Anniversary Trip in iPhone pics

This past weekend Ryan and I went to St. Louis for a couple of nights just to have a mini-getaway before the baby comes and to celebrate our birthdays and anniversary (both of our birthdays and our anniversary occur within ten days!)

So Saturday morning we packed up some of Brynn's stuff, dropped her off at my parents house, and headed for St. Louis.  We didn't have much on the agenda except to relax and shop, and see a Cardinals game, which we hadn't bought tickets for yet.  Saturday night's game was almost sold out, and bleachers and standing room only were going for $40-$70 (crazy!) so we decided we'd just try to scalp tickets or figure out something there...on the way we found this deal online called "First Pitch Tickets".  Basically, the morning of every game at 9 am you can go to a certain gate at the stadium, and the first 275 people can buy a PAIR of tickets for only $11.20!  It's sponsored by the Cardinals radio station KMOX 1120, which is why that's the price...isn't that crazy!  TWO TICKETS for $11.20.  The kicker is that you don't know where your seats will be...they could be really good, or they could be standing room only.  Since it was just me and Ryan, we could care less where we sat...we just wanted to go to the game!  (You have to go to a certain gate 15 minutes before game time to pick up your tickets...they give them to you in a sealed envelope...you open them and find out where you are sitting!)  Since we didn't know about this before we left, we didn't get to the stadium until almost 11:30, and figured they'd be sold out for Saturday night's game...but to our surprise and excitement we got one of the last 15 pair of tickets!  WOOHOO!
-

Ryan came back to the car with this cool little piece of paper and our receipt...
I have NEVER been to a Cardinal's game that cheap!

We left the stadium and headed to the Galleria to do a little shopping and because we wanted to eat lunch at Cheesecake Factory...that is one of our favorite restaurants!  We decided to shop a little first, and right across from Cheesecake Factory is Anthropologie!  I LOVE that store, but I don't buy much there because it's so expensive.  Well, they were having their annual BIG summer sale so we headed in.  I love to go in there and window shop anyway...and they always have their back sale room I like to look in.  =)  I found a couple of cute shirts that were on MAJOR sale, and I think they will work as maternity or NOT maternity.  Ryan followed me toward the dressing room and was in heaven when he saw cupcakes and food and drinks!  He goes "I LOVE this store...you need to shop here more often!"  HA!  I said "I'd love to, but go pick me out a couple of cute dresses and check the price-tags on them!"  We saw several ADORABLE dresses and then I showed him that they were $178 apiece!   HA!  He was like "oh...gotcha!"  But I'm thinking that next time I'm in St. Louis shopping by myself I may just have to splurge and buy something and then tell him "oh, but it came from your favorite store!"

I am BAD about shopping by myself...I HAVE to have my sister with me,
and since she wasn't, I had to send her pictures of everything and say, "should
I get this?"  HA!

He may look serious and like he isn't having fun, but he kept looking at me
 and saying "this is awesome!"

I kept looking out my dressing room and seeing this...

