Our St. Louis Pay-Cation

According to Sam, we went on a "paycation" to St. Louis. If only someone paid us to go...

We have never really gone on a family vacation together (a short trip to Oklahoma City doesn't count) so we decided since I needed to get out of town and Justin was going out of town for two weeks we should celebrate by going to St. Louis.

We thought this was perfect because it is fairly close, it has lots of kid friendly things to do, and a lot of it is CHEAP (holla atcha girl!).

First stop: St. Louis Zoo:

Once he figured out this snake wasn't real, he was all about it. 

There was a baby elephant that was super cute. 

Cute little monkey that stared pretty intently at us. Good thing it was a monkey or it would have been awkward.

Sam thought this was the best seat in the house. 

Don't these penguins look regal?! Their hot natured buddies outside smelled like butt though. True story. 

Sam really liked the penguins. He said they swam like he does. :-) 

Sea lions are my favorite. They swim while balancing a ball on their nose. And they expect treats in return. I heart them. 

She is on her garsh-darn flippers... amazing! 

Next stop: City Museum! 

He does this everywhere. Every. Where. This is in line for the ferris wheel. 

He was being so sweet! He kept hugging me really tight like this. Precious!

Family ferris wheel time! Sam is a bit cautious here. 

He ended up liking it a lot, despite what it seems like in this picture. 

This video is of the little squirt saying he wanted to go down the big slide, then chickening out, then Justin dragging him down anyway. He didn't really know what to think. 

Next stop: Science Museum

He could have stayed at this exhibit where you build roads and play with cars all day if we would have let him. I was so bored I couldn't stand it. 

He also really like this station where you threw coal in and got power for so many seconds. This was pretty cool and cute. 

Last stop: Fitz Soda Factory

He chose root beer. He was not disappointed. 

I can't even handle his cuteness right here. He was so excited to watch the bottling of the root beer. 

We had a lot of fun and I'd like to say more about it but right now he is demanding to sit in my lap for family movie time and well... that trumps catching up on blogging.