We haven't put many pictures of our home up lately. It is coming along just fine. Much of the front landscaping is done. We have over 15 trees on our property, and our bushes have grown even since this picture.

Us by the Giraffes. There were two of them in the background to the left of us (to our right) who look like they were posing for a picture. You can't see it very well here, but one of them was leaning into the other. It was funny.
Jonathan and his parents by the elephants.

I couldn't help but thinking of Bringing Up Baby with Cary Grant when looking at this guy above. Lions, and Tigers, and Bears, Oh MY!
Way Down Deep Where the Bananas Grow,

A Grasshopper stepped on an Elephant's Toe.

The Elephant Said with Tears in his Eyes,

"Pick on Someone Your Own Size!"

Melman! (You would have had to have seen Madagascar to know).

By far my favorite exhibit was the Oklahoma Trails exhibit. They had animals from all over the state, which is actually pretty diverse in terrain and wildlife. There were bobcats, cougars, all kinds of interesting birds and owls and such. My favorites to watch follow.

The Mexican Wolf. These were some beautiful animals and I don't remember ever seeing a live wolf before.
I have never seen a Grizzly Bear. I can't say that I want to run into one in the wild, but behind cages is fine with me. They were super active. There were two of them and they were really entertaining. I enjoy bears. I have only seen two Black Bears in the wild in New Mexico.
We are going to Yellowstone in a week. Maybe we will see another bear, but hopefully from long range. I have a telephoto lens. I am very cool with staying far away. He's smiling for the camera, though.

We went to the Ape EscAPE. It was pretty neat how they had it set up. Not many of the primates were out playing, though.

We went to the zoo with Jonathan's parents. I wanted to show you some of the unusual animals that the Oklahoma City Zoo has. I have to admit, I was pleasantly suprised.

The okapi (Okapia johnstoni) is a mammel of the Ituru Rainforest in central Africa. Although it bears striped markings reminiscent of the zebra, it is most closely related to the giraffe. Zebra
African Wild Dogs
I can't remember what this is
This is some sort of stork.

Jonathan's parents visited us on Memorial Day weekend. We were graced by the presence of Jake, Amanda, and Abby Haskew on the Friday night of their visit. They are some of our very best friends in Oklahoma. Sadly, they are leaving us on June 30th to be missionaries in Vienna, Austria. I realized that we had hardly any pictures of them, so we took a few. We are going to miss them, but we know they will be doing great work in Vienna. We hope to visit them. They will be there for at least 5 years.

And then the Bugs Came

When I got home from Ohio and spending time with my parents, the airline lost my bags. We went to the Rangers game (see below) and then when we got home that night and went to retrieve my bag on the back porch, there were BILLIONS of these black beetles. It was ridiculous. We woke up on Mother's Day and immediately set to work on the infestation. You can see the "topsoil" looking stuff? It is all bug carcasses. We were sweeping them off the porch in piles. It had to do with all of the rain we had. Oklahoma is not known for its wet weather. The running theory is that the beetles are dirt beetles and the ground was so saturated that they sought shelter in our attic. From the attic they found a way through the drywall to get into our light fixtures and heat returns. They were dropping out of all of our ceiling fixtures everywhere! The ones that survived the fall ended up all over the house...even in our bed! We hope to never experience that again. Now we sort of understand how the Egyptians felt when God sent the plague of the locusts upon them! It puts everything into perspective!

Gary Matthews Jr. was in center field right in front of us.

Saturday, May 12th we went to the Texas Rangers/LA Angels game in Arlington, TX. Ian Kinsler is an up and coming young guy for the Rangers.
Arlington Stadium.

Kenny Lofton, ex-Indian, was twenty feet from us.

I made a quilt for my Mom for her 50th birthday. It's theme is Mickey Mouse. It is my first quilt.

Mom and Dad got to come visit me at the show because their friend, Dave Ehrmann, gave them passes. I got to walk the show with them and with Dave.
Dave and his wife, Donna, have 3 parrots! This one is an African Grey named Zulu. I got along with her best.
Newt was a nice bird, too.
We went out to House of Hunan with Dave and Donna Ehrmann. Chris, my brother, got to join us. We had Sushi.
This was my Mom's dinner...Chinese Peppersteak.

On the week of May 4th through the 11th I got to go back to Cleveland, Ohio for a trade show for work.
I got to stay with my parents, which was wonderful, and just drove from their house to the convention center, 20 minutes away.
We had a get together on Saturday night with my grandma, aunt, uncles, and friends. Mom made spaghetti.