City Museum St. Louis - Take 1

This was hands down the BEST stop on our trip to St. Louis!  The CITY MUSEUM is a kid's paradise - and there really aren't even words to describe it!   You can check out their website here: City Museum.  If you are ever in St. Louis, you absolutely MUST go.  Even if you are an adult!  You can easily spend an entire day there.  We went on Friday and they are open from 10am to midnight...no joke! And they held a wedding while we were there...such a cool place!

I will do my best to describe what I can.   Basically, it is an old 11-story building in the heart of downtown St. Louis which was once the International Shoe Company.  They have filled the first 3 floors with these incredible caves, treehouses, tunnels and things you can't describe.  You walk into a tunnel and can spend 30 minutes in there before you find a way to get out - and there are probably 20+ different routes to take once you are in that tunnel!  There are slides and ladders and tunnels everywhere.  This is one little excerpt from their website: 

Cassilly and his longtime crew of 20 artisans have constructed the museum from the very stuff of the city; and, as a result, it has urban roots deeper than any other institutions’. Reaching no farther than municipal borders for its reclaimed building materials, City Museum boasts features such as old chimneys, salvaged bridges, construction cranes, miles of tile, and even two abandoned planes!

The above picture is of Kennedy coming out of the bottom of a HUGE whale!  You can climb inside the whale and take different routes outside of it....here are my favorite people exploring the whale's innards!

The is under the whale's tale.  Jeff (in the blue shirt) and Kennedy (in the pigtails) are watching a huge drum of water fall into a pit!!

It is really impossible to get great photos in this place!  It is spectacular, but my photos don't do it justice.  You could spend so much time just looking at this room before you ever explored it!  The white stuff at the top of the photo is what is hanging from the ceiling on the main floor.  So I am up high taking this photo.  You can see part of an enormouse tree house here.  And the metal "cages" coming from the left of the picture??  See those? They are everywhere and it is how you get around in much of the museum.  Jeff and Kennedy are climbing through it!  See his blue shirt and khaki shorts?  Kennedy is in front of him with a green shirt.

Here is a close-up....see little Miss Quinn in there?!  She loved this place!! That girl has NO FEAR!

Another view near the ceiling....Kennedy!!!  She is climbing in that thing!!!  It is sooo small!  Some teenagers started climbing in it coming from the other direction.  I seriously thought they might get stuck!  Kennedy had to turn her body around and climb out the way she had come in!  

The next photo is part of the tree-house....I honestly can't even explain what you are looking at...other than it is a "tunnel" of tree limbs!  So cool!  The spaces are so cramped it was hard for me to get good pictures!

This is just one part of the museum!   I will share more later.  But I wanted to leave you with the museum's description of this floor.....

Perhaps one of the most visually stunning areas in the museum, the First Floor is part undersea immersion, part treehouse hideaway, part cave adventure, and all City Museum. Above you, visitors pinball through tunnels in the ceiling, giving them a birds-eye view of the beautiful and elaborate mosaic floor. Stroll through the life-sized bowhead whale and you may hear whale songs blending in with the crashing waves of water dumped out by the “Puking Pig”- a boiler tank perched atop an 1880’s fire pump that dumps water into the wave cave below. Fish fanciers will enjoy the 5000 gallon fish tank, filled with fish native to Missouri waters.(Look out for the 39lb catfish!) And when you think you’ve seen it all, dig deeper, because several underground passageways still await you, taking you under the floor, or work your way through the treehouse and up into the ceiling again. Can you find the pump room slide?

Swimming Lessons

Miss Kennedy took swimming lessons for the third summer!  She has been a fish since she was a baby so it is no surprise that she passed her level again this year!  

The skills she worked on this year were front stroke (freestyle), backstroke, elementary backstroke, scissor kick, and diving off the side.  The pool was so full of classes this session that Kennedy's class met in the 12 foot!  I was so proud of her for not being scared - who am I kidding?!  She is never scared of water!!

BACKSTROKE

DIVING!!!!

WATER SAFETY

I passed!!!  Onto Red Cross Level IV!!

For the Love of Animals!

Hooray for a trip to Deanna Rose Children's Farmstead!  We love this place!  Kennedy even had her 4th birthday there!!!  Come see the fun we had!

 I just love this first photo - for so many reasons!   #1 - my bff taking photos of the girls from the other side! #2 - these 3 girls are so close and I love that!  #3 - Taylor had to borrow her mom's sunglasses to "match" Kennedy! #4 - The happiness of summer and exploring on their faces!  #5 - they had no idea I was taking their photo!

We always get photos taken in the butterfly garden!!!!

Quinn was so taken with the animals!!!  She couldn't get enough of the goats!  The older girls fed the goats while Quinn squealed and giggled.  She even was brave enough to hold out her own had to feed them.  So I decided she would do well in the enclosed goat area!

What do you think?  Did she like it?!

It goes without saying that Kennedy loved feeding them as well.  This has been a favorite part for her for years!

We were able to hook up with some more friends while there.    The big kids got Discovery Passbooks where they have to look around the Farm for hidden questions and then search for the answers.  Kennedy and Owen went crazy over answering the questions and filling out their books!!!!!  Here they are coming out of the General Store!

It was a great day!

First Summer Weekend!

