st louis family vacation, day 3

This sign is right in front of my aunt and uncles house, and when I saw it I wondered if maybe my uncle had it put up before we arrived! So I had my kids make funny faces, to prove what we should all be cautious with these crazy children around.

Our next day in St. Louis was blissful. I spent the morning in the parkway with the girls picking purple flowers and listening to Elsie tell me the elaborate storyline of what we were pretending...and even though she was talking non-stop, I apparently wasn't actually listening because I don't remember any of it. At some point a mother has to think her own thoughts for a while...

Then Uncle Mark told the kids that he would give them a penny for every gumball they picked up and put in a bucket. These are really sharp seed things that take over their boulevard. My big kids were thrilled with this challenge and in no time had picked up 500 gumballs each. Uncle Mark was a bit taken aback, but he did pay up. And then said the challenge was over. Ha!

Also, does your family have your own special words for things? In our family, since the kids were little, anything sharp or pointy and round has been called a Bomby Knocker. This is so matter-of-fact around here I never really stopped to consider how funny it is that we call prickly things bomby knockers. But while the kids were excitedly telling Uncle Mark how many Bomby Knockers they had found I finally snapped out of it and asked, "where did that word come from?" And Ivar reminded me that when they were really little we read a book in the doctor's office waiting room about a giant who had a big weapon called a Bomby Knocker and that I had encouraged the use of this funny word.

So now I encourage you to use it too...

This day was magical. We went to The Jewel Box in Forest Park where the tulips were positively spectacular. I couldn't get enough. It was like my body was starving for color like this, and all of the sudden I got a feast.

After walking around The Jewel Box we drove over to The St Louis Zoo, also in Forest Park. Honestly, this whole trip we never left a two mile radius (oh, except Lulu's). Everything was so easy and convenient. And we LOVED the zoo. First, it was free, which was amazing. Second, the animals there were really exciting...I had never seen a hippopotamus up close, and we got to see them very, very up close.

We walked and walked all over the zoo and made a really special family memory. 

And then we came back home and Yang Yang and Nui Nui had brought pizza and salad for supper. Yang Yang is my Aunt Jane's nephew who has lived in St. Louis for the last 25 years...so he is very much my cousin, and my only one on that side of the family! His wife is out of the country for work, and his daughter Nui Nui is adored by my kids. She slept over this night and they passed notes back and forth via Uncle Mark bringing the notes up and down the stairs. I only heard about this in the morning...I was sound asleep.

And hilariously, this is the only picture from this day of Nui Nui. (There is one tomorrow!) Rory took this pic while they were praying over the food.

We had Family Worship with everyone that night in the room where Ivar and Elsie slept and as we prayed a huge thunderstorm came through and filled the room with booms and bangs. Then Rory played Hobby Farmer with the big kids and after this big day of bomby knockers, stunning tulips, rhinoceroses and pizza parties the little kids and I fell fast asleep. While the big kids passed notes back and forth...

st louis family vacation, day 2

The night we arrived we stayed up late with Uncle Mark and Aunt Jane talking at their kitchen table. And when we woke up in the morning (quite early for me, thanks to Hattie and Alden) we met up at the table again. Good stuff happens around that table. Rory and Uncle Mark sat and drank their coffee there for hours each morning, basically until lunch each day.

And I had the kids outside soaking up the sunshine. It just felt so good to be warm and outside! At one point Elsie and I were standing in the driveway and the neighbors tree was snowing white flower petals all around us in the wind. Elsie kept saying, "it's snowing! it's snowing!" And I knew that in that moment there really was a blizzard in Minnesota, but here in Missouri we were in a blizzard of good smelling tree blossoms. That moment sort of sums up my joyful and glad attitude on this trip. I was just so happy to be out of winter! My mood was as bright as the sunshine, so grateful to be dropped into peak spring!

