Thank You, City of St Louis

My birthday was October 1, and I received an unexpected birthday "present" from the City of St Louis. Two tickets were on my windshield when I got into my car that morning. One was for Invalid Inspection and the other was for Invalid License Plates.


The expiration date on my plates was September 2009. The tickets were written at 3:50 am on that morning. My plates had been expired less than 4 hours, and I'm already getting a ticket! The upside is that this might be proof that I live in a very safe, crime-free neighborhood. The downside is that I might have a police officer stalking me. And the two tickets come with total fine of $50.

I wrote an appeal letter for these two tickets and mailed it that day. I figure it's worth a shot, right? I did have the renewed plates for my car. They were obtained and paid for the last full week in September. I just had not had a chance to put them on the car. I put them on the car that morning before I left work. So my argument against the Invalid Plates is that my car was never driven with expired plates. As for the invalid inspection, that's just completely bogus. You have to complete safety and emissions inspections in order to renew plates. That was done in August and the stickers were displayed in the lower left corner of the driver's side windshield. Right where they are supposed to be.

I included copies of all my inspection and renewal paperwork in my two appeal letters. I also included a picture of the plates and stickers on my car with a cellphone in the showing the time and date stamp.

It's been a week, and I have not heard back yet. Apparently the appeals review process is not as speedy and efficient as the citation issuing process. I'll let you know how it turns out.

Cereal...It's What's For Dinner

We had leftover night recently. I can't stand leftovers. I know it's the efficient, responsible, and frugal thing to eat leftovers, but I don't care. I just don't like them. But we had several things left over including steak, grilled chicken, and tacos. So it got to dinner time, and I asked Andrew what he wanted to eat. He grabbed his stool, pushed it over to the counter, reached up and said "Cereal". Even when he reaches up on his tippy toes from the top of the stool his hand is still like four feet away from the cabinet; it's cute and hilarious.

Cereal, huh? Okay. And then I thought about it for a second and realized we had leftover chocolate chip pancakes. Yum! So Andrew had cereal, chocolate chip pancakes, and veggie sausage (it's so good too) for dinner.

He looks pretty happy, don't you think? And I sucked it up and had leftover grilled chicken.

Our Living Room, The Train Station

The bridges are our latest addition. I just love them. Andrew does too.

Monkey See...Monkey Do

Andrew learned a new trick from a little girl at the park last night. Check out the pictures of him swinging on the bar at the top of the slide.

Joy of Bubbles

On Friday night near dusk, we went out to blow bubbles and had so much fun. Andrew doesn't make very many bubbles himself because he still kind of half spits / half blows into the wand. He sure had fun chasing them around the yard though.

The big bubble wand is awesome because it makes lots of bubbles just by shaking it. No blowing spit needed here.

I'm trying to help him get the wand close enough without licking it (yes, he did that) and showing him how to blow.

This might be my new favorite picture. The look on Andrew's face and the outstretched hand as he chases the bubble say so much to me about the pure fun and joy of childhood. I hope that life is like that for him today and every day of his future.

Snip, snip...cut, cut

Before...

During...

After...

As cute as his curly locks could be, they could also look a bit scraggly at times. It's good to be rid of the "baby mullet".

This Blog Has Not Been Abandoned

To paraphrase Mark Twain, the reports of this blog's abandonment are greatly exaggerated. (Thanks, Mr Purvis)

Wow, time flies. I can't believe it's already the middle of August, and that it has been more than a month since my last posting. We have been busy with lots of travel, work, and studying. In the interest of bringing you up to speed quickly, here are some July highlights.

July started off with a trip to a splash park and fountain at one of the larger city parks. Andrew has never been a big fan of the water so we were really surprised that he ran right in and spent lots of time playing. Later that weekend it was off to a local suburb to watch fireworks for the 4th of July. We got there early to find good seats and had to wait about 45 minutes for the show to start. I think Andrew was impressed - at least for the first minute. He said "boom" a couple of times and was then ready to go. I think he got scared that the booms kept coming. Once is nice; more than once not so much. Here's a pic of us waiting for the fun to start: glowsticks and all.

I had to attend a conference in Chicago. Susie and Andrew came along to visit family and friends and also play the part of tourists. It was great extended weekend despite the fact that I worked Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and Monday.

Andrew got to spend some time with his Great Grandma Lu. He's so serious in this picture. Must be because the book is about trains. Trains are serious business.

