Forest Park

Spring in St. Louis

I love spring in St. Louis. There are so many beautiful flowers and flowering trees everywhere you look! The two best places, in my opinion, to enjoy spring are 1.) Forest Park, especially the area around the Art Museum:

And 2.) The Missouri Botanical Garden, which is always gorgeous, but especially colorful at this time of year:

Where are your favorite places to enjoy the beauty of spring?

The Restoration of a King

The Apotheosis of Saint Louis, the statue towering over Art Hill which features the city of St. Louis’ namesake, is a familiar sight to residents and visitors alike. That familiar sight is looking a little different right now, however, as it is currently undergoing a major restoration. The statue is over 100 years old, and hasn’t been restored since 1998, so I guess it’s about time!

It’s definitely strange to see such a familiar landmark look like this, but I’m glad they’re taking care of Louis, so that he can be admired by future generations of St. Louisans!

The Top Five–Photos of 2016

Last year, I forced myself to pick my top five photos (ok, 10 total…five from my Canon DSLR, and five from my iPhone), that I had taken over the course of 2015. I thought it was a fun little project, so here are my top five (and only five…fine…five plus one, from either camera) photos from 2016.

The Missouri Botanical Garden is always one of my favorite places to take pictures, especially the beautiful Japanese Garden:

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Our town square (which is actually a circle, but I digress), is always beautiful, but especially at sunset:

Another favorite photo spot is Forest Park, especially the view outside the Art Museum in the spring:

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I took many pictures when we were in Chicago last May…this is my favorite lakefront/skyline shot:

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Back at the Botanical Garden, and the always-photogenic Climatron:

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And because I can never leave well enough alone, a bonus picture of a sea-lion, mid-wink, following the sea-lion show at the St. Louis Zoo:

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This list is a little different this year, because not one picture of our family made the cut. I did get a lot of great photos of the children in 2016, but really, they deserve a category of their own…it’s just too hard to choose!

Fall in Forest Park

I’ve visited Forest Park several times over the last few weeks, mainly because I’ve been looking for fall color. Fall’s has arrived haltingly this year, but it’s finally starting to look the way I was hoping it would!

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Some years we have to wait for it longer than I’d like, but there’s nothing like fall in St. Louis!

2016-17 School Year–Week Eleven

There is no denying it…this was a weird week of school!

Moose only had two days of school this week, between parent-teacher conferences and Veterans’ Day (plus, he celebrated his birthday this week…on one of the only two days he had to be at school!). I wanted to make the most of his time off, so we did things a little differently this week.

On Monday, I already had plans for a field trip. The Missouri History Museum had a homeschool day focusing on their latest exhibit: “Toys of the ’50s, ’60s, and ’70s.” Since Ryan had the day off work, in addition to Moose being home, all seven of us went to the museum, and then had a picnic lunch in Forest Park, followed by our annual fall walk through the park. It was a really fun day!

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I decided that on the two days Moose was in school, we’d focus heavily on a few subjects, instead of doing our normal work across all the subjects. So we still had religion (there were a lot of church-year commemorations this week!), math (we got through six lessons in two days!), current events (there was really no way to avoid that this week!) and our study of the Constitution. In addition, Turkey and Bunny focused on writing, and Ladybug finished her written work for the chapter of science she finished last week. And yesterday, with both Moose and Ryan having the day off again, we spent the morning back in Forest Park, at the St. Louis Zoo.

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This was definitely an unusual week for us, but I think we all needed something a little unusual. Next week, we’ll also be doing things a little differently, but that’s been planned all along…it’s that time of year when we take a break from our regular history studies to focus on the First Thanksgiving, how Thanksgiving became a holiday, and how it changed over the years. Other than that, we’ll be doing our regular school work, though, so it will definitely be a more normal week!