On the way down we stopped at the Scipio petting zoo. Lilli got to see and pet alpacas, donkeys, a cow, a miniature zebra, ostriches, emus, peafowl, chickens, turkeys, geese, rabbits, sheep, and pygmy goats.
The landscape down there was pretty arid, as you can see in this panorama [4] of a dry stream bed near the cabin. But despite this Lilli still loved going on walks to see the different trees, flowers, etc. She also got to see the nighttime moon (moo! or sometimes moon!) for the first time on one of these walks.
Lilli got to go to a regular pool for the first time. She was quite enthralled with playing in the water…and quite upset each time we had to leave.
One day we went miniature golfing with Leann's sister, Sherri, and Lisa, a family friend. Leann's sister Christine had a baby backpack that she let us borrow and Lilli did surprisingly well in it. We gave her a blue golf ball to play with which kept her pretty happy, but then it mysteriously disappeared. We couldn't find it anywhere, so we assumed she'd dropped it at some point. So I gave her another ball, this time pink. A few holes later, when I reached up to take it back, she somehow had the blue ball again. What a crazy little magician! I didn't think I was doing that well, but I actually ended up winning the game. Even more impressive, though, Leann was the only one in our group to get a hole-in-one!
We planned to do some birding one morning while we were down there but Lilli had a hard time going to sleep in the evenings—I guess things were too exciting. But we did see a few birds while traveling, including: American Kestrel, Turkey Vulture, Rock Dove, Common Raven, Red-tailed Hawk, Mourning Dove, Western Kingbird, Great Blue Heron, American Magpie, Rock Wren, and Western Scrub-Jay.
One afternoon Leann went with her Dad and several of her siblings to hike in Shelf Canyon, a slot canyon inside Zion National Park. The bottom left photo shows the eponymous shelves.
On the way they also saw some bighorn sheep. Can you find all five? (Hover your mouse over for clues; click for a larger image without clues.)
On Sunday, before going to Church, we all got together and took a family photo. Megan, who has taken some of Lilli's baby pictures [5], was one of the family photographers. We're on the left side, in the middle row.
Unfortunately, we brought back a cold with us (which is why it's taken me a while to post about this trip). Lilli and I caught it first and suffered through it on the drive home. Leann caught it from us a few days later.
Notes:
[1] This is Leann's mother's side of the family. It's getting large enough and spread out enough that any future reunion may be prohibitively difficult to organize.
[2] See their website here.
[3] See more of her vocabulary at Leann's post All Important Words Start With the Letter B.
[4] See my post Make Your Own Panorama.
[5] See my post Family Pictures.
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