Maya hearts reptiles

Like any toddler, Maya can be fickle---her dragon obsession seems to have given way to a fanatical love for alligators (if you're a fan on Facebook, you may have seen this picture from yesterday---Maya ran to kiss an alligator painted on the wall at her school when I picked her up):

But dragon to alligator isn't that far of a leap, really.  I think that a dragon would be reptilian, you know, if it wasn't imaginary.

While at the zoo this past weekend, Maya's absolute favorite place to hang out was the Reptile House.  She ran around the dark hallways, looking into display tanks, yelping and pointing happily.  She even liked . . .  the snakes.  Now, in previous times, Maya has had a love/hate thing happening with snakes--even our snake.  She wanted to look in the cage, but not get too close.  She preferred if Dave or I was next to her while she peeked in.  But not on Saturday--she loved the snakes! 

So we decided to introduce her to our snake* and see what happened . . .

Whoa.

 This is incredible!

Mommy, do you see this snake?!

And a little video of the fun, complete with Maya making some nice speech sounds :)

*The snake is a friendly 11 year old ball python.  Her name is Ramona, after the Bob Dylan song, although she answers (or doesn't answer) to all words equally.  She came to me through an animal rescue 7 years ago, as she was a burn victim and I was trained in animal rehab.  I was right there the whole time, and I know what to keep an eye out for in terms of stress cues.  I don't recommend that people let any old toddler play with any old snake.