• He was such a trooper and went with me to several stores!  Then we had lunch at Cheesecake Factory and met Jason and Sarah there, because they were in St. Louis for their anniversary too!  After some more shopping things started to go downhill...HA!
• We stopped at a Target and when we came out this guy was like "do you guys know you have a big nail sticking out of your back tire?"  GREAT...
• We then drove (on the nail tire) to check in to our hotel.  We had used Hot Wire to book a hotel room for Saturday and Sunday night.  Ryan wanted to just book a Drury, but I said "oh, it's an adventure...we'll just get the Hampton and that will be fine."  (Note to self...don't try to save money on a hotel ever again!)  We got a Days Inn instead of some of the nicer ones that were on the same "star rating" list and when we got there it was TERRIBLE.  There was no mattress pad, you could see through the thin sheets to the mattress, the air conditioner had been turned off and our room was about 85 degrees (not real fun for this preggo) and so it smelled musty and gross, the bathroom was nasty, etc.  I'm not usually super picky about stuff like that, but I could NOT SEE MYSELF relaxing and enjoying our anniversary trip in that room.  So even though Hot Wire is supposed to be non-refundable, Ryan called and was really nice to the lady and she was very nice back and refunded our money.  She asked if she could help us find a different room and we naively (it was about 5 pm on a Saturday night) said that we would just find one ourselves.  Mistake...
• We drove to the Cardinals game, but it started pouring.  We ran through the rain to get to the stadium and get our tickets...guess what?  Standing room only!  YAY!  (Not...)  But at $11.20 I couldn't really complain...we ran up to the very top of the stadium to wait out the rain delay.
• We started calling a bunch of places to book a room for that night and it was the most bizarre thing ever...we couldn't find a room to SAVE OUR LIVES.   We spend the entire hour and a half rain delay calling every drury, hampton, hilton, etc. within a 30 mile radius of St. Louis.   The poor people sitting in front of us probably thought we were CRAZY because all they could hear was us saying "do you have any availability for tonight?" like 500 times.  At one point a lady told me she found a hotel, but it was $300 for ONE night and we weren't doing that.  I kid you not, I was looking up hotels in Edwardsville, IL (45 minutes from St. Louis) because we were so desperate.  It started out funny and then we would look at each other and be like "this is getting serious, huh?"  HA!
• FINALLY (during the National Anthem no less) this guy found a Pear Tree Inn at Union Station (right near downtown)...I seriously think God opened that up because I think they had just had a cancellation!  We enjoyed the game (and delicious hot dogs and stadium nachos!) and even ran into one of our best friends from college and his wife (who live in Springfield!).  

This was right after we FINALLY found a hotel room! Thank you Lord!

After the game we drove to the hotel and it was SO NICE...I can't even tell you the difference between that and the other hotel!

We could even see the Arch from our eleventh floor window!

Sunday morning (our SIX YEAR ANNIVERSARY)  we woke up and got a couple of cute pictures from my parents, who were getting ready to take Brynn to church.  Clearly she was having the time of her life, and wasn't missing us a bit...and we wouldn't have it any other way!  I love knowing that when we are gone, she is so loved and cared for and having such a blast...I think my parents took her swimming in their neighbors pool about four times in two days!



After breakfast we decided to pick up the $11.20 Cardinals tickets again for that night...how could we pass that up?  Then we went shopping at Babies R Us, to the mall to look at maternity clothes and some sporting/cycling stuff for Ryan, and then met his parents (and Jason and Sarah again) at lunch...how bizarre that we were all in St. Louis the same day?   His parents were in town for one of their friends surprise birthday parties later that day.

We went back to the hotel that afternoon and relaxed and read, and then headed to a fun anniversary dinner at LoRusso's Italian (on the hill).  It was AWESOME...and I would highly recommend it!

I love CARBS and they brought out this basket with three different kinds of bread!
My kind of place!

It wasn't really even supposed to rain that day, but when we left to go to the Cardinals game it was POURING...like a torrential downpour!  So we headed to Ted Drewes which was right nearby and got some custard for the drive back to the hotel.


We had filled up the tire with air a couple of times, but it had to be changed before we could keep driving on it, so since we had plenty of time before the game (there ended up being a 3 hour rain delay) we hung out in the parking garage and I got a tutorial on how to change a tire.  HA!  Can I just say I was pretty proud of myself for being a trooper and hanging out with Ryan while he did this...I really wanted to go up and lay in the hotel bed but I pushed through!

He wasn't a bad view...

Seriously, where do guys learn this stuff?

I didn't think the game was going to happen because the weather looked so bad...but they FINALLY announced that the game would start at 10.  Since Ryan's birthday was the next day, I figured it would be fun to ring in his 31st birthday at the ballpark.  So we headed to the stadium at 10 pm!  It's really funny what you do without kids around!

Ryan was SO EXCITED when they announced the game was ON...he struck this
pose for me to send to Lindsey and Curt (who we had been talking to).

Our tickets were AWESOME for this game!

Yes, I look a little tired..this was about 12:15 when we realized it was Ryan's birthday!

Despite all these crazy things, we had an ABSOLUTE blast during the entire weekend.  We just rolled with everything, and laughed through it all.  I am so thankful to be celebrating 6 wonderful years with Ryan and am so blessed that God put us together!