Since its been about six months since my last post, I've decided to dust off the blog and freshen it up with a new post.  As much as I want to keep a blog regularly updated for our loved ones that can't see us regularly, it seems like it requires a set of talents that God didn't gift me with...much like gardening.  (Any one need to kill a cactus?  Send it my way...I'm experienced.)  Anyway, yesterday we all woke up much too early for a Saturday morning, had a quick breakfast, got dressed and left to spend a few hours at the zoo.  Although we've lived in Houston for a little over a year, this is our first time to make it to it's zoo and Brinley's first time to go to a zoo ever.  After spending a few hours on Friday night printing out maps to get us from our home to the zoo, as well as a map of the zoo and notating all the labels with the times of any special events that were happening that day and downloading the Houston Zoo App to our iPhones and iPad, I went to bed feeling quite prepared to Saturday's adventure.  Through my research efforts I learned it is best to arrive close to opening because the Main Parking lot fills up quickly on the weekend.  Now through experience we know to arrive BEFORE the gates open at 9:00AM.  We arrived about 9:45 and the main parking lot was completely full.  Instead of going along the nice little route that I had planned out on my map of the zoo, by the time we found a parking spot and walked to the entrance and paid for our family membership, we had to make a bee-line straight for the giraffes.  Out of all the exhibits, one that I wanted to do the most Brinley to experience the most was the giraffe feeding.  We had two options, the 11:00AM feeding and the 2:00PM feeding.  Knowing how well or actually not so well that Brinley handles new places, particularly when they are beyond crowded and noisy, I wasn't sure if we'd still be at the zoo at 2:00PM.  I've learned over the years that short visits are usually the best for everyone involved in our family.