Jeannie Photography: Family Day at the Columbus Zoo!

We got there with Zero Tickets! My friend Cherene had told me just the day before about the Columbus Zoo holding a Family Day. It was Free and all we had to do was go to Donatos and pick up some tickets. Piece of cake right?, ....no way, nothing is ever that easy for Eddie and I. We tried two different Donatos and they were completely out of tickets. That alone should have sent a big red flag to what was to come. After texting my friend and telling her we were unable to grab us some freebies, she texted be back a few hours later and said, no worries, we got you 7 tickets, see you at the gate! It was ON! She loves me!
We arrived at the Zoo an hour later than my friend and found out that everyone was leaving their "extra" free tickets outside for those who had none, or not enough. We were able to "scalp" 6 tickets and we were IN! (my daughter Devin was with her dad)
As parents to 5 children, incurring all the cost of raising them ourselves with no help from the absent parents financially or physically, (don't even get me started on that subject because it's one that makes my blood boil! )(with the exception of Devin's dad who has always been there for her) Eddie and I strive to come up with unique affordable ways to spend time together as a family. You know that saying "The family who plays together, stays together" We are a living example. We both know how important it is to spend time showing them how much we want them to have a beautiful childhood that we never had. Paying for our whole gang to go to amusement parks like this is usually not within our budget, so when this opportunity presented itself, even though we both had other plans, we dropped everything to spend the day with the people who mean more to us than ourselves, our family as a whole.
Although we snapped a gazillion pictures I wanted to share a few.

Please don't judge my photographic skills on these family snapshots for they are just that, snapshots, capturing our day, amid the masses of flowing people. Here are a few that caught my eye...

I hardly took any pictures of the animals that day, they were all taken by Eddie. I was there to have fun with the kids. My friend Cherene had already asked me if I would take some Portraits of her son Jordan, so I was kinda in a Portrait light hunting mode for her when i wasn't taking snapshots of the kids. I did get this beautiful shot of Norman.

My best friend Cherene, and her grandson. We owe our special day to Her! Hugs and Kisses!

The boys called me over to show me their discovery lurking in the muddy waters.....

It was this little guy....

by the end of the day, poor Norman was just BEAT! He had woke up that morning vomiting and we almost didn't get to go. We gave him medicine and put him back in bed, but he was determined to go to the Zoo since he said he had never been there before.