St. Louis

We went on a quick mini-vacation this past weekend to St. Louis. Our main reason was so Ryan and I could attend the temple, but we wanted to have some fun time as a family, too. It's a 4 hour drive, so it's no small feat to attend the temple out here. I can't wait for our Kansas City temple to be built soon!

We pulled the kids out of school on Friday, so we could get on the road. We made a couple stops along the way to let the kids run around in the mid-60 degree weather. You'll notice Brevan always has a funny expression in these pictures, because he is super sensitive to the sunshine. We've convinced him to get contacts so he can wear sunglasses outside.

I was very proud of my trip-planning skills on this little trip. I found a good deal on a Marriott hotel room, which also gave us a free $15 Visa gift card. I also looked online and found that The Magic House was free on this evening. It is the BEST children's museum for kids, because it has engaging activities for all my kids, regardless of their age. It was very crowded at the museum, since everyone got in free, but it saved us almost $60. Ryan and I split up - he with the boys and me with the girls, so I only have pictures of some of the girl's activites.

Purchasing and selling food in the store . . .

Playing in the Victorian house . . .

Serving pizza and Coke in the restaurant . . .

Shelving books in the library . . .Grandma Springer, will you hire these hard workers?

Playing Librarian . . .

Selling ice cream . . .

Fishing . . .

Playing dress-up in the Fairytale Village . . .

The static electricity that made our hair stand up . . .

The best photo of the day . . .

And one final shot of our whole group, before heading back to the hotel for a swim in the pool before bed.

I have to quickly finish explaining my good trip-planning skills. We ate dinner at Ihop on Friday night, because all the kids could eat for free. We had a free hot breakfast at our hotel in the morning, and had lunch at Steak and Shake on the way home, where all the kids ate for free again. I love getting deals!

Ryan and I went to the temple on Saturday morning, and left Brevan and Brynlie in charge in the hotel room. It was pretty nerve-racking to leave them there alone, even though we have started to leave them for short periods of time at home. We gave them distinct rules to follow, and had them keep the little kids entertained with TV shows. While we were gone, Logan had a nasty poopy diaper, and the kids did their best to clean it up and keep him happy. Since I was worried about the kids being alone and not being able to call us on our cell phones, we decided to do initiatories at the temple instead of doing an endowment session. It was a great experience, and I love to be reminded of the blessings we receive in the temple.

On the drive home, we got stuck in a SNOW storm. Great way to start off the first day of Spring! While driving in the fast lane on the freeway, Ryan went around a curve and saw a car in our lane which had just spun out and was at a COMPLETE STOP. There was a barricade on the left side of the car, and luckily Ryan was able to swerve into the other lane before hitting the car. He started honking his horn and had me quickly call 911, but the vehicle behind us was a semi-truck and we don't think it was able to avoid the car (we couldn't see what happened, because the visibility was bad and we were on a curve). It was a scary experience, and made us so grateful to be traveling safely!

It was a fun, short excursion, and we enjoyed laughing together and being spiritually fed. Perfect weekend!