The Lee Family: Olivia's First Grade Field Trip!

Today Olivia and her fellow 1st graders had their field trip to the Sharkarosa Wildlife Ranch in Pilot Point, just over an hour drive from us. Originally I had a conflict with a tennis make-up match in Fort Worth, but was able to ask another player to play for me. Yesterday, I told Olivia I wasn't able to go and she completely lost it and cried and cried. I decided that at the end of the day it was more important for me to spend the day with Olivia on her field trip then play yet another tennis match. It is Olivia's only field trip for the year and I didn't want to miss out. She was so excited when I told her I would be going with her!

Today started out cloudy, cool and a little rainy, but the forecast promised it would be in the low 70s. I ended up joining Stacy and Casey, with Stacy driving her new car. It took us over an hour to get to Sharkarosa, which was really in the middle of nowhere. Shortly after we arrive, the school buses arrived and we connected with our kiddos. It rained the entire drive up, but thankfully stopped for the entire field trip. However, it was COLD! It was in the low 50s, a little windy and cloudy. Several of the kids forgot jackets and were in their short-sleeved shirts. I had both tennis jacket and my rain jacket on over a long-sleeved shirt and was still freezing! I ended up giving my tennis jacket to Poppy, who looked so cold and pathetic. I couldn't even imagine only wearing a short-sleeve shirt in the weather! Olivia wore her pink zip up and I brought her heavy windbreaker/rain jacket that barely fits her, but was essential today. She wore them both zipped up!

The field trip started with a ride on the tractor-tram, which was open to the air and very chilly. Our tour guide drove us to see the horses, which we could pet, through the zebras and deer, which we couldn't pet and then to see the camels which we were allowed to pet. It was pretty fun, although chilly. Of course, Olivia was "starving" so I gave her a bag of pretzels on the sly. It still didn't improve her mood much and I knew she was cold and miserable when she said "I just want to get on the bus and go home." I overheard one boy say "I'd rather be at school doing math problems!" Ha! That kid must have really been cold!

Finally our tour was over and we headed to the main pavilion where we were given a talk about an alligator and were allowed to touch one that had it's mouth taped closed. It was a beautiful alligator and I took a cute photo of him with Olivia. After, our guide took us to the kangaroo enclosure and gave a short talk on the kangaroos and explained each one to the kids. Thankfully, after that we were able to eat lunch over by the bears. The bears are super cool to watch play, stretch and wrestle together. I sat by Olivia, who ate every bite of her lunch. After, she wanted snacks from my backpack! She was very hungry! Once she had some food in her belly, she was more interested in playing and ran to the playground to play with most of her classmates.

After they had a chance to play for a bit, with some of the boys getting pretty muddy when they jumped off the merry go round, we headed back toward the pavilion. The kids pared up and rode on the tractor-pulled train. Olivia joined up with her buddy Cora, who is really one of the sweetest kids in the class and a lot of fun. While they headed off on the train, Hala and I went into the gift shop to look around, and mainly to warm up! I hadn't felt my hands in an hour and was still very cold. I bought each of the girls a stuffed animal key chain - a giraffe for Olivia and an alligator for Sofia. They were really cute. Of course, Olivia noticed the gift shop as soon as she got off the train and we returned to look at all the gifts on offer. She wanted a kangaroo and we picked out a small stuffed snake for Sofia.

We headed out and visited the porcupines, monkeys and the adorable ring-tailed lemurs that had an adorable baby on one of the mom's backs! So cute! They all looked as cold as we felt. Unfortunately the petting zoo wasn't open but the kids were able to stick their fingers through the fence and touch some of their little goat noses.

Since the weather was so crumby and there was really nothing left for the kids to see, the kids loaded onto the buses 45 minutes early to head back to school. We were more than happy to climb into Stacy's warm car and get feeling back in our fingers and toes! Of course, Stacy teased us since she grew up in Michigan and the weather was fine to her! Casey and I just didn't grow up with many cold, dreary days! The field trip was fine, but Sharkarosa wasn't as interesting as it could have been. There wasn't much to do and there was little to no educational or hands-on activities. Some of the kids were overhead saying they would "rather be at school doing math." Yikes! In the end Olivia enjoyed it and it was fun to spend the day with her!

A cold smile as our tour begins