Before lunch we went for a walk up and down their street. Uncle Mark and Aunt Jane live in a really stunning neighborhood, with houses built right before the Worlds Fair in 1904. Uncle Mark explained a bit to me how St. Louis was one of the major cities of the world at that time, with the second largest and busiest rail yard in the world. In 1904, St. Louis was very much an epicenter of our country. It would quickly be passed by Chicago, but at this time the city was bustling with industry and business. And doing quite well, as you can see by these lovely houses! Many of the houses have a matching small house behind them that served as the carriage house for horses.

Then we came in for lunch and Aunt Jane had chicken salad on croissants with kettle chips. At the end of the trip we asked the kids what their favorite parts were and Elsie said, "Aunt Jane's cooking!" Everything was so good.

Then Hattie went down for her nap and we all had quiet time. The pace of this first day was so wonderful. I thought many times, "this really does feel like a true vacation." In the late afternoon we drove to Forest Park to find the playground. This next picture is a new favorite. Ivar jumped off a little too quickly, it seems.

And then we flew a kite. I always have these romantic images in my mind of flying a kite with the family. But to be 100% truthful, all of our kids took a turn crying in frustration while trying to get this dollar tree kite up in the air!

Finally we went out to supper at Lulu's, a favorite Chinese restaurant where we ordered very authentic things for our kids like pot stickers and orange chicken with fried rice. Last time we were here without kids and Aunt Jane ordered an incredible spread of food she loves from China. But this time with the kids we ordered everything that was familiar. Uncle Mark and our cousins came to join us this night, but the camera battery died, so you'll have to wait until day 3 to see pics of the rest of the family. :)

Special thanks to Ivar for taking this awesome picture. We'll get Hattie's chin next time. :)

st louis family vacation, day 1

Last week we loaded up the minivan for a trip to St. Louis. At the last minute we decided to leave a day early, as there was winter weather in the forecast. Thankfully we did or I think we would have been stranded on our farm. A whole blizzard hit Minnesota. But just 8 1/2 hours south in St. Louis it was 78 and sunny with trees in full blossom and tulips and daffodils at their peak. I mention this just so that you, too, can file this fact away: that when it is still full blown winter in Minnesota, you could get to much warmer weather in just one day of driving. It's sort of amazing to me!

 We packed a picnic for our first lunch and found a fantastic small town playground and picnic area (with bathrooms!) in New Hampton, Iowa. This is a new family favorite destination. We had a blast, ran around for an hour, could be as loud as everyone needed to be, used the bathrooms many times, ate ham and cheese roll ups and basically marveled that we were not wearing winter coats.

Ivar was in full-boy-glory, teasing me that he might fall in the water, exploring how close he could get, watching a frog swim by and then he found the treasure of all treasures: laying in the bottom of the stream was an abandoned play gun.

Could there be anything more thrilling for an 8-year-old boy?!! Rory helped him fish it out with a long stick and then they hung it in a tree so that it's rightful owner might find it again and wonder how it got up there.

Oh, and then they found half of a crayfish. Clearly this rest stop was epic and full of adventure and excitement. We were glad we hadn't stopped at McDonalds. That would have lacked so much!

Then we got back in the car for the long haul. It took us 11 hours to travel the 8 1/2 hours we had to drive. Which isn't terrible! 2 1/2 hours of stops was pretty impressive to me. I kept saying, "we're making terrible time, but we're having a great time!" Though in the last 30 minutes Alden had had enough and let us know his frustration until he fell fast asleep. We got to Uncle Mark and Aunt Jane's house around 8:45 and transferred the little two into bed while the big two explored the house and where we would spend the next two days...

Knocka Knocka, it's Hattie Joy

Hattie is 3 1/2 and is a pure delight. Many nights I will wake in the middle of the night to a quiet knocking on our door (that is not completely closed anyway) with her speaking, "knocka- knocka, Mama. Knocka knocka" And when I get up to open the door she'll tell me she doesn't want the tornado to get her, while climbing into our bed squishing her pillow in between our pillows. I'll collapse next to her and if I open my eyes, her bright eyes will be staring at me, her whole face smiling. It's sort of a highlight of my life right now. And after a while she will get carried back into her own bed because she moves around too much.

