Our trip home went pretty smoothly.  Although, the night before we left there was a tornado warning in St. Louis so there were tornado sirens going off.  I was sharing a room with Saryta and she was pretty freaked out.  I have to admit that I thought it was kind of cool and it was fun to watch the storm outside.  The tornado ended up touching down several miles from us so we didn't really get too many effects from the storm. 

 

Overall, our trip was a blast and completely exhausting!  We were all glad to be home.

Briggy on the stroller at the airport

Bryston got into candy when we got home

 

Bryston

Briggy got messy too

Bryston & Briggy requested to sleep in the crib together that night.

The City Museum was one of the major highlights of the trip for me.  Here's a description of the museum from Trip Advisor so that you can get an idea of what it is:

 

"Don’t take the name so literally. We're about fun. Not your white walls, walk around, and be quiet museum. If you want to climb around, get active with your kids or are a big kid at heart, we're the place. If you get freaked out easily, you might not want to come. We’re four floors filled with miles of tunnels, a full cave system, over 30 slides, a circus, an arts area, a large outdoor climbing space, Architectural Museum, a Cabin that serves adult beverages, a Museum of Mayhem, Mirth and Mystery, and a ton more. Also, there’s the roof with a Ferris Wheel and a bus hanging off its edge."

 

This museum completely rocked.  It literally did have miles of tunnels that you or the kids could crawl into and get completely lost.  The tunnels went behind the walls and up into the ceiling.  There was an entire cave system with tunnels that went all over, and then it's filled with all sorts of slides made out of scrap metal or something.  This museum was incredible and I would recommend it to anyone.  Well, I do admit that it is a bit terrifying to send your children into because you might never find them again.  They actually have you write your phone number on the kids wrist bands.  I'm assuming kids get lost a lot.  Well, here are some pictures:

Michelle & Barry in front of City Museum

This is on the roof of the Museum

Bryston by some of the outdoor tunnels, bridges, and slides.

Bryston & Michelle climbing on some scary surfaces

The girl on the top right is Haley going across the bridge.  The picture is a bit deceptive.  The bridge was wrapped around in metal so you wouldn't fall out.  But it still was pretty scary.  We then slid down the slide on the left.

Bryston in a tunnel

Porter & Bryston on the train

Michael, Porter, Haley, Briggy, Michelle, Bryston eating lunch

Michelle, Bryston, & Haley riding the hamster wheel.  Michael ran in this with Haley so fast that she fell down and almost went around in a complete circle.

Michelle, Bryston, Porter

Briggy, Michelle, Bryston sitting on the top

Bryston spinning around on the oversized top

Jace & Bryston running around on one of the slide things

Bryston

Michelle & Bryston sliding

Bryston & Jace

Jace & Bryston climbing up a tunnel into the ceiling

Briggy

Jace, Bryston, Briggy, Isaac

Bryston in one of the tunnel things

Bryston

Bryston in the cave tunnel

Bryston

Bryston in the tunnel (Lots of the tunnels are only small enough for little kids)

I climbed to the top of this

And then I slid down a slide from the top of this that went around in circles like the staircase

Bryston

Bryston climbing all over

Sarah & Bryston

Briggy

Colton

Michelle, Bryston, Briggy

Bryston

Hope, Michelle, Bryston, Luke, Barry in front of City Museum

On Thursday we made our way towards St. Louis to ride on a boat on the Mississippi River and then go to the top of the Gateway Arch.  Well we kind of overestimated how much time we had to get there and found that we were running pretty late.  We had a specified boat ride that our whole family was going on that was nonrefundable.  Well we made it into St. Louis only to find there was all sorts of construction blocking us from getting to the parking garage.  All of us were separately driving in circles around St. Louis trying to find a way to the parking garage.  I was in the car with my mom and dad.  My dad finally asked some man on the side of the street if he knew how to get to the arch.  He told us to take a left hand turn and then we would be right there.  Well, we went down the road he had pointed at only to discover that we were going the wrong way on a one way road and were headed directly towards another car.  Luckily we both moved out of each others way and quickly got onto another road and into the parking garage.  It was pretty terrifying.  Well, while we were getting out of the car, the guy came running over to us to talk to my parents.  I assumed he had come to apologize for almost leading us to our death.  Nope I was wrong.  He came asking for money for giving us directions.  How funny is that? 

 

Well, after my parents gave him a tip we all started running for the boat.  At this point we were super late and it was pouring rain and it was about a 5-10 minute run to the boat.  We all got completely drenched but made it to the boat.  Sadly, our whole group didn't make it but the majority of us did.  To be honest the boat ride was a little lame.  Getting to the boat was actually much more fun.

 

Following the boat ride, we actually rode in an elevator to the top of the Gateway Arch and got to look through little mini windows at the whole city.  It was pretty incredible.  It was a very enjoyable day!

Boat we rode near the Gateway Arch

BJ, Wendy, Haley, Lisa, Dan, Barry, Kathy, David, Mercy, Saryta, Anoel, Michael

Briggy all drenched from our run in the rain

Jace, Bryston

Bryston

Briggy, Michelle, Colton

Colton, Michelle

Briggy

Colton, Michelle, Briggy

Bridge we went under on boat ride

Gateway Arch

Michelle

Luke & Briggy

Briggy & Luke

Bryston lost his jacket on the way here so he used my mom's jacket

Bryston waving the stick like he's Harry Potter with a wand

Briggy, Kathy, Bryston on ride to the top of the arch

Michelle, Colton, Barry

Bryston looking out of one of the windows from inside of the top of the Gateway Arch

St. Louis, MO

Michelle & Colton

St. Louis, MO