Vacation - Day 4 - St. Louis Arch & Zoo

Day 4 proved to be much better than the previous day and we hit the ground running with a return visit to the arch. Levi got a digital camera for Christmas and had a blast taking pictures everywhere we went. Hopefully I'll get around to posting our trip from his viewpoint - he got some really good pictures.They had a large scale in the waiting area to go up in the arch. The kids enjoyed seeing who was heavier. I told them that Daddy and I (& Garison) would not be participating :).

So, our family had to fit in this pod with two other adults...hmmmm....

On the way up I think the kids were trying to figure out exactly what was going on (you can also see Levi's black eye really clearly here - the result of a CARS car accident):

I was really proud of the kids at the top, they climbed right up to look out...

I on the other hand did not enjoy this view straight down...

I preferred to look out at the city.

Here we are at the top!

Yes, I am a tourist.

After we went up in the arch, we drove across town to head to the St. Louis Zoo. The Zoo is actually free, although we bought the pass that let us have unlimited train rides - I was 8 months pregnant after all :). The train was the absolute highlight of the zoo - I think the kids could have ridden it all day.

It might have been Mommy's favorite part too with the cool breeze...

I got a FLIP video camera and I must say that I LOVE it. So easy to use and fun too. I'll spare you the other video's, but wanted to include at least one:

Levi loves Tigers (as any good Auburn Fan should), so we couldn't pass them by:

This picture is only funny because Garet climbed through this tunnel, but what you can't see is there is a glass window in the middle with snakes in it. Kinda freaky.

I knew hippos lived in water, but I never realized how fast they swam. I could have watched these guys for a long time. It was amazing to watch!

I've never really been a "zoo" person, but I have to admit that I had a really good time at this zoo. The first hour we were there was a little stressful, but then the kids relaxed and we ended up staying all the way until closing. A good family memory indeed.

Vacation - Day 3 - St. Louis Arch (well kinda)

Did I leave you in suspense long enough? Things have been absolutely crazy here and I hope to update you on that soon, but I wanted to finish up our vacation before I forget all the details!

After we left Santa Claus, we drove west (spending the night in IL) and Friday morning we drove on into St. Louis, MO. St. Louis is another one of those places where people kinda looked at me funny when I said we were going. Last year when we were in Paducah for Garet's Granddaddy's funeral, they had a brochure for St. Louis in the hotel - I had no idea how many things there were to do in St. Louis, so I put it on my list! Plus, it is only about a 6.5 hour drive from here.

We checked into our hotel in downtown St. Louis and immediately headed over to the Arch (can you seriously go to St. Louis without visiting the arch?). It turned out that the wait to go up was a little over 4 hours when we arrived, so we just bought tickets for the following morning. This turned out to be a very, very good thing.

We spent some time under the arch at the museums. Here are the kids in a replica of the pods that take you up the arch. The kids look so grown up to me: Taking some pictures outside...you are starting to get a feel for how the kids were doing by this point:

The melt down is starting:

I seriously don't know how we got these two shots of the kids smiling...

...as this was what was really going on:

We ended up canceling our plans for Friday night when the kids wouldn't take naps. In all fairness to them, they hadn't had naps in two days and we had a crazy full day at Holiday World. It was time for a break. So, we went to the pool and ordered pizza in and the night was wonderful. It didn't hurt that this was our view from our room:

Vacation - Day 2 - Holiday World!

After stopping for the night in Kentucky, we drove into none other than Santa Claus, Indiana on Thursday. My sister-in-law, Kelly, had been to this amusement park called Holiday World and it peaked my interest. Sure it sounds a bit hokey and telling people that you are going to Indiana doesn't exactly sound exciting, but it was so much fun!

The park is divided into two areas - an amusement park side and a water park side. We arrived at the park just after 10 AM and planned to leave around 2 or 3 when it was time for a nap. We didn't leave until almost 7 PM - the kids were troopers!!

This is a family-friendly place if I've ever seen one. First, I got in half-price when they saw I was pregnant. Second, they have free drinks all over the park so we never got dehydrated. And, they had free sunscreen in the water park area. How cool is that?

The best part about this park was that they had so many rides that preschoolers and toddlers could ride. I bet there were 10+ rides Kara could go on and 20+ that Levi could go on.

