MO to TX

Tuesday, January 6th:

The alarm didn't go off, so we didn't get out of Columbia until 9:30. We drove and drove and drove with our only notable incidents being Jacob walking out of the bank bathroom with no pants on and Ella crying for the last hour and fifteen minutes of the trip. Good times.

Mall; Chinese (food); Bonkers

Monday, January 5th:

Another lounge day. After Ella's nap, we took the kids to the mall to ride the carousel and play in the play area. Maroua and I went to Target to pick up road food for the journey back to Texas the next day.

For dinner, we went to downtown Columbia and ate at a tiny Chinese restaurant. It was pretty good, but it was no El Rancho. Maroua and I took Ella home and Kris and Ryan took the boys to Bonkers, an indoor play area, and closed the place down.

Library; Shakespeare's

Sunday, January 4th:

Another hang out day. After Ella's nap, we went to the library and met up with Rami's girlfriend, Dot. The kids played and read books for a long time, but soon it was time for dinner.

We had tried to go to Shakespeare's Pizza the night before, but were met with a one hour wait, so tonight was the night to actually sample their fare. We all dug in and had none left over.

Devil's Icebox; El Rancho; Slumdog Millionaire

Saturday, January 3rd:

This was another lounge day. Once Ella was napping, however, I went with Ryan and Maroua and the boys to a state park to walk around and check out a cave called The Devil's Icebox. We picked up Sonic on the way and had a picnic before hiking off. The park was really nice and we followed a boardwalk for nearly the entire trek.

Once at the cave, Ryan helped the boys go inside. There was a small stream running through it, so they had to be careful not to get wet. Once both boys had had a turn inside, we headed back towards the entrance.

We had a bit of a meltdown halfway back, but I won't go into it...

Once back at the house we were thinking about dinner and decided to hit El Rancho once again. I again ate too many nachos and again had trouble sleeping because of how full I was. But as I write this, I know in my heart that I would do it all over again... mmmm.... Outside were weird clown people who kept the boys entertained. The adults, on the other hand, were creeped out.

Once the kids were in bed, Maroua and I went to the Ragtag Theatre and saw Slumdog Millionaire. It was really good!

STL; Zoo; Fitz's; City Museum; White Castle

Friday, January 2nd:

We got up early-ish and loaded up both cars for a day trip to Saint Louis (STL). The boys rode with Maroua and me and Ella rode with Kris and Ryan. As hoped, Ella napped on the two hour drive.

Our first stop was the St. Louis Zoo. In STL, the zoo and many museums are free. We found parking and walked around. We really lucked out on the weather- it was in the 40s and 50s. The zoo was really nice, but there were several closed exhibits due to weather. The kids rode the carousel and saw huge grizzly bears, lions, and a new baby giraffe.

Now it was time for lunch. We drove to the beautiful old downtown for lunch at Fitz's Root Beer Company. The Fitz's root beer is pretty good, but a little too minty for my taste. Kris really liked it and Maroua feels as though it's not good by itself and needs ice cream. During lunch we discussed what to do next. Maroua had heard that The City Museum was really cool, but it cost money. It's $2 cheaper after 5 so we figured we'd go ahead and go and by the time we got there it would be 5 already.

The City Museum should be on the list of thing to do before you die, but probably should be before your body quits on you. When we arrived, we were amazed at the huge, iron structure on the outside. It was an intricate maze of rusted stairs, airplanes, a firetruck, and slides and it was probably five stories tall. We hurried in and immediately saw a three story slide that ended in the lobby. We each paid our $10 and walked in, marveling at everything. First up: the outside crazy playground. It took a while to figure out how to get out there, but once we did, it was amazing. Jacob's big goal was to get to the firetruck. We climbed stairs, went through tunnels, and finally got to the firetruck. We played there for a long time before heading to the ball pit. This was a chaotic, giant cage filed with kids throwing beach ball sized balls. Rami and Jacob had a hard time getting around, but liked the challenge. After a while, Rami got hit by a stray ball so we left. Jake wanted to go back to the firetruck and Maroua and Rami went around looking at more stuff. Maroua found us later and we went to the bottom of the playground where they had a fire pit and were letting people roast marshmallows. It was so surreal!

We regrouped and went to explore the inside of the museum. The kids rode a train and played in the toddler area while we adults rested up a bit. This place was crazy! There was a huge area just for arts and crafts, a skateless skate park, a big area devoted only to blocks, stone work from the tops of buildings, and more. And then we went on the craziest thing of all..

THE SUPER ULTRA MEGA COLLOSSAL SLIDE!!!!!!!!!

We climbed a million stairs (I carried Ella, so I got my workout for the day!) to get to the 7th story. We then took a slide all the way down to the first floor. It was nuts... It was a spiral and mostly enclosed, so it seemed like it took forever to go down and a lot of the time it was pitch black. So crazy... Once at the bottom, Ella and I had to sit for a while-- we were breathless and dizzy. After that, we went to other areas: the mangroves where you climb through trees and tunnels and the caves where the stalagtites and stalagmites look like dinosaurs. A lot of this would have been more fun if we were not fearing the deaths of our children the entire time. There were tunnels and slides everywhere so it would be really easy to get separated and never find each other again. (Kris looked up the death rate when we got home-- 0 dead, 2 very seriously injured. We were sure the whole place was a death trap...)

And then we saw a circus. Nuts, right? There were about 5 aerialist acts in a small circus arena. They were part of the museum's circus classes and performed for tips. The kids were getting very tired and hot so we stripped them down to only one layer of clothes.

