4 Miles

Yes, they are excited.

And, another night of them not going to sleep until after 9.

Oh, and that light will be moved tomorrow. I hadn't realized how close it was to Will's head until I saw it in the picture!

So Friday afternoon we headed out for St. Louis to visit my sister and James' brother and sister-in-law. The main goal of the trip was to get the other half of the bunk bed Heidi and I used growing up (we split them to twin beds, I kept one, she got the other). Will's been using the one I got, and we figured we could pay her for the other half and get a matched set for less than buying a new set. She was very willing to do that with us.

During our drive we got to drive through another round of storms. Later we found out those storms caused tornados and major flooding in Indiana (since we'd already had so much rain earlier in the week the ground was saturated. Add 10 inches to that, and it was BAD.) We stopped in Effingham for a break and saw the dark clouds to the west. James' brother called us to warn us about the bad weather just as we were starting up again. We listened to the radio and heard about the storms and tornados being sighted, but that didn't help us much since we didn't know the area at all.  Thankfully we just drove through heavy rain, that's all.

We got there around supper time and enjoyed tacos with Teri and Rachel. The boys went down and we opened up the game and started to play. I must be prideful for a moment and say I won the first one. It was a great feeling, since I very rarely win a game (unless it's against Will).  Of course I was playing against two people who'd never played before, but I beat James too!  We stayed up too late talking and playing the game.  The kids woke us up too early the next morning. Pretty par for the course for family vacations!

Saturday we went with Heidi to get her bed. Then we went back to her place and took the old bed down to the van. Alex was so tired from the early morning on Friday, only a 45 minute nap on Friday and then staying up so late, he fell asleep coming home from lunch. I took him out of the carseat and upstairs and laid him on Heidi's couch–he slept through the whole thing. He slept through us moving the bed through the living room/down the stairs. He slept through us putting him back in his carseat. He woke up right when we got to Teri's.  And he didn't go back to sleep. He and Will had a "quite time" upstairs while James napped and I read. Because of all the bad weather, Teri had to work and Rachel had to pick him up.  They came back, Heidi joined us, and we had a wonderful supper of bugers and hot dogs. That night we played James' game again, and Heidi won!

Will had fun playing Jenga, as well as building castles/towers with the pieces.

Sunday we went to the zoo. Since we managed to go the hottest weekend of the year, so far, the goal was to leave early and see the zoo before it got to hot. Of course we didn't get there until 10 and it was already getting pretty steamy (I had forgotten how bad humidity can be. We have NOTHING like that in Indiana usually!). We got tickets to ride on the train, and that was the boys favorite part.

We stuck around to see a few animals but soon got too hot and hungry so we headed to the van. We enjoyed a picnic lunch in the shade of a big tree, had fun feeding the birds and then hit the road to come home!

My dad had called us the night before to warn us I-70 was closed for a streach because of the flooding from the storms. Thankfully, by the time we came through, they had opened up the road. We made it home in four and a half hours and Alex slept for over 2 of them. 

Tuesday my parents and brother came down to visit us. They were taking Doug to the airport to fly back to Arizona and we enjoyed a last bit of time with him.  During the time they were hear a strong storm came through. We had the windows open, and one thunder/lightening combination were so close we could hear the lightening hit something near by.  And it was LOUD, and that scared Alex. So we closed the windows.

He still kept his hands over his ears for a good five minutes after that.  Like the look of distrust on his face? I found it quite funny.

Doug also played around with the boys and showed them what you can REALLY do with a piano.

The storms passed well before Doug's flight left, but he still had delays getting home. Poor guy didn't get in until the wee hours of the morning and then got sick. We hope you're feeling better (and REALLY hope you didn't give it to us)!  Later that night though we had another round pass through, and Alex woke up crying from all the thunder again (he had done the same thing Monday night).

Wednesday was another rainy day. I took the kids to story time at the library. Except June 4th was the ONLY Wednesday in June they didn't have story time.  The boys enjoyed playing on the computers and with the toys there though, so it was still a nice morning. 

Thursday we were BU-SY. I needed to run a few errands in the morning. A store near us was having a grand re-opening sale and we stopped by to grab a few deals. We got to enjoy LOTS of samples, so it was a fun adventure. Then it was off to the post office (a place that is never fun with two little boys). That afternoon we took a load of junk valuable items to a friend from church's house to sell at her neighborhood garage sale. See, we don't have a driveway that is good for a sale, the road we live on is too busy. I asked our Sunday School class if anyone was having a sale I could join in on, she was the only one who replied, so we joined in, even though she lives about 20 minutes away from us. She does have twin girls Will's age, so Will was quite excited to visit their house. The boys had fun playing and we unloaded things on the first really hot day of the season.  That evening I packed for our planned weekend away, as well as for the morning at the garage sale.

Friday was even hotter. We got up early and were on the road by 7 am to get to our friends house by 7:30…I had expected bad traffic since we were going on the freeway. It was no busier than any other time! So we got there a bit early and set up.  It was a hot and slow morning. But I sold one of my big items I wanted out of the house but money for, so I was happy. We left around 12, then came back for lunch. While James fed the boys and loaded up the van, I ran to Target for a few items for the trip. Then, we were off to St. Louis!