St. Louis Trip

My Mom took the kids and I to St. Louis for the Schneider Family Reunion (my Grandpa's family) back in July. It was a special birthday treat, and we had such an amazing time filled with special memories that will last a life time. It was bittersweet as the last time we took a trip for the reunion all together was actually Greyson's first trip ever and Grandma (my Mom's Mom) was still alive. She passed away very unexpectedly just 4 short days before Hannah was born. I have so many memories from that trip, and I wanted to kind of recreate and build upon that with Hannah along for the ride.

Waiting to board our flight. We HAD to get Hannah a little travel backpack so she could be like Greyson. It was a GREAT investment, and she was thoroughly thrilled.


Boarding the plane
We went to this great place called the Magic House where they have TONS of fun kid stuff to do like work in a grocery store
Serve up ice cream
Work on cars
Hannah decided she needed to get her hands dirty :-)

The basement of the place was set up to recreate all of the different scenes from Huckleberry Finn. Here is Greyson ringing the riverboat bell. He LOVED this!



The ONLY shot of him in the Huck Finn hat. It was not a popular item, but of course I had to get a photo in it.
Hannah was equally thrilled with it
Working the electrical plant. Run for your lives!

He loved counting money and "filling out deposits" at the bank
Catching fish
Playing house
We saved the water for last, and it was a HUGE hit. They (and both of us) were SOAKED!
She of course had to hoard all of the little cups


The Schneider family reunion was held in the basement of the old high school (Alton High School on the border of Hartford and Alton, Illinois) where my Grandma and Grandpa actually went. It's not the school anymore, but it was so neat to see life come full circle with my kids playing on the playground (a new one). Hannah and I swinging on the bench swing.
On the way back to St. Louis from Hartford we took a wrong turn and ended up driving right by the Arch. Greyson was totally amazed by it so we thought we'd just take a detour and see what happened. We thought we would just drive by it since it was late afternoon and no one had napped, but we drove by a line of carriages waiting for riders. Greyson decided it looked like fun so we went for it. It was PERFECT!

Greyson loved "Chuckie" the horse.
We decided to push our luck even further by driving to this awesome park in the middle of downtown St. Louis. It was literally like a whole city block with fountains, sculptures, a huge digital TV screen, flowers and more. We don't have anything like it here, and I was SO envious of it. I wish we had something that neat here in Dallas, and it was FREE!

Greyson was in love with this "piano on the ground"
The fountains went on FOREVER. They had more fountains that went into big pools that the kids could swim in as well.
The kids could climb and touch all of the sculptures. It was perfect for exploring.
I thought this picture was funny since you can see my Mom, Hannah, and I on the big video screen while we take this picture of Greyson lol.
Hannah and I walking back to our car through the streets of St. Louis. What a great memory :-).

We took the kids to the Butterfly House, and it was a huge hit.


Hannah was beside herself with glee.
She picked up this flower and was just inspecting it.
Greyson had to get down on the ground so he could be at one with the butterflies. Some kids would run through there and go from one butterfly to another but not our little boy. He found one or two that he liked, and he just copped a squat right there on the path so he could enjoy them thoroughly.
The butterfly bench.
He was so interested in the exhibits where they showed different bugs and such.
After all that quiet exploring we decided to walk across the parking lot to the park so the kids could let off some steam. We could not get them to stop swinging to save our lives. We were pushing them for what seemed like a life time, and it felt like it was a billion degrees out while breathing through a wet blanket .
We attempted to stop pushing them with the hopes that they would be done, but this was their response. Life was OVER!
Joy again!

The trip back! Hannah was pretty good during the flight excpet for the last 20 minutes during the descent. She was going NUTS, and everyone kept staring at me and mouthing "I'm so sorry." I was tearing up, because it seemed like she was in utter despair. It made me think that a 12 hour car ride may be a better idea for our next trip.
Back at Love Field with all of our luggage. Hannah crashed out hard in the last few minutes of the flight, and she didn't wake up until we got home. She was so worn out from all of the crying.
It's official. I have like a thousand more pictures for this post, but they are on my Mom's camera. She is traveling constantly so I'll post now with the hopes of adding the pics of some of our other St. Louis adventures later. I am too far behind to keep waiting.