Around 11:00 (the museum is open until 1AM) we went back to the car and headed back to Columbia. Kris requested that we find a White Castle on the way home, so Ryan led us to our very first White Castle experience. I say gross, Kris says good.

Fireworks; Chuck E Cheese

Thursday, January 1st:

We just hung out today. Once Ella was awake after her nap, Ryan set off a couple of fireworks outside. Then, after she had gone to bed, Maroua and I took the boys to Chuck E. Cheese (we had to stop by and get frozen custard first, of course). There were not a lot of people there, so the boys just ran around and played until we closed the place down. Then we took them home and tucked them into bed.

New Year's Eve; Youzeum; Chinese (people); Artisan Salsa; Ragtag; El Rancho

Wednesday, December 31st:

During the day we just hung out. We'd made plans to go to the "First Night" celebration in downtown Columbia. Ryan's parents were going to come over to baby sit, so once we got Ella tucked in, Maroua and I took the boys out to par-tay while Kris and Ryan went to hang out with some friends.

Our first stop was the Youzeum. It's a museum about body stuff. Normally, it's $10, but that night's cost was included in the "First Night" fee. It was kinda lame. There was one arts and crafts table for the kids, but that was it. The boys really liked the Rube Goldberg machine at the end and watched it for a long time.

Next we went to the Methodist Church for crafts and Chinese singing and dancing. Rami fell asleep almost instantly. Jacob would lay down only to pop back up again when he heard something interesting. By the time the presentation was over, so were the boys. We walked back outside in the freezing weather only to find that the "First Night" busses had stopped running to this area. We walked to the Artisan and got the boys milk and brownies while we warmed ourselves. It was apparently Salsa night, though our little party animals were not really interested. Maroua ran back to the Youzeum to get the car and we all piled in with the heater blowing full blast. This is when Jacob said, "I like it to be a little cold. This is a lot cold. I don't like it to be a lot cold." Back at the house, the boys were tucked in and Maroua and I went on a crazy wild goose chase trying to find Ryan and Kris (we did).


Once together, we all headed to the Ragtag Theatre. It was really loud and there was some old guy playing saxaphone along to the hip hop music. We stayed long enough for one drink then headed to go eat at El Rancho. El Rancho is not TexMex, but it is amazing food! I ate an entire platter of nachos, even when my stomach said I should have stopped at half. (I did have trouble sleeping that night because my stomach was so full...)

On the way back to the car, Kris's borrowed jacket became a problem. He had borrowed Ryan's dad's University of Missouri coat that had a big M on the back. Should not have been an issue since Columbia is where that university is located, but it was New Year's and there were a lot of drunk people around... Anyhoo, the story goes: we'e walking down the street towards the parking garage when some chick yells out, "Hey! Go Mizzou! Hey, guy with the big M on his back!" We just keep walking with nervous smiles and giggles. Then some other guy in some other circle of people says, "Hey! What are you laughing at? You got something to say?" We just hurried on our way. (Maroua, Ryan, and Kris should help me with this story. It's hard to remember everything on my own and the side discussion I'm currently having about "The Fox and the Hound" is not helping!)

Once back to the house, we all hit the sack.

Ernie's; Walking Columbia

Tuesday, December 30th:

Everyone but Ella slept in late. We packed up two carloads and drove to Columbia's downtown. We ate breakfast at Ernie's-- pancakes, waffles, a banana (Ella), French toast, eggs, bacon... Everything you could ever want was on that menu.

Ryan had to go to work so the rest of us went walking the historic downtown area. We window shopped tons of places, including one that sold the same kind of scarves that I made for Christmas (they're worth $36, apparently!).

We ducked into the Artisan for some coffee and milk and a game of "chest." Ella started getting cranky so we headed back to Maroua's house for naps and playtime. The boys liked

playing Batman and Robin and liked playing in the backyard with the dogs.

ALSO...

Maroua has a bun in the oven!!!!!

; D

TX to MO

Monday, December 29th:



We left the house at 7AM to drive to Columbia, Missouri, to visit UCI friends Maroua, Ryan, and Rami. The drive went well considering that Oklahoma toll roads cost us about $15...! I can easily say that Dot's Cafe in Claremore, OK has the worst bathroom in America, possibly the world. It's a tiny cafe where you walk through the dirty kitchen, out the back door, to a lean-to bathroom. It's basically outside in the 25 degree weather. The boards on the door are warped so the door won't close all the way. The toilet seat is FREEZING! You can't put toilet paper into the toilet because it's not really a toilet. It's a toilet over a hole in the ground. I ended up changing Ella's diaper while she stood up.

One tiny blooper... I managed to get everyone out the door on time, but I left all of our coats on the couch AND I neglected to put on shoes. You would think that this makes me crazy, right? I mean, how can you leave the house with no shoes when it's 20 degrees outside? Well, it just goes to show how comfy my new house shoes are. I *thought* I had shoes on... We stopped in Osage Beach, MO at the outlet mall and went shoe and coat shopping. The kids had coats in the car from church on Sunday, but Kris and I were SOL. I got a new pair of shoes and jacket while Kris opted for just a pullover sweater.

We arrived at around 8:30 and both kids had fallen asleep. The woke up once we went inside Maroua and Ryan's super cute house and partied until 10:00. Jake and Rami sleft in sleeping bags on the floor while Ella slept in the pack n' play in our room upstairs. The "big kids" stayed up talking until 1:30 in the morning then headed to bed.