2nd Annual Girl's Weekend ~ St. Louis

Last year began what was sure to become an annual event for me, my mom and my sisters.  Mom is so hard to shop for for Christmas and birthday, that buying tickets to a play and making a weekend out of it is the perfect gift.  Not just for her, but for all of us!  Now that we've made it two years in a row, I am already looking forward to next year!

Again, we headed to St. Louis.  It is a great halfway point for the four of us to meet and there is SO much to do there.  I found it funny that, 1.  The only plans we had were to go to see West Side Story. 2.  We didn't see any of the same things we saw last year.  Not even close. 

We started our adventure by heading to the box office to pick up our tickets.  We ended up staying in the area for the majority of our day.  Who knew there was so much in this area?!

This was, probably, my favorite moment of the entire weekend!  Maybe my favorite moment ever with my mom and sisters!  We were all laughing SO hard!  One of us was real close to having tears running down their legs!  I won't say who! (:

We paid a little visit to the St. Louis Art Museum.  None of us are into art, but hey, why not?  Did I mention that it was FREE?  Yep! It was!

 I was slightly in awe as I was looking at original Van Gogh's, Monet's and Picasso's!  WOW!!  I wished that Ben could have been there to see this!

Outside of the art museum was a wishing tree with what other people had wished for.  This was my favorite wish.  I feel the same way.

Not only was the art museum in the same park as the outdoor theater where we would see West Side Story, but so was the zoo.  Yes, the four of us adults went to the zoo.  No kids!  And you know what?  There was no bickering or complaining at all!  (:

 There were some very interesting people at the zoo, but we'll just stick to animals here. ;)

I love the zoo!

We left the park area and headed downtown St. Louis.  We had no idea what we were going to do.  We just thought we would head the direction of The Arch.  Jon had mentioned to me earlier that the Cardinals were playing at home that night.  I mentioned it.  Kris said, "I wonder if scalping tickets is legal here."  The next thing you know, we are stopped at a stop sign and there is a guy standing on the corner with tickets.  The conversation happened very fast in our car.  We decided that we would give it a whirl, but that none of us were willing to pay more than $20 for a ticket.  I can't even begin to tell you the hilarity that ensued in the next few minutes!  I will just say that we ended up with four tickets for $100!!  Not too shabby!!

Sooo...we were off to the ball game!

 I hadn't been to a major league baseball game in so long!  I think the last time was when I was in 3rd or 4th grade.  I live too far away to go to big games.  I love that we have a minor league team in Tulsa, but it's not quite the same.  I was really excited about the game!  One thing,  even though I'm not much of a dedicated baseball fan, I couldn't root for the Cardinals.  Nope.  Just couldn't do it.  Go Cubs!

The Cubs won!

We had so much fun!

To think that all of this fun happened in only one day is just crazy!!  To say that we were a little wiped out would be an understatement!

We may have done a little bit of snacking...

On Saturday we did some shopping.  We got some amazing deals!  Of course, that only happens when we go shopping with Mom!

Since Kris works for Maggiano's, we thought that would be the perfect place for dinner before we headed to the play.  YUM!!  It was....oh my goodness...it was amazing!

I felt a little bit guilty going to see West Side Story without Ben.  He loves the movie!  He would have loved the play!

I tried SO hard to get a picture of the four of us.  It just wasn't working out very well.

This is the best we could get.  (:  But I love it!

Thankfully, after the play, someone saw us trying to take a picture of ourselves and offered to take it for us.

The play was great!

The weekend was great!

This weekend was the getaway that I needed away from home!  Between Jon going away for a week for work, Abby in softball, Ben in marching band, Luke and I spending every waking moment together and trying to get all three kids ready for school to start... I definitely needed a break!  This was so perfect!

I miss my mom and sisters all the time and this is perfect thing for way for us to get to see each other, take a break from life at home and have fun.

I can't wait for next year!!

Christmas...Birthday...Mother's Day Weekend

 Back in November, Rebecca called and told me that Mary Poppins was coming to the stage in St. Louis and asked what I thought about us girls going in together to get Mom tickets as a Christmas gift.  We could all meet in St. Louis for a girls weekend to go see the play together.  I knew this was the perfect thing for so many reasons.  1.  Mom loves those kind of gifts.  2.  Mary Poppins is my favorite Disney movie.  When I heard (Quite a while back that it was going on Broadway, I really wanted to make a trip to NYC to see it!  3.  Who could turn down a girl's weekend?  I rarely get to see my mom and sisters, especially without the kids around!  4.  The play was running over my birthday and Mother's Day weekend.  Nice!!

Mom was thrilled when she opened her Christmas gift!  Thanks to Skype I was able to "be there" when she opened it and saw that pure excitement on her face.  It was priceless!  I was so happy that we were able to come up with something so great and that we could all enjoy together.

Mom wasn't the only one excited.  I was.  As the time drew nearer my excitement continued to grow.  I was so excited to be able to go see my family and to have a getaway without my kiddos.  Don't get me wrong, I LOVE my kiddos, but things have so busy around here, that it felt like a well deserved break.  Not to mention that it was my birthday weekend.  I love my birthday and it almost felt like we were going away for me!  Selfish, I know...

