Meet me in St. Louis

For Spring Break Andy and I took the kids to St. Louis to meet my sister, Dave, Syd and Bruce. They will be moving there this summer. It is going to be so sad not having them around anymore. Last summer was so fun having Jen and the kids at the pool almost every day with us. But, Dave had a really great job opportunity in St. Louis and couldn't pass it up. So we now have a new city to visit frequently and I must say I really enjoyed St. Louis. I had been there several times as a teenager for swim meets, but this was the first time I got to enjoy this city with my family.

Dave is currently living in a Residence Inn, so we went there and watched the UK-UL National semi-final game. After the Cats big win the kiddos went outside and starting screaming, "What's your favorite color baby?"

"Blue and White!"

They are such little wildcat fans already! I love it.

The next day we went to the St. Louis Zoo. It is a really great zoo. Unfortunately, it was very crowded and hot (in the 90s) the day we chose to go. The zoo is huge and I am pretty sure we saw less than half of it. The kids really had a good time though. Luke loved the penguins and Emma liked the rhino and the hippo.

After the zoo, we came back to our hotel and the kids went swimming. I am convinced we could've ONLY gone swimming the entire vacation and they would've been fine with that. My kiddos are quite the little fishies. :) After swimming, Luke crawled in the bed and acted very tired. I thought it was just that... that he was tired. We ran out and got some dinner and he didn't want to go in and eat... that is so not like him. So, we ran through a drive through. When we got back to the hotel, I felt him and he was burning up! I ALWAYS pack Tylenol on vacations... not this time though... we were only going to be gone a few days... everyone was going to be fine.... sigh. So I sent Andy out to find a grocery store and get some Tylenol and Motrin. I got Luke in a bath and ready for bed, when Andy got back we gave him the Tylenol... his fever went down quickly... thanks goodness. Then in the middle of the night we threw up in the bed and on the floor of the hotel room... poor little guy. By the next morning he seemed fine again. We had plans to do the Arch and the City Museum this day, but instead he let Luke rest most of the morning. By afternoon we decided he was feeling better and we went down town St. Louis to the Gateway Arch and then to a late lunch.

We had a lot of fun at the Arch. The kids really enjoyed it. We didn't go up in it this time.... the line was really long and I wasn't sure about being pregnant and going up. There will be other trips to do this.

I could tell Luke was starting to feel bad again... so we headed back to our hotel and let him rest for the day. He seemed better again... so we met Jen, Dave and the kids for dinner. Then, Andy, Emma and I stayed up and watched the Cats win the National Championship! Go Big Blue.

The next day we headed to the Butterfly House. It was really great... over 6000 butterflies and 2000 were blue morpho butterflies... they were gorgeous. Poor Luke felt bad the whole time we were there. We met Jen and the kids at the playground beside the Butterfly House and told them goodbye and headed home. We had planned to stay a bit longer, but I felt like Luke needed to get on home and rest and get over whatever this bug was.

So, we had a really great time, even though Luke got sick. There will be many more trips to St. Louis and we can do all the things we didn't get to do this time.