St Louis

    Since we don't get to see Kate, Brian, Zoe and Emma all that often, when they left Indiana to go to St Louis to visit Brian's family.  We sort of followed them.  Luckily, Brian's family let us crash at their house!  St. Louis had great things to do and explore, and I think the kids will be requesting a trip back very soon!  They loved the Magic house and couldn't get enough of the elephants at the zoo!

gracie playing in the sand!  the good news...she wasn't a playground bully this time and refrained from body slamming people out of her personal space!

evan did one thing the entire time he was there.  he fished.  they had a little pond indoors where you could catch pretend fish with magnets.  then, you dropped the fish in the pond on the other side of the room and watched the current take them down the river that run under glass tiles in the floor.  he loved it so much, i may insist that bret dig up part of our floor to recreate it!  or, maybe we will just visit st. louis again ; ).

gracie loved the nursery with all the babies and vet office with all the stuffed animals.  it took some serious negotiations to get her to move from either place!

with all the activities it wore everyone out...but gracie always finds enough energy  to put her hands up and dance!

then, evan, who could take or leave naps found it in him to snuggle with packaw

gracie swinging like a big girl!!!

and one of the best parts of brian's parent's house...a GIANT hill in their back yard.  if this was at my house, i would have my kids out there every day doing sprints up the hill.  they both thoroughly loved running up and down it.

another great thing about new places?   new friends!  this is e with my new  bestie, amanda.

and, of course, kate was all about the hill too!  when she woke up from her nap that was approximately 1.5 hours longer than she expected (i MAYBE forgot to wake her up), she hit the hill!  amanda was a little more willing to stop and pose with aunt kate than evan was!