Here's Andrew waiting to watch the train with his Aunt Tammy and Uncle Ryan.

And here's Andrew driving the "Thomas the Train" down at Navy Pier. He did this twice and got to sit in the front seat both times. He loved it. I'm pretty sure he thought he was actually driving it.

Andrew with Lake Michigan behind him.

The last pictures are just crazy fun. And proof, I think, that Andrew is growing up into a little boy. A mischievous, wuddly little boy. We were making dinner one night when Andrew seemed a little too quiet. I walked into his room and found this.

He's having a great time. Gotta love it. Stay tuned. My next post won't be a month away.

All Aboard!

Yesterday morning we asked Andrew if he felt like going to see a "real train". He got so excited that he ran straight to the front door. So we headed out to a historic train station near our house where the Amtrak to and from Kansas City stops about four times a day. Susie had printed out the schedule last week so we knew when the train came through. We got to the station about thirty minutes early, and Andrew was easily occupied with all of the train models and books inside the station (first built on that site in 1863). He also liked going out on the platform and touching the train tracks.

As it turns out, we weren't the only parents who had brought their son to the station just to watch the train. There were two other boys there too. And one even bought the $11 ticket to take the 30-minute ride downtown with his dad. His mom and baby brother dropped them off at this station and were going to pick them up at the next one. That will be something we'll have to do next time.
Andrew, Susie, and the conductor. Do they still call them that? I really need to learn more about trains.

One thing I do know is that they do still say "All Aboard!" I think Andrew was a little scared of the train. It was pretty big and noisy. Plus the engine actually went through the station and blocked off the major street next to it. So for a good five minutes, the arm was down blocking traffice and the loud warning signal was going off.

After the train left the station and we waved goodbye, Andrew asked us where it had gone. We told him it had left for the next stop. His response: "I find!" Good luck, buddy. It will be back through in another four hours.

Magic House (Stay-Cation Part 2)

Here's another set of pictures from our recent Stay-Cation. This day we went to the Children's Museum in town. Lots of fun. Lots of kids. It's really an awesome place with everything desgined to be a hands on learning experience for the kids (and parents too).

Sliding down the beanstalk slide from the Jack and the Beanstalk story. This was part of their fairy tales section.

Driving a Caterpillar. Andrew loved it. He took at least three turns sitting up there playing with all the buttons and controls.

The hall of mirrors with four Andrews.

A look at us playing the bubble organ through the bubble tubes.

Museum of Transportation (Stay-Cation Part 1)

During the first week in June, we had a family stay-cation. We took the week off of work and just stayed home. We didn't pack up the bags or the car. Instead we just relaxed, spent time together, and played the part of tourists in our own town. Our first stop was the Museum of Trasportation, a place that I thought was going to be fairly boring. I was wrong. They had probably close to 40 full size train cars that you could walk around and climb into. They also had a nice air-conditioned (it was hot that day) museum with old cars and a Route 66 history. Andrew has just been into cars and just recently gotten into trains so he absolutely loved it.

Locomotive.

Caboose!

If it was blue, this one would totally be "The Little Engine That Could". It's the oldest engined they have - a wood burning locomotive from 1858.

This may have been Andrew's favorite part. I think he and Susie rode this train about five times.

With the engineer in between rides waiting for the next riders to be shuttled to the train.

Sprinkler Saturday

It was hotter than blue blazes this weekend - mid 90s and humid for most of the weekend. The heat didn't stop Andrew though. He was ready to get outside on Saturday moring. So at 9:30 we threw on swimming suits and got the sprinkler out to help us beat the heat. Yes, it was hot enought for the sprinkler that early.

Grandma Barb even took a few turns getting wet.

And she was wearing her clothes!

Dumpster Diving

Near the end of the walk a couple weeks ago, we spotted something in the alley sitting up next to the dumpster. It was a Little Tykes workbench that was in great condition except for a little dust, dirt, and cobwebs. It even had the plastic screws and nails. I think it must have come out of someone's garage or basement. Andrew immediately started reaching out of the stroller to get to it. After playing with it for a few minutes, we asked him if he wanted us to take it home. He giggled with excitement. So I picked it up and carried it on my shoulders for about 2 blocks to our house. A quick hose down once we got back in the yard, and it was ready to go.

BEFORE....

& AFTER