Seals - Sweet! Leopards - Awesome! Monkeys - Not so much...

The last couple of weeks has been a flurry of packing and getting ready for our big move to our new house this Friday. Saturday we spent much of our day in Home Depot. So today I decided to take Finn to the Lincoln Park Zoo, so we could have some fun and not think about moving for a few hours. It was the first trip where he really saw the animals and reacted to them. It was so awesome seeing him watch and laugh every time the seals swam by. Then we went to the Lion House and he LOVED it. There were lots of leopards walking around and he would point to them, say "cat", and make his "rowr" sound. We were having a blast! So much so that I decided to take him on the carousel - another hit! So after that I decided to take him to my favorite place in the zoo - the primate house. First "house" we come to had a big baboon in it. He's just sitting there checking everyone out. Soon there is a good sized gathering of people checking him out too. I guess we were boring him, because he opens up his mouth and gives us a big yawn, which TERRIFIES Finn. He started SCREAMING! Literally screaming and crying. I tried to tell him that he was just yawning, it was alright, but Finn was not having it. And that experience tainted the rest of the monkeys, apes, gorillas etc. Every time we got to a window with a new "monkey" in it, he would just turn his head and say "bye bye." His indication that it was time to move on. I tried and tried to calm him down, show him how the monkeys were playing and jumping around on the ropes, how the glass between us meant they couldn't get to us - Finn was not having it. Each time I tried, I got a "bye bye" monkey. During one of my monkey pep talks to Finn, the woman next to us turned and said - "is he the kid who screamed at the baboon." After I admitted he was, she said "that was hilarious." Not hilarious for the mom who won't be visiting the gorillas again for some time. Bummer.