July mini break in St Louis

The weather has been so gorgeous this month that Kel and I decided to take a rare free weekend (absolutely no scheduled activities!) and head for St Louis. Since Nic couldn't join us, we added camping to our adventure. Nic hates camping. Kel and I love it! We packed up the car and headed out on Saturday morning. First stop, the City Museum. This is our first visit since they opened the rooftop and, consequently, we spent the bulk of our day on said rooftop. The City Museum never disappoints.

Here is Kel in the parking lot with the museum (quite possibly the best place on earth) in the background. You can see the exhibits on the rooftop. There is a ferris wheel, a swinging rope, some slides, a water area, lots of places to climb and explore, and the school bus (of course!).





Here's a look at the school bus taken from down below, in MonstroCity. I must have been standing up by the airplanes, since there's nothing above me and the vantage is pretty high.



And now Kel, in his favourite exhibit of the day, smiling back down as he climbs up to board the school bus. Yes, that school bus, the one on the rooftop!



Driving the school bus. Which means that he's hanging out over the edge of the rooftop here. The background is washed out, otherwise you'd be able to see that we're above the surrounding buildings, way up in the St Louis sky.





The ball pit is crazy!



This is the water feature that eventually ended our day at the City Museum. Playing here again later, Kel took a wrong step and fell right in. All the way in. Soaking wet, from head to toe, and it was a chilly day, so we had to pack it in. See those shoes? They are no more. Because we were camping, I had no way to dry them. And since it was chilly, they only sat out and stayed wet overnight. By the time we arrived home the next evening, they were stinky and off to the trash. Monday morning required an emergency run to the shoe store.




The very cool rooftop ferris wheel.




A happy (and chilly!) Sunday morning, waking up in our tent.




Next stop, the Magic House! They have really updated the exhibits and expanded since our last visit two years ago. We spent the entire day here and could easily have stayed twice as long.



Wet jeans during the garden water play time. Seemed to be the theme this weekend. Luckily it had warmed up enough that we could go back to the car for shorts after he'd finished here.







The new construction area was a huge hit.




The expression on his face here is priceless. This is when I see Nic in him. Oh so worried!



Sitting back to watch a kinetic art exhibit do its thing.




Hey, if you make a face like this when your mother asks you to smile, just remember that it may be posted on the internet for everybody to see!