Coops are for Chickens!

But, Mama, there's nothing to do!
Originally uploaded by the golbys.

We haven't had the best luck lately, health-wise. After recovering from whatever virus caused her sore throat and high temperature last weekend, this weekend Kathleen contracted some sort of stomach bug. Fortunately for us, we still managed to see Daddy on a VTC (video-teleconference) before we realized that Kathleen was really sick. A day's worth of nearly unmitigated crankiness all became clear Saturday evening in a serious bit of post-dinner messiness. Rats!

Anyway, so we missed church for the second week in a row. (Listen, dark forces conspiring again the Golby girls' attendance at church: we are non-negotiable on Easter. We're going!) We spent Sunday at home, carefully sipping white grape juice and nibbling on toast and dry cereal. The subdued, ill version of Kathleen seemed okay with that.

By Monday morning, though, my normal, busy toddler was back! We pulled out every trick in the book (before morning nap, even), and nothing was entertaining enough for Kathleen. She made her desire perfectly clear by running to the front door and slamming her little hands against it; Kathleen had had enough of being cooped up!

After morning nap we promptly headed out the door. Kathleen's been watching (more than I'd like, since she's been sick) a "Leah's Farm" Signing Time lately, and she's been picking up the signs for a number of farm animals. However, when she sees pictures of these animals, she uses the correct sign and "dog" interchangeably. She sees a cow, she signs "dog." Hoping to clear up some of that confusion, we visited the zoo, with an emphasis on the petting zoo.

We had a great time! The petting zoo portion of the local zoo isn't all that big, but there was enough to interest Kathleen for a while. She was extremely excited to see the goats:

She is dancing AND signing "goat" here. Well, actually, she'd just finished signing "goat," which is one of her favorite signs. Kathleen was more excited about the goats from a distance (she's not a stupid kid) than she was up-close in the goat pen. But she was still pretty interested in them. She was also very interested in the chickens, and signed about them continuously.

Kathleen was not as impressed with the cow, the miniature horse, or the llamas. She called them all "dogs" and no amount of explaining would deter her. On our way out, we also stopped to see the giant tortoises, but I'm not sure whether she could tell they were animals and not just big rocks. She liked the elephants, and used that sign correctly, but signed "dog" while being amused by the monkeys' antics. I guess we'll have to go back!