Ella's 1st Vacation!! (part 1)

We took Ella on her first real vacation, you know over night in a hotel room.  We went to the Cincinnati Zoo and to the Newport Aquarium in Kentucky!  State number 4 for Miss Ella.  We kept telling her we were going to see lots of fish and monkeys...or "ish" and "a ma ma" as Ella would say.  We headed to the zoo first thing Monday morning.

We got an up close encounter with the elephants...

And did you know that penguins live on every continent south of the equator.  These are African penguins so they like the heat, no cold water tank required.

We watched these little guys for a LONG time.  They were so cute and playful.

These gibbons, or monkeys for us normal folks, were swinging like crazy and boy, were they loud.  Ella couldn't take her eyes off of them.

We watched the sea lion and walrus bask in the sun.

And then these otters came right over to play right in front of Ella.

It was a good thing Mommy got her penguin fix from earlier because she had to miss out on the indoor penguins.  They were in this building called "wings of the world."  Daddy seemed a little irritated that Mom wasn't going to go in but the first thing he said when they came out..."It's a good thing you didn't go in there."  What kind of zoo just lets birds fly all over the place?

Just when we had given up on the polar bear, out he came.  He put on quite a show in the water for us.

And then the monkey house..

This little chimp family was adorable.  The baby must not have been very old because mama chimp was looking pretty rough.

Ella loved the manatees.  We tried to leave but she just kept circling back.

We saw cheetahs and the white lions...and of course more monkeys on monkey island.

It was getting late and the poor babes hadn't napped yet.  As soon as we passed the last exhibit, she was out like a light.

Mommy & Daddy shopped the gift shop for a surprise while she napped.  We even drove back to the hotel and sat in the parking lot for almost an hour until our sleeping beauty woke.  We went swimming in the hotel pool and topped the day off with some Cincinnati style chili for dinner.  Yummy! A wonderful day and a wonderful surprise for bedtime.

 Ella giving her monkey kisses.