Going Through Life One Blog Post at a Time
It is always nice to know you are loved. I returned to work after a short vacation to discover some additional decorations to my office. I will leave some of the stuff up for a few days, but the picture on my computer monitor had to go. He is a bit scary. Oh yeah… And watch out Crystal Kroner. Your days are numbered! 😉
We visited the St. Louis Science Center for our last day of vacation. The Science Center is not that big, so we had plenty of time to look at all the exhibits, see “Live Sky Tonight” at the McDonnell Planetarium, and see “Journey to Space” at the Omnimax Theatre. We started out looking at the dinosaur exhibit. The kids thought this exhibit was particularly neat and got to learn about being an archaeologist.
John would have spent all day looking at this machine if we had let him! It was quite impressive and he could not get enough. Every time we got near the entrance to the Science Center, John would stop and watch the balls as they moved through the different parts of the machine.
John’s other favorite part was figuring out how to program this train so that it would actually move. He was so proud of himself when he got it moving backwards!
Laura’s favorite part was visiting the Life Science Gallery. She thought it was so cool that she had to wear a lab coat and protective eyewear to enter the Gallery. Her activity was analyzing isopods (roly-poly bugs) through a microscope. She LOVED it!
In case you are wondering, Andy’s favorite part was the Planetarium show and mine was the Omnimax movie. After a long day at the Science Center, we headed for home about 4:30. It was an uneventful, easy trip home. What a great trip, but it is *always* good to be home!
For Day 2 of our mini-vacation, we visited the St. Louis Zoo. Our first stop was the Children’s Zoo, which is free for the first hour of the day. The kids had a great time brushing the goats, petting the guinea pigs, and looking at all the different displays. Laura thought this sign was particularly funny…
Next, we stopped to visit the bugs at the Insectarium. Of course, you have to take a picture on the big bug!
We actually got lucky because the only time it rained all day was while we were inside the Insectarium. The rain did the weather good because the rest of the day was beautiful! We wandered around the zoo enjoying the different animals. The kids always love the elephants.
We all loved seeing the Sumatran Orangutans. We got an amazing view of the baby, “Ginger,” that was born at the zoo this past December. Her mother brought her right up to the window for just a few minutes. We were lucky enough to be standing right there to see it. So cute!
At some point during the early afternoon, I checked Facebook only to discover that some great friends were also at the zoo. I sent a text message mentioning that we were headed to the Sea Lion Show and, when we arrived, they were there! The kids were very excited to get to watch the show with their friends.
It was a great, fun day at the St. Louis Zoo! Right about 5 pm, we took our sore, tired feet back to the hotel for dinner and some time in the pool. We didn’t swim for long though because the pool was packed and the kids were tired.
After returning to our room and getting the kids to bed, Andy and I enjoyed a bottle of wine in the smallest wine glasses. A great ending to a busy day.
Today begins our three-day St. Louis mini-vacation. First up, LEGO KidsFest! We really didn’t know what to expect…
Wow, what a neat experience! It’s essentially a travelling LEGOLAND. There were different stations set up all over the floor of the Edward Jones Dome. The kids got to build, build, build!
One of Laura’s favorite parts was the biggest pile of LEGO bricks “ever!” She climbed right in the middle and got down to business building.
John had more fun just jumping in the massive brick pile.
We also had fun looking at all the different models. Really, how could you not LOVE an Indiana Jones made entirely out of LEGOs?!?
Or Lord Business from “The LEGO Movie”? And, yes, Lord Business was tall… Very tall…
The girls and the boys split up for a bit and, when we met back up, Laura and I found John and Andy building a race car. It’s a good thing they even have race tracks to race those cars on!
We wrapped up LEGO KidsFest with one last swing through the Model Museum. I was most impressed with Lightning McQueen. It took a LEGO Master Builder and his team 2,000 hours to build. Lightning McQueen is made up of over 325,000 bricks and is 12 feet long by 6 feet wide. The detail is really just amazing.
LEGO KidsFest was so fun and I am glad we went. It was a great way to start our mini-vacation!
Andy took the kids to the annual train show at Paquin Towers today. Of course, John loved every minute of it, but Laura was a bit bored… That is, until she started talking to one of the modelers. She came home just full of information about the trains. I think it was a success.
…are made for walking! It was a walking kind of day…