Hattie loves to be a helper. Ivar and Elsie have morning chores and she will always ask me, "what's my job?!!" And then no matter what I say she'll protest, "At's too Ard!" And I tell her, "no, that's not too hard, and Hattie, you can do hard things. So go and pick up the crayons in the livingroom and put them back in their tupperware..."

Most of the time she calls Elsie Mary, and refers to herself as Laura.

When I tell the girls to go and put on something nice for church, Elsie will come down in a lovely dress with tights and jewelry and Hattie will run down holding her favorite overalls, "these nice!" She has worn her overalls the last three Sunday's in a row. I keep meaning to get a picture because she and Elsie contrast each other in such a comical way to me. But she does tend to get a lot of compliments on her overalls. :)

When I think about Hattie I always just feel so glad that she is ours. I feel so grateful to be her mom. Her bi-annual big appointments continue to go really well and they continue to watch her as an interesting and special case who hasn't needed cranio surgery yet. We meet with a speech teacher to work on certain sounds that are hard because her pallet is so, so high and her tongue can't reach behind her teeth. So we are working on that, but boy she is one very active, outgoing, friendly, enthusiastic, passionate three year old. And the joy of our home.

Elsie's Cookbook

Last Saturday Elsie made her first recipe, asking me to not tell her a thing or help her because, "then it wouldn't be my own recipe!" She had an idea and just wanted to try it. So I left her in the kitchen and only came in to help her put the mini cakes in the oven.

As it turns out, 4 eggs, 1.5 cups of sugar, 1.5 cups of flour, 1/3 stick of melted butter and a handful of chocolate chips do make for edible and yummy mini cakes in a cupcake pan! We were all totally impressed for a recipe that never creamed things together or anything. It was just a dump and stir recipe.

The next day was church potluck and she told me excitedly, "You can make my mini cakes! I have the recipe all ready for you!" In the end I made chocolate pudding with thin mints crushed on top (by the way, I had more people ask me for the recipe on this one, than anything I've ever brought before! Ha! Instant pudding! File that one away for your next potluck!!!) and when Elsie saw her face fell and she said, "Did you not really like my mini cakes?"

Oh dear me. "No, no, I loved them. I just wanted something easy to make and didn't want to bake. But you're right. Many from our church would LOVE to have one of your mini cakes. I will make those next!" So after the kids went to bed I made a dozen mini cakes following Elsie's recipe and then make a card to set by them, "Mini Cakes, Invented by Elsie Groves" exactly as she wanted me to write.

And wouldn't you know, she got LOTS of attention and compliments on her original recipe. And it all made for a new favorite Elsie memory. Then we came home and she insisted on making a pie. Again with no instruction. She crushed graham crackers for the crust with butter and then made a similar filling with lots of eggs, lots of sugar and coconut flour. It was sort of like a baked custard.

Then she told us she is starting a cookbook. What fun!

Elsie is 6 1/2 and a complete wonder to me. She comes down from her room every morning dressed for success, complete with accessories, the right shoes and a hair style to coordinate. She is a joyful girl, very shy in new situations and loves to laugh and be silly. She helps me with the little kids, and often has more patience than I do, using a loving, falsetto voice, "No, no, Alden, you cannot throw your food on the floor. Are you trying to tell us you are all done? Then you say All Done." And Alden will repeat her. In these moments I try to take notes on how she does it...she is so dear and sweet.

She will talk nonstop while working in the kitchen with me, "Mom, I don't really want to be doing this, and I'm like sort of mad about it on the inside, but I'm like, I just have to do it. And either I can do it mad or I can do it happy but I still have to help and so then I choose happy so I can be more joyful because it's more fun to be joyful, right mom? I just wouldn't want to be mad every time I have to work, or we would all be mad a lot because there is a lot we have to do each day and I'd rather be happy..." And on and on and on and on.

I love having her companionship and look forward to eating more egg and sugar based recipes from her upcoming cookbook.