Why we love St. Louis...

It is hard to believe we are less than 10 months away from being done here in St. Louis.  We have loved exploring this city for the last couple of years.  There are a multitude of things that are awesome about it, so I will give you a list.  And this should serve as a reason that if you haven't come to visit us up here yet, you still have a little time left to come :)

1.  Forest Park

Forest Park is amazing.  Imagine it being like Central Park in NYC.  It is huge and is where you will find the Art Museum (FREE), Science Museum (FREE), History Musuem (FREE), and Zoo (FREE).  You will also find the Muny, the outdoor amphitheater where they do awesome plays during the summer months.  Michael and I just went a couple weeks ago to see Les Mis.  There are free seats in the back, but you can also buy tickets starting at $5 or so.  There is also the World's Fair Pavilion, which Michael and I went to a few days ago on a date.  We actually started our date at the Art Museum which just recently opened a new wing (amazing...), then went to the pavilion to sit and chat and snack on some wine, cheese and crackers, and chocolate :)  We just so happened upon a guy who was sitting out there practicing his flute for a wedding the next day.  He was amazing and provided great background music for our little date :)  And the view there is pretty cool.  Then there is the boat house where you can rent paddle boats to ride around the park if for fun.  They are constantly having all kinds of events out at the park too.  There is Shakespeare in the Park in early summer which is where they do a play outside of the art museum for free and have all kinds of cool stuff going on with that (and it's free).  Then the have hot air balloon races in the fall and a thing the night before where you can go out and see them glowing at night and walk around and look at the balloons.  Then it is always fun to just go and picnic out at the park and play on Art Hill, or in the winter time that is also the spot to go sledding.  The Zoo has concerts on the weekends in the summer.  And throughout the year, if you go to the zoo the first hour it is open you can ride the carousel, get in the children's garden, and get in to pet the stingrays all for free (which typically cost extra after the first hour).  I could go on and on about how awesome this park is...

2.  Trader Joe's

SO I know this isn't exclusive to St. Louis, but we didn't have one in Birmingham.  If you haven't ever been to one, you should.  I love just about everything there.  Just a few of my favorites...
*Roasted Red Pepper Tomato Soup
*Caramel Sauce
*Cheeses
*Chocolate mints
*Cookie Butter
*Coffees
*Vanilla or Chocolate Icecreams
*Wines
The prices are awesome and the food is divine...

3.  Parks

There are so many parks here in St. Louis.  We haven't even made it to all of them.  There are just so many parks that have great playgrounds and/or splash pads.  There are ones that have great little ponds too.

4.  Farmer's Markets

There are a multitude of these as well.  Our favorite would have to be Tower Grove, which is closer in to the city.  Great vendors and there is a great playground and water play thing for the kiddos as well.  It is in a cool park as well where you can find fun places to picnic too.  There are other markets as well that are great too.

5.  Botanical Gardens

This place is huge and beautiful.  It is not free most days, but on Wednesday and Sat. mornings it is free, so that is when we always go.  There is a fun children's garden.  And they do free concerts out there one night a week in the summer where people can get in free and bring picnic stuff and sit and listen to a band and take in the beautiful scenery.

6.  Downtown

Of course there is the arch to see.  There is also CIty Garden where kids can splash around in the water.  Also downtown you will find the Cardinal's stadium.   Then there is the City Museum.  We went there our first summer here and it was really cool.  You can google it to find out more about it, but well worth the money to check it out.

7.  St. Charles

This is a cool little town just north of where we are (about 20 minutes away).  It was part of the Lewis and Clark trail.  So it has a cool park area by the river (Missouri I believe...).  It has a cool historic street by the river that is old cobblestone and has some really cool shops and restaurants.  They are always have cool things going on out there throughout the year too, like street festivals and such.

There are still things we haven't gone to yet that are on our list of musts before we head out of town next year.  We still need to go to Purina Farm's (which we hear is pretty cool), the Anhauser Busch Brewery, Cathedral Basilica, and many other things that just aren't coming to mind right now.

Doesn't this make you want to come check out this cool city with us???? :)

Oh, and the food here.  While we do miss having a good ole meat and three kind of place and some good bar-b-que, there is some really cool places we have discovered to eat at.  Some of our favorite places would have to be Ted Drewe's (frozen custard), Dewey's Pizza, anything at "The Hill" (an Italian area where there are all kinds of Italian places to eat at), the Spaghetti Factory (SK's favorite), Cafe Ventana (where we go when we have a hankering for beignets), Scottish Arms, Bailey's Chocolate Bar, Bailey's Range....I could keep going, but I will stop cause I am getting hungry now...

Long enough post right.  Just had this on my mind this morning, and thought it might be fun to look back on :)  And mainly to convince you to plan your visit up to see us!