pit stop at the zoo~

Are you still following me on my vacation pit stops?  Well then ... it's off to the zoo! 

It's been thirty years since I've gone to a zoo.  I've been to the Milwaukee Zoo in Wisconsin and the Como Zoo in Minnesota  ~ so this was a treat for me.  I loved it; but must confess... when I first got there I really felt bad for the animals ... all caged up like they are.  Then, I got to thinking... I imagine more than 80% of these animals were probably born in a zoo and have never known anything different their whole lives ~ plus they are treated kindly, fed 3 square meals a day, are given room for exercise, kept clean and healthy, they don't have hunt for their next meal,  etc...  so then I let myself go  ... walking around from cage to cage and really REALLY enjoying the day.

That log above the bear ... you can crawl in there to see the bear on his side of the glass.  There was some little kid in it ... so I didn't do it. lol  Besides that ... I think I was a little over the size limitation! ha  Dear Hubby told me, "Don't even think about it Mel."  I love his concern for me.

I hope you enjoyed my little photo tour of our zoo run.  I wish I had more photos to share; but I was having major camera issues on our trip.  So... I'm just thankful for those I do have.

Tomorrow... a garden tour.

Until next time...

So it goes in my neck of the woods.

~mel

pit stop at the wax museum~

Before I get into my pit stop post at the wax museum, I first want to show you a tin that I have.

I found this tin at a garage sale last year.  It was full of nuts and bolts and was so dirty you couldn't even see what the pattern was on it; but I bought it ... with the hopes that it was as pretty as I was envisioning it ~ once I got it cleaned up.  The center painting on it is a little scuffed; but I still love it.

What made me post about it today is a post made by Dianna over at Bits and Pieces and a photo that she had of one of her tins.  Here is her tin from her grandma:

Surprisingly though, her tin is from Holland and mine is from England.  Here's the bottom stamp on my tin.

Thank you Dianna for your post and making me take a closer look at my treasure.
~~~
Now...
On to another one of our pit stops.
We stopped over in Branson, Missouri on our way home from Texas.  One of the places we visited was the Hollywood Wax Museum.  Just thought I'd share some more snapshots.

Here's King Kong hanging on the outside of the building:

 and some of the other character ~

There was a lot more to see ... but these are a few that I managed to 'sneak' some photos of.  (I even had a lady take one of Slim and I with the Bonanza crew... lol) Apparently, you're not suppose to use photo flash in there; but I figured I'd just take some shots until someone told me I wasn't suppose to do that. What? Like my cheap little camera's flash was gonna melt the wax?? I'm bad. I know.  I don't know what the rule was about me laying on the bed with Hugh or standing on the stage with the Star Trek boys.  What can I say...  They would take your picture when you walked in with King Kong for $20; but I wasn't about to pay that.  It already cost me $33.00 to get in the door.  Branson is fun; but you pay for everything!! It really is a tourist trap.

I hope you enjoyed my photo tour.
Until next time...
So it goes in my neck of the woods.
~mel

pit stop with the butterflies~

As promised ... I thought I'd share some of our vacation with my fellow bloggers :)

One of the places we made a pit stop at was the Fort Worth Botanic Garden.  We have been there before when the garden were in full bloom, the Rose Garden, Fullers Garden, the Japanese Garden, and they are beautiful; but this time of the year nothing was in full bloom yet.  We knew this; but that wasn't the reason for our pit stop this year.  This year we wanted to see something new that we had seen advertised.

We went to the Conservatory to see the "Butterflies in the Garden", sponsored by the Fort Worth Garden Club, Fort Worth Botanical Society and the Botanical Research Institute of Texas.  They are as beautiful as the flowers and it was a wonderful way to spend a day.

It was very hot and humid in there ~ it took your breath away; but so worth it!  Not only were we in awe of the foliage and exotic plants ~ what really caught your breath were the butterflies.  All 12,000 of them ... released from Asia, Africa, South, Central and North America.

Now... you would think with that many butterflies fluttering around it would be an easy task to photograph them.  Wrong... in fact, it was really really hard to get a snapshot of them fluttering about.  They were sooooooooo fast ....... and your camera would fog up something fierce.  They had hair dryers along the walk way to defog your lenses.  Pretty cool idea, huh?

You would also think that they would be super easy to spot ... wrong again ... it was amazing how they blended in with the flowers and leaves.  But what was really amazing was the size of some of them.  The blue morphos are as big as your hand ... and even they were hard to get a snapshot of.  BUT... we persevered and did get some great photos.  Some of them though I must admit; I borrowed from the internet.

Here are some of the butterflies we saw: (in no particular order) malay lacewing, red cracker, malachite, great egg fly, orange longwing, small postman, zebra longwing, blue morpho, great mormon, paper kite, ruby spotted swallowtail, plain tiger and tailed jay.

--click on the image to enlarge and open in new window--

I hope you enjoyed the photo tour.
Until next time...
So it goes in my neck of the woods.
~mel