Lions, tigers, and bears - seriously!

For our nephew Connor's 4th birthday today, the family had his party at a wildlife refuge down by Butte College. At the mere mention of animals, the Canadian was all ready to go. We got there right when the shindig was supposed to start which of course meant we were first ones there by a long shot, but that just allowed us to wander around a little on our own before all the little ones showed up. All I can say is that we must have showed up right at their nap time, because everyone was laying down snoozing. Except for the Liger (lion/tiger mix) who was ramming against her cage trying to get some teenage girls. But besides that, they were all conked out.
One of the birds said "hello" to Chris when he walked up, but then wouldn't say it again. Performance anxiety, I suppose. The bears were my favorite. There were two brown bear cubs that were wrestling around with each other and chasing each other around their enclosure. And then there was Winston, the "special needs" bear, who suffered head trauma as a baby. When he wasn't busy falling off of the logs in his cage he was sticking he front feet in his water bucket. Bless his little, mentally challenged heart. Here's one of the bear cubs cleaning his foot like nobody's business.



As part of Connor's birthday package staff did a special reptile show for us that involved snakes and lizards.
After the reptile show Connor starting breaking into his presents.
What?! A Cars 2 snuggie from Aunt Susan and Uncle Chris? Yeah, we're that cool. Except for the part where Connor noticed that the little boy on the box was playing a Nintendo DS and starting telling his mom that there was a DS in the box too. So we had to crush his dreams and let him down easy that it was just a snuggie, no DS. After fueling up on some halloween sugar cookies we bid the birthday boy a fond farewell and skedaddled.

And what was awaiting me when we got home? A box full of gluten-free treats from my sister, Jessica, for my birthday.
Within a minute I had the box open and half a snickerdoodle shoved in my face. Soooo good! I've already got plans for the flatbread to use as pizza crust tomorrow for lunch and to make french toast out of the bread. Then the rest will go in the freezer so that I can continue to enjoy it for weeks to come!