Protesting at the zoo

This morning we packed up the kids and headed to the Brookfield Zoo. Vunge was going to meet us there with her kids and Soren, and she gave us extra tickets that would expire on the 31st. When we got to the zoo, the kids seemed ok with being loaded into the double stroller and the umbrella stroller. We walked in and stopped to take a picture with a huge animatronic dinosaur, but for some reason Nikko was not happy to be stopping. We thought maybe he needed to run around, so we found a little area that was family friendly that required us to park our strollers. The boys seemed to like the outdoor area, which was meant for a petting zoo, but when Ronin started playing in the dirt excavating site we decided to explore the indoors. Nikko wasn't happy with the plan and tried repeatedly to pull me outside. He protested pretty much the entire excursion, didn't even like the lemurs that we watched being fed. Once he got into the stroller he was still very combative. We met up with Vunge and went to another kid-friendly area which was made up of farm animals, but Nikko didn't want to leave the stroller. He pretty much wanted the stroller to stay in motion, but even when we wheeled it around he was balking. I was so incredibly confused and felt bad that Nikko seemed to be so frustrated. I couldn't figure it out and was starting to have a bad time myself. Ronin was also acting up, and in the petting zoo he managed to fling himself to the ground and get geese poop on his leg. It smelled absolutely rank and I gagged later on when changing his diaper. Nikko seemed to calm down a bit later as we walked toward our lunch area. It's possible that he was crabby because he was hungry, but we all suffered for it. After lunch all the kids went to play in a kids' playground and Nikko was himself again. He didn't even protest when we had to leave. All the kids fell asleep on the way home.

But once we got home it was for a quick juice refill, a gift wrap, then off to the Creen's house for Riley's birthday party. Luckily they were running late as well! We got to eat at the same time, and Nikko seemed curious about his surroundings. He didn't cling to me as I had expected he would. But as the afternoon wore on, I dreaded the cake time. He, of course, wanted some cake and Denis gave him some, but he threw a big fit when one piece was finished. Denis ended up sharing another piece, but I told him to announce that it was the last piece, then no more cake, etc. Nikko listened, but was still whiny until the cake was put away. We came home and I was exhausted from a whirlwind two days of activities. I was beat up emotionally because handling Nikko's mood swings was so challenging, and then Ronin's whining and crying didn't help make things easier. I wonder if Nikko senses that preschool starts at the end of this week...