Summer celebrations in St. Louis

We celebrated the 4th this year in St. Louis! Derek was able to get an extra day off so we opted to visit his brother and family for the holiday weekend. We had a super fun time and have some awesome pics to prove it! 

We enjoyed a parade in the morning in downtown St. Charles.

We traveled to the St. Louis fair -- first stop: air show!

Michael's had a fun trailer with crafts for the kiddos. The boys made a pop tab necklace.

And Belle made a crown! She said, "I look like Repunzel!!" :)

Belle and Uncle Brad

We set out our blankets and hung out by the arch!

 We ran into KC friends! Brian, a family friend, married Derek and I seven years ago and here he is loving our little girl! 

All of the cousins!

We enjoyed the fireworks that night and then we had an interesting journey home on the city metro, which proved to be a cultural experience at the least for our kiddos. As much as we think our kids don't listen at times, all of the kids did a GREAT job of listening when it was really, really important in the giant swarms of people!

We spent the rest of the weekend just hanging out and spending time with family! Uncle Brad cooked breakfast and read books to the kiddos.

The kids played in the pool

 And we did a few fireworks ourselves!

We ended the weekend with a trip to the arcade- the kids (and dads) had fun!! 

It was a wonderful little trip away. I'm glad I got to experience the fourth at the arch-- it was something I've been wanting to do for years!!! Spending time with Brad and Mary is always enjoyable and I'm glad to provide opportunities for the cousins to play together! 

Being Thankful

I love Thanksgiving! I enjoy the food, time with the family, and just the overall attitude of gratefulness! I have so much to be thankful for in my life. God has blessed me with a wonderful family-- the one I was born into, the one I married into, and the one Derek and I created together! I am forever thankful for the pretty conventional stuff like my home, our health, working cars, jobs, my education, our church, the freedoms we posses in this country and the list could go on and on and on! But I'm also super thankful for other things that are super relevant in our life right now, even if they may seem a little silly.

• Our community
• Netflix
• Our Babysitters
• Mismatched socks
• Grocery Stores Kid Tactics

I had entire descriptions for each of these things, but then I realized that the post was about as long as some short books. So, I'm keeping it short today, but I will be back to talk about these! I asked Jackson to share what he is thankful for: One: Mom and Dad. Two: his blankets. And then when I absolutely made him chose a third, he added Optimus Prime and Bumble Bee. I asked Belle what she was thankful for and she said cheese and candy. True story. 

We are still over in across the state with family and last night, right around 10pm, we decided to make our way downtown for annual St. Louis Thanksgiving day parade. It was SO much fun!! We drove into a closer suburb and then hopped on a train to take us downtown. 

When you add a train ride + giant balloons + marching bands (mostly that's just for me) + yellow "Bumble Bee" cars + candy = the coolest morning ever for the kiddos. 

(and yes, Jackson is wearing a Kansas Jayhawk sweatshirt and yes, it makes me a little ill to know it will forever be etched into the memory of this Thanksgiving. But we only packed a heavy duty winter coat and it just wasn't that cold. So this was all we had to borrow from. At least it's covered in my favorite picture of the morning -- the last one! Oh, and Jackson was wearing his Missouri Tiger shirt underneath, but unfortunately I didn't take any more photos once we came home!!)

(Jackson is a surprisingly good Kazoo player!)

And this is my favorite photo from the morning! I love the Arch in the background.

We had a great day. It's been so much fun visiting our family. And may we never forget the "It's Not Gravy" moment... a story too epic to ever forget. But I'll save Belle the future embarrassment from actually posting the details. :)

Lastly, I'm SUPER thankful that seven years ago today, that Derek proposed! Little did I know that just seven years later that the majority of things on my thankfulness list would all be based on one little question! 

Cousin time, take 2

Back in the beginning of the month, my nephew Gabe stayed with us for several days. I shared a quick post when he first got here, but I wanted to share the rest! The cousins had a great time together!

Gabe was here for 9 days before his parents came over from St. Louis. We crammed in lots of fun!

The park

Gabe got to join us on our weekly pilgrimage to McDonalds with Great Grandpa. 

 

The boys slept peacefully together and never ever fought over the same toy. {ha, yeah right! They did good sharing a bed. Sharing toys, eh, not so much}

We got pretty good at getting three kid plates together at meal times!

And loading up three kiddos to go places. 

Like, to Burger King on a certain day when I realized that taking care of three kiddos is hard work—let along preparing a meal to feed five people. Whew. Thank goodness for that BK giftcard! {and seriously, this is the face Jackson gives me when I said, “say cheese!”.}

Then, Aunt Mary and Uncle Brad came over to Kansas City to visit. And they brought this guy! He’s saying, “Hi Aunt Amy!” Isn’t he cute!?

We got all the cousins together to take a picture—which was not an easy task, but we did it!

Apparently, I need to do a better job of actually taking pictures of Brad and Mary—not just their kiddos. Though I only have one picture to show for it, Jackson and Belle loved playing tackle with Uncle Brad.

We celebrated Gabe’s third birthday

And we had a big family get together at Ryan’s—like 20 of us! 

It was a crammed-packed two weeks full of lots of fun and playing! The boys loved riding bikes together and throwing year old “popper” fireworks in the garage. And it's really nice to visit with Brad and Mary when they come visit. I’m working really hard to nag them to death convince them to move to Kansas City. Maybe someday!

Cousin Time

Last week, we had a cute little addition to our family—my nephew, Eli Christian!

{He’s dreaming of cuddle time with Aunt Amy!!}

I can’t wait for him to come visit this weekend so I can just hold and snuggle this little guy. In the meantime, Eli’s big brother Gabe has been staying with us since Wednesday. It works out great— my brother/sister-in-law get to enjoy baby Eli all by himself for a few days while my kids get to spend some special time with Gabe.

It’s been fun! The first night was a little crazy, as expected. Lots of giggles and squeals of excitement.

But the boys looked like this by the time 10:30 rolled around, so it wasn’t too crazy. They’ve gone to bed perfectly every night since then!

We’ve gone on walks, played at the park, visited Grandma Linda & Papa Forrest. It’s been a little crazy with three kiddos, but it doesn’t feel like it’s all that different from two kids really. It’s just been really fun!

    
We even conquered the grocery store with three kiddos in tow tonight! I am sort of disappointed we didn’t get a trophy as we exited. Even without a trophy, I’m still feeling proud. Not only did we get what we needed—the boys had SO much fun. They giggled nearly the entire time, thanks to Derek’s crazy driving.

Belle has been having fun and playing too, but it’s just really, REALLY hard to get a picture of all three kids. But here’s a picture of her from tonight… she couldn’t find her sucker.

Hahaha. We’re all looking forward to a super fun week! Hoping yours will be too!