Happy Birthday to Me!

The big 35...I believe I have more to be thankful for this year and more to celebrate every year. Getting pregnant and the beginning of our family was the best gift I could have gotten as well as all of the love and support from our families and friends that have come to us since... :)



The day didn't pass by without a celebration or more surprises! Our friends, Justin and Paige, had a great birthday surprise for me. Lex called and asked me to leave work a few minutes early...I made arrangements to come home, she had clothes ready for me, water, and we hopped in the car and headed down McDowell. We entered the gates of the Phoenix Zoo and Justin and Paige were there to greet us. Paige is in charge of all of the African animals at the zoo and she took us to meet all of her 'babies' for my birthday. I hate that I don't have pictures of the whole experience, but at the same time, we were totally in the moment with the animals since we weren't caught up with the picture taking process. First we met Half Ear and Notch, the rhinos. Paige called them to us and told us their stories. They are girls and one is super protective of the other. She brushed them and we were able to pet their tough skin- They are covered in coarse hair too, which surprised me- I've never been up close and personal with a rhino before!



Then we went to see the 'piggies' as Paige calls them. The warthogs are such interesting creatures with hair like horses, hooves and noses like pigs and tusks like elephants. The girls are Tori (mama) and Little Pig. Paige has trained Tori to come to the fence and roll over to have her belly rubbed, so we all rubbed Tori's belly! Little Pig was shy and let her mama get all of the attention. The boy warthogs were Colossus and Olympus- we ran out of treats, so they stayed in the shade during our visit.



The grand finale for me was meeting and feeding the family of giraffes. Their building is twice as tall as the other barns for the animals. We met all five giraffes, Samburu, Jambo, Makope, Charlie and Zuri. Each of them has different markings on their puzzle patterned fur. Jambo has a pattern of a heart on his chest that distinguishes him from the others. Makope gave us lots of kisses and her name means 'eyelashes' in Swahili. Zuri was very shy, but eventually ate out of our hands. Charlie was the tallest male, 18 feet tall I believe. Samburu was one of the moms and ate out of our hands too. They are the most graceful animals and we couldn't stop smiling when they looked at us and arched their necks toward us to give kisses! They have the most beautiful eyes and were very gentle creatures. We told Paige that she has the best job ever and she definitely agreed :)