Xander...

It's 100 degrees outside, but Xander is either laying in the sun or snuggled up in a big, warm afghan. Silly kitty...

Festival of Lights

Last week, Gus, Buddy, & I went to the Festival of Lights at the zoo. Unfortunately, Lulu couldn't go with us. This has been a yearly tradition for us since the kids were little. We always seem to pick the coldest day in December - but that's part of the tradition. We go, we freeze, we complain, we laugh about it - and we do it all over again the following year, LOL.

giant lion nutcracker outside the entrance

huge Christmas tree just inside the entrance - beautiful!

normally, I hate these inflatable figures, but they were kinda cute here

lights around the lake - they were timed with the music

one of the very stinky, but cool, elephants

one of Santa's reindeer

Am I the only one who didn't know that scorpions' exoskeletons glow in the dark??

I'm not fond of snakes, but this is a king snake & he eats other snakes (even venomous ones), so he's okay in my book

the 3 new manatees - one is a baby - isn't she cute??

My cousin works at the zoo as the penguin keeper. He gave us a great tour of the bird house and then took us back to meet a couple of the penguins. Majorly cool!!

Kyoto, a 2 yr. old King penguin - his feathers are super soft!

he's ready to go back - apparently he was unimpressed with us, LOL!

This is Buddy - a 24 yr. old Magellanic penguin. He was very friendly - I loved him!

Look at his feathers - more than 70 per sq. in.!

so cute how he followed my cousin when he called him!

Buddy & me doing what we do best - act silly!

Gus & me

Buddy & me

Baby ducks

Remember the baby ducks that I blogged about a few months ago? We would see them with their mama, waddling through the yard, going from pond to pond. So cute!

These four seem to have made our street their "home". They make their rounds to all of the houses, but I think we're the ones who feed them the most. When they see one of us, they will waddle as fast as they can to our yard.

We started out by feeding them in the yard. Then we moved to the sidewalk, and then the porch. At first, they were pretty timid and wouldn't get too close. Now they will walk right up to us and even eat from our hands. I'm pretty sure they even recognize my voice since I talk to them while I feed them.

I'm pretty sure that these ducks are the babies of the female black duck & male mallard that we've seen together every year since we moved here. Female black ducks are very similar to female mallards, except that black ducks have a blue spot on their wings and a greenish bill, while female mallards lack the blue and have an orange & brown bill.

From the looks of these "babies", there are three females and one male. And that's probably more than you ever wanted to know about ducks, LOL!

Here's a video of me talking to them on the porch: