My Trip to Missouri

During my lay-over in Denver I walked around the airport and was very pleased to find a memorial to NASA Astronaut Jack Swiggert, one of the heroes of Apollo 13. I hope I'm not too much of a dork to get excited over this.


And when I arrived in Missouri, this is what was waiting to greet me (besides my sister, her husband and their baby-along-the-way). An ice storm! It was really cool to see that some trees had totally split and fallen over on account of the weight of the ice that had built up on the branches.

The St Louis Cardinals Stadium!





Nice views of the arch. It was SPECTACULAR in person.

This is inside the crazy/clausterphobia-producing/disneylandish/five-seating compartment that climbs up to the top of the Arch from its inside. Pretty cool.





Beautiful views of St. Louis from the top of the Arch.

My sister and I saw this obscure object in the river below the Arch. We could NOT figure out what it was. Any guesses?



Fun in the museum at the base of the Arch!


I don't know if you can see them but behind us in these two pictures are tons of geese. It was pleasant to watch them relaxing in the frigid water, but we quickly made an exit when we discovered we were standing on tons of goose poop. Sidenote: Who ever knew that geese poop like cats? You'd think since they're birds they would poop more like birds. But no. You couldn't tell the difference between cat poop and goose poop.

We ate at PF Changs before making the two hour drive to Waynesville, MO, where Heather and Matt live (Waynesville is close to Matt's base, Fort Leonardwood). We finished off our delicious meal with the most wonderful banana spring rolls. OOOOHHHH, those were good.


Heather had the guest bed all set up nice and cozy even with a gift pack! The gift pack held a movie, perfume, lip balm I had been wanting, a cute journal, etc. Such a good sister. Oh yeah, also on the foot of the bed were some clothes that she didn't want, including some underwear, so she decided to leave them on my bed for me to decide whether I wanted them. When Heather and I were on our way to the hotel the night before, she got a call from Matt back in Waynesville. He asked in a very "oooh I caught you in a big silly mistake" tone of voice why in the world there was UNDERWEAR on the guest bed. Pretty funny. Heather just simply explained to him why. When I finally got to the guest bedroom myself the next day, I said "Why is there UNDERWEAR on the bed?" just to tease Matt, and he looked at me and emphatically said "I know! Isn't that WEIRD?"


My pregnant sister!
We went out to dinner at an Italian restaurant a few days later. Heather ordered bijou cheese chicken without knowing what "bijou cheese" was. We decided that since it was an Italian restaurant in WAYNESVILLE, MO, it was probably going to be chicken with cheese-wiz. When she actually got her food and it really was covered in this orange cheese it made us laugh so hard. But I have to include the fact that she loved it. And it was NOT cheese-wiz. :)

Me in front of a YUMMY bar-b-que place called Bandana's!

The last event of the trip, and the most exciting! That's Heather with the hospital behind her, where she was going to get an ultrasound and find out the sex of the baby! They let me come into the ultrasound room with her, so I got to see her little baby GIRL moving around and everything. I thought it was really cool how you can SEE the heartbeat with the ultra-sound. I shed a few tears. My little niece.

And now I'm back home...and discovering that I think I'd rather be in Waynesville, Missouri. At least until the 30th when they move to Seattle!