We took a day off yesterday.

And by “day off,” I mean we decided not to send Ishu to school because we went to the aquarium instead.

I’m taking advantage of this last and final year where I can do things like that. Just decide not to send him to school because I wanna be with him or do a fun thing with him.

Shedd was doing one of their “Free for IL Residents” days and we hopped on over there shortly after it opened to beat the crowds.

It was our first time there since they renovated the place and, man oh man, it’s had me questioning whether I should renew our lapsed membership. It’s so nice and connected and easy to get around now.

We only stayed for a couple hours, but we got to see the BELUGA show. We’ve been several times but have only ever seen a dolphin show but lucked out yesterday and got to see the belugas.

They might be my new favorite animal.

Maybe.

I really love an octopus too.

Speaking of which, the octopus is back. It was removed from the exhibit for a long time while we had a membership but we got to see it yesterday and this book has me wondering what all of its thoughts are.

We walked through the Amazon Rainforest exhibit and were looking at a snake and its skin that it had shed on the branch below it. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed a super tiny frog on the branch next to it. I pointed it out to Ishu and he looked at it and, with such confidence, responded, “Oh yeah, it’s a poisonous dart frog.” To which I nodded and thought to myself, Okay, he’s probs just making that up, but I’ll just smile and nod and read him the sign. And when I went to go read the sign, sure enough, it said “poisonous dart frog.” And I just wonder how come my child knows all this stuff.

It’s wild.

The fact that their brains can file away all this information. HE’S FOUR.

But, maybe, that’s WHY he can file that information away.

He doesn’t have to think about what he’s gonna make for dinner or when to pay the bills or how to be a grown-up.

Still pretty cool stuff though.

When we got home, we ate sandwiches for lunch and watched The Incredibles while Riyu napped before heading over to gymnastics.

It was a good day.

A happy day off of school.

We’re back to business over here today, but very thankful to get to do stuff like that every now and again.