St. Louis Vacation

We had a great week last week on our family vacation. We left on Saturday and drove to Columbia, MO to stay with Sarah (Matthew's sister), Bismark, Hannah & Carson. We stayed there almost 24 hours and thought breaking up the drive would be better for myself and for Ryane. We had a good visit with them and headed onto St. Louis on Father's Day.

After arriving in St. Louis we checked into the hotel and thought we'd drive around to find out where Matthew's conference would be and exactly where others things would be. I can say it wasn't much fun driving around streets we didn't know and getting detoured a bit by flooded streets down by the river. One turn took up down the MOST ROUGH cobblestone street there is!! While it would be great if I was actually trying to into labor, it was just really rough and seemed to last forever! :) We finally found somewhere to eat and our way back to our hotel for the night. Monday, Matthew was off to a conference class for the day and Ryane & I were on our own. We enjoyed swimming at the hotel and taking a trip to Union Station to feed the fish, which Ryane loved, and we walked around the mall.

Tuesday, we had most of the day to spend as a family, so we visited the Magic House and had lots of fun and imaginative play there. There was lots of things for Ryane to do there and there was also many things for kids that are older than her. Overall, I highly recommend going! This could be one of my favorite pictures of the trip.....



That night Ryane and I joined Matthew at his Conference's welcome fair that many family's attended. They had lots of stuff for Ryane to enjoy and it was fun to be able to see the many other families that came along for the conference. Later that night, Matthew snuck away with some friends from college for drinks and gambling. He tells me they all walked away winners, so that always makes it more fun for everyone.

Wednesday, Matthew was back at his conference and Ryane and I mainly hung out spending quality time together. Seems like forever ago that I got to spend that many days in a row with Ryane and it was so great. That night, we attended the cardinals game. They were playing the Royals, so we had plenty of opportunties to cheer and watch the Royals win!! It was Ryane's first official baseball game and well, it may be a bit longer before she's really into it. :) Ryane told us she was "Done!" maybe as late as the 4th inning. ha!



Thursday, our last day in St. Louis, after Matthew was done attending conference stuff in the morning, we managed to find the zoo after much looking. I've been the zoo there before, but I can say it was absolutely amazing this time having Ryane and Matthew there. Ryane was so cute to watch and made me feel like a kid again as well experiencing the animals for the first time (as she doesn't remember going to Wichita zoo last year).





I do have lots more pictures from the trip (surprise, surprise!!), but the internet is not being my friend to upload them to a different link. overall, the trip was great. We did have some moments of frustration though with potty-training on vacation - yikes! While at the hotel, everything was good, but when we went out and about (especially the Magic House), it didn't bother Ryane one bit not to tell us anything and just go...then, still not say anything about it. I swear there was a moment I was ready to go buy diapers! But, we all made it through the trip - hee hee - and back home to concentrate on it again.