A Day at the Aquarium

Eric and I have been wanting to go to take Skylee to the SLC Aquarium for a while, but it's so expensive that we haven't made it.  Fortunately, the MBA Program had a "Day at the Museum" where all students could go with their families for free.  We of course took Skylee Dallas with us and had an amazing time!

Kristin dropped Skylee off at our house and she had fallen asleep on the way.  We tried to keep her asleep and I took her in on our bed, but as soon as I laid her down she was wide awake and screaming.  I calmed her down and turned on some songs on YouTube and she slowly woke up (although we would have rather her go back to sleep -silly baby).  We gave her some goldfish and put a blanket on her.  She dumped out the goldfish more than once, but she always helped pick them back up.  At one point Eric went to put her blanket away because she wasn't using it and she said 'MINE!" so Eric gave it back.  It was really funny.

Once she woke up she started dancing to the songs and having a marvelous time.  It was so much fun!

After a while, we decided it was time to go to the aquarium.  She LOVED it.  She was so captivated by the fishes and kept pointing to them.  It was adorable.  At every tank, she would go straight to the glass and stand as close as she could get.  There was a giant octopus who climbed down a wall while we were at the tank, she was so enthralled.  It was precious.  We brought a stroller, but she mostly just wanted to walk everywhere herself - she is so independent.

There is a really cool area with South American Fish that Skylee really liked.  At the front, they have some birds that we watched together.

They have little ledges by the tanks that are just Skylee's size.  She would sit there and then motion for me or Eric to sit by her, and then point out all the fish to us.  It was absolutely precious.  She is so damn smart.

In the end, there were some South American Birds that she was fascinated by.  We stood there for quite a while!

Our next stop was the Penguins.  This was by far Skylee's favorite area.  She was so fascinated by the penguins.

Skylee also LOVES selfies.  It's actually really funny.  Whenever she sees Eric and me taking pictures, she comes and sits on our laps so we can take selfies.  We pulled out the phone to do a selfie and she immediately started waving at herself.  It was so much fun.

There are several ramps throughout the aquarium and she wanted to run down all of them.  I tried to hold her hand so she wouldn't trip.

There was another penguin area where you could only see the penguins when they were underwater.  We put Skylee on this ledge and she immediately laid down and just watched them.  I could have died it was so precious.

After the penguins, we went and got treats with the MBA folks.  We got Skylee a cookie and she liked it a lot.

In the meeting room, there was a tank with fish and she loved it.

Our next stop was the Utah fish.  This was a really cool area with fish from Flaming Gorge and Lake Powell and otters.  Skylee really liked the otters.  There were red rocks and arches and there was a little crawl space we wanted her to go through.  She was a little apprehensive at first, so Eric stood at one end with her and I stood at the other, and then we got her to come through.  After that, we couldn't get her to stop.  She loved it. And it was the perfect size for her to walk through without bumping her head.  It was adorable.

They had an Orca Whale display where the kids could climb on the whales.  The baby whale was the perfect size for Skylee.  She climbed all over it.  However, she also wanted to climb on the big whales as well.  Eric helped her get on the big whale, but unfortunately, she wasn't able to climb up the fins of the other whale.  She was rather disappointed.

With that, we had seen pretty much all there was to see.  We had to exit through the gift shop, which was fine by me because I wanted to get her a stuffed animal.  She fell in love with this goofy turtle.  It wasn't my favorite and I kept trying to get her to like another one, but I could not get it out of her hands.  She just loved that turtle.  When we went to pay for it, she wouldn't even give it to the cashier, but they were able to get the barcode to scan it.  When we were leaving Skylee waved goodbye to the cashier and blew a kiss.  It was hilarious.

Kristin and Dan were still out and about so we decided to take Skylee to a park.  We did a few slides with her and she liked them, but some of them were a little big for her and I think it scared her.

After that, she was very sleepy so we took her back to my parents so she could take a nap.  Overall, we had a wonderful day with Skylee Dallas.  We are smitten by our adorable niece!