St. Louis #1

We took a trip and spent about five days in St. Louis. It was great fun and I would definitly go back. There is way too much to put into one post though, so we start with the zoo, which was Avery's birthday activity post-poned. Aric put up lots of St. Louis pictures on Flickr, click here.

Because of my personal preferences, we started the zoo with a lot of time in the reptile house which was awesome! Their bug building (including butterfly biodome) was really great too. One of the most awesome things they had in the kid's area was a clear tube slide that went through the river otter exhibit! Had a hard time pulling Avery away from that one... They got to pet guinea pigs and also play veterinarian again (like at the children's museum). We went to the zoo two days, since entry is free, and the kids loved it all.

On a side note, we visited an uncle's house yesterday near a lake and had a blast! Avery went out on his first paddle boat ride and went swimming -with inner tube- with all of his cousins. Curran got to go on a big trampoline for the first time; he had fun, but it took some getting used to the big bounces. I got to go diving and swimming for nearly an hour after Curran got too cold to swim with me, and it was soo peaceful! *happy sigh*

Avery lovin' 5!

So here is Avery with his crazy birthday
cake, and I do mean crazy! The center was a flower candle that opened up and was much more of a firecracker in the middle then any of us expected... Curran was just a wee bit scared, poor guy.


















Avery enjoyed playing with his new foldable soccer goal and opening many gifts. We will be going to the zoo for his birthday activity, but couldn't do it on the day.

Curran is 2 Years Old!

Curran had to put on a birthday hat first thing in the morning! Then we all ate and piled into the van for a trip to the Children's Museum of Denver. He spent at least half the time at the fire truck; oh he'd visit the other exhibits for a few minutes, but we always had to go back to the fire truck!

The boys did really spend a good bit of time in the vet center too. They had real x-rays to look at on a lit wall, and all the instruments and stuffed animals you could ask for.

Curran also got his first trike so that he could ride bikes along with his brother. I personally love the handle at the back to help push him =)

We be pirates!

Here's the boys in their pirate hats. Curran's trying his best to make a scary pirate face after trying to say the pirate alphabet: A, E, I, aRRRg! He normally says "A, aRRg, aRRg". It's very cute =)

Of course then the pirates plundered some pudding and got just a *bit* messy, hehe.

Excitment

Things got a bit interesting for us this evening: around 6:30 pm the town tornado siren started going off. We all stood looking at each other for a sec, "Is that for real?" Then turning on the radio heard about a funnel cloud sighting about 16 miles west of our town. We had about 15 minutes of 'tornado warning' status. (And no this picture is not local.)

So we got to pile the boys downstairs. I grabbed cell phone and the file that holds our birth certificates and passports and went downstairs too. Avery was pretty agitated at first until it was explained that the siren doesn't mean that our house will be hit, just that there is a chance of it - so we have to be prepared. Of course as all good little kids will think of, Avery asked, "What if we have to go potty during the tornado warning?" *chuckle* But a valid point; we have no toilet downstairs. We told him if another warning came that we would take him potty before going into the basement. He seemed ok with that =)

As I write this sentence the storm has just passed us and no more storms in sight, so hopefully it will be a quiet night from here on out! What an exciting evening :P