St. Louis Weekend

We went to St. Louis for New Years. We love it there! They have even more awesome things to do with the fam than KC does. We went to a Holiday Celebration at Grant's Farm which is a family place run by Budweiser with the Busch Family Mansion up on the hill. You can have all the free beer that you want but a Hot Chocolate is $2, kind of funny. Admission is free too. They had it decorated like temple square with over a million lights, it was beautiful. We went to two shows; one for the kids which was the 12 Day of Christmas done by 4 elves and a new twist on the Christmas Carol with a Ventriloquist Narrator and Chinese Acrobats representing the ghosts of Christmas past, present and future. The acrobats were amazing. I can't even imagine having that much strength, balance and flexibility.

The kids also got to see Santa's reindeer, penquins from Seaworld (which the Busch family also owns, who knew?) and the Budweiser Clydesdales all dressed up in their holiday finery (their harnesses alone cost $70,000) What would it be like to have that much money? Scott joked that those horses live better than we do. It's probably true.

St. Louis Zoo Rocks! It is by far the best zoo I've been too and the third largest in the states. It is also amazingly free. (The Busch family probably owns it too) They have the most awesome penquin habitat ever where the penguins are up close and personal. You could reach out and touch them if you wanted to. You can see them above and below the water at the same time. The hippos are the same way and they are amazing swimming balarinas. Disney's Fantasia isn't far off. We watched a baby elephant picking up thin sheets of ice with it's trunk. We couldn't believe how precise he could be with his trunk.

The ape and monkey houses are in these cool old buildings with gardens/atriums in the center. We watched a daddy orangatang taking care of business. So funny!

We went for our annual Christmas tour of Crown Center and Union Station.

Fitz's Railroad Cafe had this really cute gingerbread town display. We didn't go into Crayola Land this year because the line wound back for about a mile and the kids had already seen Santa at Zona Rosa.

We love the detail they put into their displays!

Playgroup Christmas Party

Playgroup Christmas Party. The kids are doing a reindeer race. They also made a candy cane and snowman ornament had lots of treats and did a present exchange.

Here they are catching snow (marshmellows). We love our playgroup buddies!!

Preschool Nativity Program

We went to Maddie & B's Preschool Nativity Program. It was sooo cute. Maddie is our glowing little angel and did all the hand motions and even some of the singing. We are so proud!

Brayden is the donkey in the red shirt with his ears pushed back. The ears were too long and in his eyes, he couldn't see for the first half of the program so he just stood perfectly still, he finally pushed them back and started singing and dancing.

Maddie's friends Julia and Landon played Mary and Joseph. Aren't they all adorable!

Maddie and Brayden's Debut Performance!

Nutcracker

We had a Mommy/Daughter Date to see the Nutcracker put on by the Independence Ballet Conservatory. We dressed the little girls up and took them out to lunch before the ballet. It was so much fun to see them all dressed up and watching the ballerinas. It is one of our favorite traditions.

KC Ice Storm

We are in the middle of an ice storm here. Nothing like the one that we had in OKC that took down our trees, phone lines, and power lines but still makes for pretty pictures.

It did break off half of our neighbor's tree. I think it's funny that our icycle lights have icycles on them.

Gingerbread Houses!

We made our annual gingerbread houses with the kiddos. We are getting lazy in our old age and decided to buy the kits instead of making them from scratch. It is so much easier!!

December 7th was our first snow day! The kids had so much fun making snowmen, throwing snowballs, and sledding in our backyard.