My mom's complaining that I'm not writing enough blog entries. Well, I feel like the only thing I've been writing about is my feet and that has got to be boring. Three weeks ago, I switched strings (groups of animals I'm in charge of) at work and at about the same time took over being president of our zoo keeper group. I've spent most of my free time working on these things, rather than dinking around on my computer. Nothing exciting or worth writing about, just lots of research and figuring things out. Switching strings has been hard, but in a good way. So far, it's working exactly as I hoped and my feet are feeling much better. I'm also REALLY enjoying working with my "new" animals- especially the tigers, camel, swans and emus.

This morning I took a break from the crazy and went for a long hike at Banner Marsh with Logan and Duncan. We left home ~6am, hoping to see some cool animals right around sunrise. We weren't disappointed. I kept Duncan on leash while I made sure no one else was in the area. It turned out to be a good thing because there was a dead swan I'm sure he would have rolled in. Unfortunately, it was a native trumpeter swan rather than one of the abundant, introduced mute swans. Bummer, but something ate well. We climbed to the top of the levee and hiked south. I was scanning the trees for owls and the lake for beavers and otters. I was pleasantly surprised when I noticed an odd shape at the top of a huge tree that did indeed turn out to be a great horned owl! Logan and I both had binoculars and we watched for a long time. It was his first great horned owl and he was excited to see it. He was even more excited when we walked a few more steps and saw a beaver working in the lake. He was able to see its flat tail and we watched it swimming and diving. There was a second beaver, but it was pretty far out in the water and tough to see even with binoculars. We saw hundreds of coots, thousands of grackles, a large variety of ducks and geese and even a pair of Wilson's snipe. Duncan tore around and had a ball. Logan tore around and had a ball. I hobbled around and had a ball. If Logan hadn't had a football game at 11, we'd probably still be out there.

Logan is on a good flag football team this year. It's great that they score and win, but Logan seems a bit frustrated that he doesn't get as many plays. He has to share the "star" duties with all the other kids on his team. It's awesome to watch him because he's always completely tuned in with what's going on and eager to play. I think he smiles the entire game. I hope we can find him a JFL team this fall because I know he'll love "real" football.

Kaylin came along to the game this week because we promised a trip to Sweet CeCe's frozen yogurt following the game. If you haven't been to Sweet CeCe's, you should probably go today. I prefer ice cream to frozen yogurt, but this place's yogurt is the best I've had. The experience is out of a magical childhood dream. You get a huge cup and fill it yourself with any or all of 8 different flavors or swirls. You then move on to an area with lots of different candy, cereal and other toppings that can be dispensed from wall dispensers. You then move to a buffet table with soft toppings such as fruit, brownies and candy such as peanut butter cups that can't be in the dispensers. They even have hot fudge, caramel, whipped cream and cherries. It is fun and delicious. I can't wait to go back. I might be more excited about it than the kids. Gene loved it too. Oh, I forgot to mention that Sweet CeCe's is at the Junction City shopping center and that the prices are similar to Cold Stone Creamery.