 One thing we knew was on the agenda for the weekend was to go to Olga's.  We all love Olga's and hate that the only time we can ever go is when we are in Michigan.  A few years ago we discovered that there is an Olga's in St. Louis.  Sweet!!

So...that was stop #1!
The food was great as always, however, the Orange Cream Coolers were slightly disappointing.  Just not how they used to be.  Come to find out...they've gone lactose free... YUCK!  Oh well..

 I had no idea that, even though it was my birthday weekend, that there would be cake and presents!  Mom made my very most favorite cake!  White cake with white fluffy frosting with coconut...DELICIOUS!!!  I haven't had that cake in so long and it was just as good as I remembered!  Mmmm...I want some now!  Since I never get to see anyone in my family for birthday (or any other special occasion, for that matter) it made my birthday that much more special. 

Thank you, Mom, Kris and Rebecca for making my birthday so special!

 We spent some time wandering around Downtown St. Louis.  I don't care how many times I see the Arch, I still think it is so cool!  It is so pretty and amazing!

Kris and Rebecca were on a little bit of a mission to find a few local breweries so that they could take some beer home to their husbands (who really enjoy brewing their own beer).  They were successful and I'm pretty sure Scott and Neil were happy with their loot!

Smack dab in the middle of the city...art!  Such a neat place nestled in amongst the tall buildings.  I loved it!

The picture in the top left corner is of both hotels that we stayed at on our trip.  The Renaissance Marriot and the Embassy Suites.

Jon was able to use some of his points to get us this amazing hotel room.  It was completely huge and amazing.  I'm so thankful he was able to do this for us!

And the moment that we had been waiting six months for!

TIME FOR MARY POPPINS!!

AMAZING!!!  That is the only way I can think to describe the play.  We all LOVED it!

Part of me wished that Abby could have been with me.  Maybe when it comes to Tulsa???

What an amazing weekend! I can't think of anything that would have made our time together any better or more fun.  I felt so happy, spoiled, free, special, loved...it was just fantastic!  I am so thankful that I have Jon who was willing to take some time off of work and hang out with the kids all weekend so I could go have some fun!  I would love to make this girl's weekend an annual event!

An Amazing Weekend

I had an awesome opportunity to go to Oklahoma City this past weekend for the Deeper Still conference with Kay Arthur, Priscilla Shirer and, everybody's favorite, Beth Moore! It was an awesome time!! The music was amazing! The speaking was amazing! The time spent in an arena with 9,000+ other women was amazing! The time away from home with a friend without any kids was amazing! I definitely believe I heard a word from the Lord!! I am excited to be home and start some things anew! Praise God for love and forgiveness!!

This is my friend, Laurie, who I went with. There was a group of women from our church that we met there. It was so nice to finally meet some of the women from church and now be able to put a name and an experience with their faces!

Kay Arthur: "Rest is the activity of faith for this anxious moment, this test, this tribulation....."

Beth Moore: "It is within me!" Stay faithful!!

Priscilla Shirer: "God is able!!" Ephesians 3:20-21 NOW to Him who is able to do EXCEEDINGLY ABUNDANTLY above ALL that we ask or THINK, according to the power that works in us, to Him be glory FOREVER and EVER!!!

I loved how before each woman spoke, the other two would pray over her!

Lunch break!!

On our way back after lunch we had to stop for a photo op in front of some Christmas trees. :)

This was an especially touching thing for me. I know it is really hard to tell what is going on, but that is four panes of glass on the stage. Before the conference started in the morning, those panes were at each of the entrances. If you had something that you were praying for or praising God for, you could write it on the glass. They told us that there would be something special done with them later. During the praise and worship time there was a guy on the stage painting something on each of the panes.

This is how it turned out. I KNOW that God can take care of what I wrote on there! Now it is up to me to trust Him to do it! (Why does that have to be so hard???)

This was actually kind of funny in the beginning, but was also very cool! The ladies were doing a Q&A session and one of the questions was asking what they wanted for Christmas. Beth Moore said that all she wanted was healing for her back pain! The other two decided that there was no time like the present to pray over "Miss Beth"! The funny part was that as they were laying hands on her back, she asked for them to pray for everything from her head to her toes! So, "Miss Kay" and "Miss Priscilla" did just that! Priscella even laid hands on her feet! Amazing women!

The outstretched arms are of the ladies showing that they were laying hands on "Miss Beth" as well. It was very cool! Miracles happen!

Laurie and I decided to stay another night after the conference to just hang out, do some Christmas shopping...whatever. Well, it was FREEZING, so instead of walking around Bricktown we thought we would take the trolley to do a little sightseeing. Maybe we should have asked a few questions! We didn't realize we would be on there for an hour and a half driving all over OKC!! We had a great time and did some MAJOR laughing!!!

This was our trolley driver. And I can say "ours" because we were the only ones on the trolley for over an hour! Good times, good times!!

The riverwalk looks beautiful all decorated for Christmas! I can't wait to back with my family in a few weeks!


This is just way too funny not to share! I have never seen a restroom sign like this one!

Laurie made me.....

Anyway, I had an amazing time!! I really needed a break from all of my wifely, motherly duties! I laughed so hard this weekend and that was greatly needed!! I am praying now that all of the things I learned this weekend will not just be an exciting temporary thing, but that I will continue to learn and grow in Christ!