making memories in St. Louis || May 14, 2017

Okay wowowowow where do I even start?????

From my journal-May 14, 2017
-So today was super duper filled up and busy-but a very awesome busy!!!
We got up at 8 (and my face and arms were covered with hives from accidentally eating corn) (it was so awful) and got ready to go! Dada was in a 'Get ready, we're going on an adventure!' mood! We left at 9 and around 2:00 we were 20 mins from the zoo, and traffic came to a stand still. Joshua prayed, and about 10 mins later we were moving again! 
Really half the time is getting there, and the other half is finding a parking space. (St. Louis is like that :l) We ended up paying, but it was a good spot close to the zoo, so we were thankful!
The zoo was AH-MAZING!!! So many animals that took my breath away. (ESPECIALLY THE FLAMINGOS OMW!!) 
We saw elephants (more on them in another post :)) hyenas, lions, penguins, polar bears, and so many others! it was so great!
Then we went to Illinois and touched the Mississippi river and saw the arch! I was really hoping to touch it because I haven't been able to in all the times I've been there, but it was all fenced off. :( Oh well, there will be another time. :)
It was awesome and wonderful and amazing to see everything again! And we made the bestest memories!!
We ate at Culvers for dinner, and now I finally have 10 scoopie tokens to get a volleyball! (hehe, nerd here) So next time we got to Culvers Imma gonna get one!!!
We got home at 12:40, and I was still pretty itchy so I took some pills, benadroyl, and rubbed coconut all over, and that helped. I really didn't want to have to get an IV again. :( Thankfully I didn't have to, I just toughed through it!!
(The next morning caden and lilli woke up with swollen faces, from a reaction to the sunscreen. :( Poor guys!!
And that's it!! Our adventure in St. Louis had ended, but I will forever look back on that as one of the best days ever!

(except for the allergies...)

Now zoo pics!!!

No words will ever express how much I love this wonderful woman! First a Mother, Forever a Friend <333

I was lucky to get this pic, in between allll the people!!

African Caboon, XD

I squealed when we got to the Africa sign, 'AFRICA!!!' 

The flamingos were my absolute favorite!! For some reason I just loved them!!! <3

*squeals* awwww!

Micah did so good in the hot weather! Little guy was on top of the world in his stroller, lol!!

Yep, it don't get much awesomer then this for a Dad!!! He's the bestttt!

And then the arch!!!

oops more zoo pics...

...

lions, look closely...

and a tiger!!! (pretty sure that's it for zoo pics!)

ahhh! I love this place!! One of my favorites that I've been many times!!

The Mississippi river!! 

and I'll end with this, since I have officially decided that this is my favorite animal evah!!!!

So that's it!!! What we did for Mother's day! And it was the greatest, all of us actually TOGETHER! 

and btw, today was the end of  my 21- challenge!! I did really good, completing all of them!! WOOT WOOT! 

Please leave me book comments if you want!! This was a ton, so book comments it is!! ;)

(oh, and this wasn't the surprise. *head desk* I'M WORKING ON IT I PROMISE!!)

A computer story.

As I mentioned in a previous post awhile back,(no pictures ) we lost all the pics on our computer.
Here a little while ago, our whole computer completely quite working. So I am using my mom's phone, signed in with my account. As you may know, smart phones take terrible pics, (no offense to anyone with great pics! ) hence, no posts on my new photography blog. As soon as we get another computer, I will be posting photoshoots if a bunch of stuff! Just hang in there for a little while longer folks! :)

What describes a brother and a four-wheeler?

HOLD. ON.

                          (Pictures coming soon! :)

             

God's dishes ( :

A few days ago we were deciding who would have what chore/job and Joshua and Levi got picked to be the dishwashers and counter cleaners. Well, I was happy that I wouldn't have to do dishes, but Josh wasn't. With a family this big it is not a fun job, if you look at it as not fun.
Tonight there was a load of dishes and so he wasn't at all looking forward to washing them.(Probably cause they couldn't all fit in the dishwasher! :) I decided that I would do all of the dishes tonight, so I came up with a fun way to look at doing them.
I pretended that all of the dishes were God's dishes and we had just finished a great big meal in heaven! Every time that I was tempted to "half" wash a dish and hope that no one notices it, I thought, "Everything has to be sparkling for the next meal and God would not be very happy if His plate was not clean!' It worked quite well and before I knew it, all of the dishes were clean and ready to use for the next big meal!
Joshua was SOO happy that I did all of his dishes and I think viewing it as God's dishes will help him to get done with them on time and not look at them as a burden. Maybe this will help you too! : )


   Oh, and I don't really know if there will be meals in heaven, but we will see when we get there I guess! Tell me if you would volunteer to wash dishes even them!!! :D

Photo shoot with Lilli-bug!

Had a chance to get some pics of Lilliana the other day! Enjoy!!