Zoo Zoo Zoo...and Calaway Park

Well it has been 5 days since the dreaded Tick bite! After a lot of deliberation from the doctors who were unsure of how to treat someone as young as Jessica- they ended up deciding that she was experiencing a allergic reaction to the bite NOT Lime disease or Rocky Mountain disease which is far more serious. Her hives came and went for a couple of days and every time she felt the least bit warm, I panicked. But the past few days have been reaction free. We have been warned that any time in the next 30 days if she experiences any flu like symptoms we must rush her in immediately. ...um but not to worry they said. Actually just as I was starting to calm down from the fear of her ugly reaction I came home from an appointment of my own and John cautioned me not to panic as he`d found ANOTHER tick in our house. In our HOUSE! That meant we brought Not ONE but TWO home with us.

John took a picture, probably because he knows I love photos. In this case- I wished he`d just squashed the thing!

Seriously my mind started going with a hundred different fears. What if one of the other kids brought it home and got bit without me realizing it. What if there were still more to be found. What if it laid EGGS! Ew Ew Ew!

I could`nt handle the thought of those things so the next morning we did what any rational person would do. We packed our bags and headed for Calgary!

Actually we were headed to Calgary for a different reason and we decided to turn it into a Rausch Family Weekend. It was so nice to hang out with my siblings and nieces and nephews for a couple of days in an environment that contained no bugs!

Friday after my appointment we all met up at Calaway Park. When I was little we used to go here all the time and it was always a summer highlight for us. As an adult...

I don`t know how many times I found myself saying, `Stay together`` or ``If you run ahead one more time then we are leaving...` All those years ago, I could never understand why my Dad did`nt seem to enjoy Calaway Park as much as us we did.

Now I get it.

Still we enjoy these things because our kids do. There is a huge pay off in watching your kids have the time of their lives.

The verdict is still out on whether or not Jessica actually enjoyed this ride!

We stayed until the Park closed and then we all headed to my sisters home and let her make us Dinner!

It was a symbiotic sort of thing. We all were starving, and she was willing, and had also just had the busiest day at work EVER so why not just keep her busy!

We are efficient that way. The rest of us enjoyed a relaxing evening. Thank you Crystal.

Saturday morning we all met up again- only this time at the Calgary zoo. We LOVED the zoo. It had been a couple of years since we`ve been there and they had made some great changes. You know that big long tunnel you walk through as you enter the zoo with animals etched into the wall. Well that is pretty much where the mayhem began.

Insert me yelling at the kids every 4 minutes to yet again, ``STAY TOGETHER!``

I`m so much fun to be around in those settings. Ask anyone.


Some of our favorite animals to see:

These rays were cool. This exhibit is only going to be around for another week or so but it was really neat to see these rays swim past you as you lean over the pool. Speedy little things!

(It might be difficult to see the ray in this photo but it is in the bottom left hand corner)







There were baby peacocks walking around, a sweet little toddler giraffe (would you call it a toddler), and this adorable one year old gorilla.
For some reason that little monkey made me really excited for our own arrival in a few months.

Perhaps that`s because we`d just seen the huge hippos and sadly I felt I could relate to those lazy beasts a little to well. It`ll be nice to be NOT pregnant someday.


It was a great weekend, made better by the company we had.

I always gauge the success of an event by the amount of time it takes my kids to fall asleep once we leave.

In this case- they were snoring about 2 minutes after we said our good byes!

So, I think we did pretty good!