they want to go back, so all in all, we had a great day! Thank you to my twin mommy friends. I really appreciate your friendships and your generosity.