Being over 36", Levi was able to ride several "big" rides. Unfortunately I don't have any good pictures of him on them, but the kid was fearless. Levi is usually very cautious about things, but he went on every ride he could!

The bumper boats were by far the kids favorite. Kara took no prisoners as she zoomed around in the water:

After spending the morning in the amusement park, we changed into our swim suits and headed to the water park. I so wish I had taken some pictures in there - the kids areas were amazing! By far, the best kids water park I have ever seen. Levi & Garet headed to the water slides while Kara & I hung out in the lazy river and toddler areas. It was so relaxing to me because one of the toddler pools bubbled like a hot tub (without the heat) and it felt so good on my back. I just sat there and floated while Kara played around.

We ended the day back at the amusement park - the kids couldn't get enough. I highly recommend this park as a stop. Sure it was hot and I was 8 months pregnant, but it was so worth it to watch the kids have so much fun!!

Then we were off to location #2...

Vacation - Day 1 - Our Anniversary

If I've said it once, I've said it a thousand times - Vacations are my love language. A few months ago, I planned out a little family trip somewhere new. However, for various reasons I can't go into, the trip did not look like it was going to happen. This past weekend was the absolute last weekend we could go due to Garison's impending arrival and things did not look good.

Garet had been in Hawaii for a week and then home for a few days and then headed out at 4:45 AM last Monday and returned at 11:30 PM on Tuesday. Despite that, he let me start packing so that we could leave on Wednesday after he went in to work. I honestly don't know how he managed to stay awake (especially if you know Garet and his sleep).

Last Wednesday was our 9 year anniversary and I could ask for nothing more than a little vacation. Sure, the actual day was nothing to blog about...work for Garet, a flurry of activity at home packing last minute and getting in a car and driving four hours north. Our "anniversary dinner" was spent at a Burger King (in a gas station no less), but you know what - I wouldn't have changed a thing about it.

Here we were 9 years ago.... surrounded by friends and family...

and we are just as happy now as we were then. There has been a reason this blog has been silent much of this year - this has been a tough, tough, tough year for our family, but I am thankful to say that we are still best friends, still love each other very much and extremely blessed to watch our family expand once again in a few weeks.

So, where did we go? Stay tuned!

PS: I did a much better job last year of commemorating our 8th anniversary. Go here to see our first 8 years together!

Its that time of year!

You may have remembered the video I posted this time last year, and my views have not changed. Today Levi, Kara and I all walked into school very happy. I think the kids were as ready to go back as I was to take them. Kara sat down at her table and looked at me like, "Why are you still here, mom?". It was good to see all of their friends (and my mom friends too!) I could tell the kids missed each other during the day though because they held hands the entire way out of school.

Here's to a great year ahead!

Before & After

This was the view from my front porch back in April:

Within a couple of minutes, we had some serious hail come down. I don't know how well you can see this, but we had between golf-ball size and baseball-size hail. The hail was so loud - I was home alone with the kids and I thought the roof was going to cave in!

We didn't think much about it at the time, but several weeks ago many houses in our neighborhood started to get new roofs. So, we thought we might as well look into it. Sure enough, we had hail damage! Here is our "before":

"After":

"Before":

"After": When we were building our house, we made a last minute change on our roof color and have regretted it ever since (7.5 years!). Thankfully, we were very pleased with the color this time around...now we just need to pick a door & shutter color. Yea for hail (and low deductibles)!

Side note: The actual day of the re-roof project was horrible. They put the dumpster in front of our garage and I was trapped inside with the kids all day. My head was killing me from all the pounding! Lesson learned: park on the street the night before!

Summer Swimming

Levi just finished up his swim lessons for the summer. I have extremely fond memories of swim lessons growing up - I was pretty much a fish until I was nine. Unfortunately when we moved to AL, I never got back into it - something I regret because I really loved it.

Levi is our little guy - here he is lined up and going over the rules of the pool: Showing all the parents how to get into the pool:

Kick-board King:

Levi's favorite was doing the dog paddle with the noodle. He kept talking about how big his muscles were getting from doing the dog paddle - I'm assuming this is something his teacher told him.

This was the first year that I didn't sit in on the lessons (or have to get in the water - yea!). It was perfect because I could work-out while he was in swim lessons and Kara was in the nursery. The last lesson, however, was the one for the parents and Kara couldn't be upstaged. She kept trying to take her clothes off and jump in the water - this girl is not scared of anything!!