St. Louis Weekend

We had another wonderful weekend in St. Louis visiting the Chinese Lantern Festival, seeing Hairspray at the Muny, visiting the Zoo to see the new polar bear, attending mass at the St. Louis Basilica, going up in the arch, and staying at the Chase Park Plaza.  Rodger's parents and siblings came up and stayed with us on Friday night and Saturday while Loran and Chris stayed with us on Saturday night and Sunday.  Wonderful way to spend a quick weekend out of town!!

David and Sophie at Wildflower restaurant in the Central West End

Inside the Old Court House in downtown St. Louis

Chris and girls having a little fun riding the escalator at the downtown Hyatt

Across the street from the Ball Park Village

Riding in the tram up to the top of the arch.  Very cozy!!

Loran, Abby, and Sophie enjoying the view of the Mississippi river from the top of the arch

Enjoying Hairspray at the Muny

Enjoying the movie Hairspray after seeing the play Hairspray!!

Missouri Bontanical Garden - Chinese Lantern Festival

During our trip to St. Louis, we went to the Chinese Lantern Festival at the Missouri Botanical Garden.  We saw the Lantern Festival two years ago and felt we had to come back again this year with the entire family!  The display was just beautiful and compliments the garden very well.  Below are some of the pictures from the evening.

These towers are made with ceramic dishes

50's Mini Glee Camp

Sophie and Abby sang and danced this week to 50's songs at SPA. They sang "Blue Moon", "Tutti Frutti", "Yakity Yak" and others.... Sophie was such a great singer and dancer... And we are so proud of Abby who had such great smiles on stage!

Future Bride??

Sophie really thought she was going to catch the bouquet at Jill's wedding. Love these pics!

Happy Father's Day 2015

Happy Father's Day to Rodger and our Grandpa and Papa!  We celebrated at the Morton Arboretum at their Passport to Europe Festival.  We ate pierogies, watched Polish dances, shopped the vendors, drank beer and ate pretzels in the beer garden, and OOM-PAA danced the chicken dance to the German band.

Rodger and his girls

Lovin' the cheese covered pretzel in the beer garden

Rodger chicken dancin' with the girls...

Abby is big enough to walk on the rope bridge without touching the ground. 

 

Just keep swimming...

Sophie on the starting block

Sophie swims 25 Free and 25 Back at each meet

 

The 6 and Undies Girls

At today's meet, Sophie's 4th swim meet, she had a big accomplishment.  Sophie earned a First Place in both of her events.  She was in heat 2 for these events, but nevertheless won both of them.  Sophie's time on her backstroke was 28.55 which qualifies her for the "city meet" for the older 8 and under team.  She improved on the freestyle, but clearly backstroke is her forte!

Disney at Dusk

The School of Performing Arts put on a week long day camp called Disney at Dusk.  The campers, aged 5 - 10, performed at the Carillon Tower on the Riverwalk on Friday.  Sophie was in the "Red 5 year old group" and sang songs such as "We're all in this Together", "You'll Be in My Heart", "Step in Time", "Hakuna Matata", "Cirle of Life" and "Supercalifragilisticxpalidoucious". Her group solo was from the song "Under the Sea"; she had great tone and moves to go along with it.  Sophie and her friend Nora had a great time and plan to be in many more shows as they get older.

"It's our problem free... philosphy...."

"Um - diddle - little - little - um - didlle - aye"

Sophie, age 5, and Nora, age 6

The SPA performers...Sophie is being held by Miss Miggie on the right side

Sophie and Abby had their hair curled for the day

Safety Town 2015

Sophie and Harper fighting fires together

Graduates of Safety Town!

Not just because her Daddy works there, but the Nalco smoke house was one of her favorite parts of the camp

Dance Recital 2015

We are so pleased to see our girls having so much fun in all of their activities.  But, it brings me so much joy to see them enjoy performing on stage.  This year, Abby took ballet for the first time at School of Performing Arts.  She loved her teacher and moving her hips back and forth on the lyrics "bow, wow, wow".  Sophie enjoyed having Ms. Vicky for the second year in a row and is starting to learn how to tap dance.  She loved having friends in her class and had great facial expressions to the song "Lollipop".   Thanks to Grandma, Papa, GG, Auntie KK, Grandma Janis and all of the other friends that watched their performance.

On GG's 101st birthday, she saw these two cuties perform

The Guebert Girls

Adorable

Friends and neighbors

Krystan and Abby

Sophie and Miss Vicky

Celebrating with a Kitchen Sink