Barrett Family Fun: 2014

Excitement was in the air on Thanksgiving morning for our group of nine as we traveled from MN to St. Louis. As we had planned the trip we never would have imagined that riots would break out just 15min. drive from our destination. Fortunately we had a great trip with no negative excitement. Our journey started because my father turned 60 a few weeks ago, so our whole family went on a vacation together to St. Charles, MO. for their Christmas Festival.

Our first night we headed into the Historic St. Charles for a great photo op with all of the decor and completely empty streets.

For our Thanksgiving feast. We headed to Cracker Barrel to have a traditional Thanksgiving feast. The food was great, the wait for a table was not as great. (I guess there are a lot of people who do not want to cook turkey dinner)

The cousins sure get along great. My kids really enjoyed having them around.

Friday we headed into St. Louis for the day. We forgot our good camera for this day hence no pictures on this blog. First we traveled to the City Museum - Let me warn all parents with young children DO NOT STAY ON THE FIRST FLOOR!!! The first floor was very neat with all of these crazy nooks and crannies for the kids to crawl through, but a nightmare for the parents to try and keep track of them. Once we realized that there were more floors to the place it was much better and a place I wouldn't mind taking the kids back to (once they are much older.)

After the city museum we headed to the Gateway Arch - I am proud to report that all nine family members made it to the top of the Arch. We were there right in time for the sunset. This was a very neat experience, but again something that my children should be older for to truly understand the significance of the Arch.

Yes we are those parents. After the Arch we headed to the festival of lights at the Budweiser factory. We got to see the clydesdale horses and get our picture taken with them. It really was an event for all ages, plus the perk of a 5 drink free wristband for the adults.

Saturday was our day to head to the Christmas festival in St. Charles. What a neat tradition they have going on in that town. If you have never experienced St. Charles Christmas Festival I would highly recommend it. They have a parade with all of the different characters that you will find throughout the town. When you see them on the streets through the day you have to do some sort of task in order to gain their trading card. The object of the game is to collect all 40 of the trading cards. We were close to getting them all. All of the stores are decorated for Christmas and it has a high fun energy around the town.