Meet Me in St. Louie . . ..

So, we left Claremore and headed for Joplin, MO. We had some good friends that moved from Frisco almost exactly a year ago who now live in Joplin that we wanted to stop in and see. Their oldest dd was in K and 1st with Ian, and Charlotte (the mom) and I had done several Beth Moore studies together. Unfortunately, Helen (the dd) was off with some girls from her church at a retreat, and Ian couldn't see her. We did enjoy seeing Charlotte and the other 2 girls.

5 minutes into the trip to Joplin and Alaina's already saying "I got nothing to do!" Oh, are we in for trouble. Thank goodness we've got the DVD player.

We stopped and visited our friends, admired their beautiful house, decided we wanted to buy the one that was for sale next door (tehehe), and went for lunch at Decker's Dogs. Then it was onto St. Louis.

About an hour down the road. . . Road construction! EEK . . 12-15 miles an hour (see the pic? No lying on the speed limit). ::sigh:: By this point I've taken a Relpax because I've got a migraine. . . so I spend the next several hours dozing while Andy drives.


We finally get to St. Louis (See pic of our first view of the arch? Looks so tiny there, doesn't it? tehehe) and we can't find the Embassy suites there. . .they've hidden it, picked it up and moved it elsewhere.. .1st street is not the easiest place to find. After 2 calls to the hotel and 45 minutes, we finally find it. I've lost count of how long this leg of the trip was!


We take the kids to the swimming pool . . it's freezing, but you know kids, they wanna swim anyway. Swim about 45 minutes, most of which I spent sitting on the side of a round baby pool, then come back to the room. Andy leaves for pasta, I get kids showered. Into bed they go . . .all 3 of them in a sofa bed that's the smallest sized queen mattress I've ever seen! We, however, have a wonderful King sized bed.

Things I learned getting to St. Louis:
--Maybe I could move to Joplin afterall! Charlotte's house was gorgeous, and HUGE . . .and a finished basement! Wow, what I wouldn't give for one of those. I told her to get Andy a job at the hospital her dh is now working at and we'd talk!
-- No matter how much stuff you have for the kids, they're always gonna tell you "I'm bored" way earlier than you expect them to.
-- $1 toys from the buck store can keep them ocupied for a long time, especially if they've been wrapped
--Call the hotel for directions BEFORE you hit the city, so you can get directions from the highway, instead of assuming "near the arch" really means really near the Arch! ROFL . .. dumb us!
--kids will sleep 12 million to a sofa bed. . . just for the allure of sleeping in a sofa bed.

(keep reading below for our time in Claremore)