Our first weekend of the summer was great fun!!  We have a tradition every Memorial Day weekend.  We attend Celebration at the Station and I look forward to it all Spring!  The Kansas City Symphony puts on a free concert outside of Union Station.  The audience sits on the hill overlooking Union Station.  We bring lots of food, blankets, chairs and games.  This year we brought some friends to experience it for their first time!  The children searched out their parents' electronic devices...no surprise. ;) 

Once the sun set, this children played with glow sticks and flashlights!  It was great watching the lights projected on Union Station and enjoying the KC skyline.   Eventually we turned out chairs around and watched the wonderful fireworks display over the WWI Memorial.  Quinn did NOT enjoy the fireworks at all, poor girl.  Too noisy!!  But she had done an amazing job all night considering how late she was up!  It was an awesome evening!

We also took our first dip in one of the neighborhood pools!  There had been quite a thunderstorm just a day before and the water was still chilly!  But Kennedy was still her normal fishy self - loving every minute in the water!  As I suspected, Quinn is going to be quite the handful at the pool this summer!  She thinks she can just run anywhere and go in the big pool at any time!  She will absolutely be wearing a flotation device all summer!  

Hooray for summer!!!

We can now cross off a few things from of Summer Bucket List!!!

#58: Go to a Free Concert

#38: Visit Multiple Pools (this was pool #1)

Memorial Day 2012

We had a busy Memorial Day Weekend this year!  Our actual Memorial Day was filled with family time!!  We had a grilled turkey burger lunch at the Miles' and the Kennedy, Logan, Quinn and Zia enjoyed some time in the sprinkler!!

Isn't she cute?!

First sprinkler action of the year!

Logan preparing to run through the sprinkler!

In the morning we went to the Louisburg cemetery and caught part of the ceremony.  Papa Lou, Aunt Barb and Great Papa Henry came as well.  We all spend some time at Sam and Great Grandma Helen's graves.  Then we all went to Miss B's Cafe for brunch. 

Three generations! All in blue!

Papa shows Kennedy the gravesites of other relatives. Quinn says "Wait for me!"

Rare family photo...it was super windy!

Quinn with Great Papa Henry.

It was a great day!

HHT Awareness Month

 In the past on my blogs I have mentioned that I have HHT.  I have spoken about how Sam had HHT.  I have shared little tidbits here and there about HHT.  But it is time for me to begin sharing even more.  Being that this is HHT Awareness Month, I believe this is a fitting time! 

A few weeks ago I took my girls to a local doctor interested in treating children with HHT.  I have had a hunch for quite some time that Kennedy had HHT and figured it was time to know for sure.  Dr. McBride was fabulous...she is the FIRST doctor I have MET that actually has HHT and has children with HHT.  I can't tell you how comforting it was to actually meet with someone who knew what we were talking about!  She quickly diagnosed Kennedy with HHT, as I suspected.  I am looking into genetic testing for Quinn as she isn't showing any outward symptoms as of now. 

Over the course of the next month I will be sharing a bit about HHT and also personalize it for you by sharing how it has affected our family.  I hope you will read along!!  It may affect someone you know! 

First, I ask that you watch this video.....it is worth it!   My doctor, Dr. Chakinala, speaks in it...I will see him again in a few months!

The HHT Foundation's Awareness Campaign has 3 goals:

1. Identify the 90% that are Undiagnosed - The more people hear about HHT - through word of mouth, watching a video, reading a post on Facebook, or researching nosebleeds on Google - the more people will be aware of the disease. This will ultimately lead to self-diagnosis, a visit to a medical professional, or a call to the HHT Foundation. These actions alone can potentially save a life!
2. Educate Medical Professionals - According to a recent medical survey, most HHT patients experience an average of 11-14 years of misdiagnosis by Emergency Room physicians and Otolaryngologists (ENT) due to a general lack of knowledge about the disease. Awareness can lead physicians to seek information and training on how to diagnose, treat, and manage HHT which will ultimately increase the number of medical professionals  who are knowledgeable about HHT and make it easier for patients to receive proper care.
3. Motivate the HHT Community -  We need HHT patients, physicians, and researchers to engage their families, local friends, Facebook friends, and co-workers in the fight to find a cure for HHT. The simplest thing you can do is send an email, which is already written for you, to your Congressional Representative. Although the Foundation has significantly advanced HHT in a variety of venues, we are only one voice - our message is so much stronger, louder, and impactingl when we all recite it together!

Grade ONE - Done!

Yup - here is proof she is done with first grade.  And to think that at the beginning of the year I didn't know how I would survive with her at school ALL DAY.  Yet, I did.  And she loved school - so much that as we walked out of the building she sniffled and said "I don't want to leave school."  I pray she always feels that way!!!

Last fall I created some forms for her to fill out to document who she was at the beginning of the year.  I then kept them hidden all school year.  You can read about it in THIS PAST POST.  We even have her hand and footprints!  The end of the year needed to be recorded as well, so I created a similar version to see how she has changed since the beginning of the year!  She LOVED doing them and comparing!!!

After school let out, Kennedy's 1st grade scrapbook club came over for our year end get together.  :)  So I didn't have her Summer Fun Box out yet!  Then she spent the night with her BFF that night...so the box was waiting for her when she returned the next day!

Her Summer Fun Box was filled with all sorts of fun things we will need to have a great time this summer!!  I also set out the framed list of Summer Fun from THIS PAST POST.  I think the box was a hit!

I can't wait to start sharing all our summer fun!!!!