A Good Investment

I took the kids to McDonald's the other day and was surprised to see that Beanie Babies were the Happy Meal Toy. Are Beanie Babies making a comeback? Why was I not notified?

Circa 1997, I was obsessed with getting the entire collection of McDonald's Beanie Babies (10 at the time). I accomplished this lofty goal and turned a little profit. I would like to remind Colleen about our one hour drive to sell said McDonald's Beanie Babies collection. Shameful, but true, a woman paid me $375.00 in cash for this collection.

I also acquired several others including Tabasco the Bull, which at the time was going for a pretty penny. I was careful not to damage the tags and I kept them all in excellent condition. My reasoning for jumping on this bandwagon???? My words were, "It was a good investment." Ironic, considering Daryl works as a financial advisor now.

Fastforward to my trip to McDonald's with the kids this week... when I opened the plastic package to give Reese and Aidan their Beanie Babies, Reese immediately want to rip that little heart tag right off. My first instinct? NO, NOT THE TAG! Then I realized that these little bean creatures are worthless. Go ahead Reese, pull that tag right off, and she did.

If Aidan got married today...

This would be his cake.

My apologies to the future Mrs. Aidan Gourley.

Country Mouse Meets City Mouse

It is always a treat when my sister-in-law Natalie comes to visit with her family. We love spending time with them, and we really love giving them a taste of our city life. It amazes Natalie how much downtown has to offer and how much it continues to change each time she visits. She even got a little choked up this visit thinking about how much she loves St. Louis and how it is homebase for their family. This visit she brought Tim's sister and her husband, who also live in Tennessee. Tim took them to visit the Arch for the day. Daryl and Guy packed their sketch books and pencils and rode bikes to the art museum. I was excited to take everyone else to the City Garden.

The kids had a great time playing in the water features and jumping on this piece of art that makes music when you jump on the pallets.

Natalie and Reese on a rock in one of the fountains. Mimi and Pappy are keeping an eye on Aidan and Levi who are swimming in the same fountain.

A photo op of the kids at Kiener Plaza.

Aidan and Levi at the fountain in Kiener Plaza.

The boys at Ted Drewes.
Enjoying some sweet family time at Ted Drewes.

Reese hearts Ted Drewes. We could not get this cup away from her.

It was so great to visit with Natalie & company. They will be coming back in a few weeks and we can't wait to see them again! We love you!

Happy Birthday Reese!

Reese turned two years old last weekend and we had a summer themed birthday party. The party included pool time (although it was the one summer weekend in St. Louis that was lower than 90 degrees), hamburger shaped sweets made out of frosting, fresh fruit, hot dogs, and of course cake! Reese loved her cake and thought everything, including the candle was edible. I think she would have eaten the whole candle if I didn't stop her.


Snap shots of the decor. Clockwise - close up of the delicious cake, fruit slices favor for the guests, the birthday girl, the invitation, hamburgers (frosting and nilla wafers), the cake.

So many of Reese's friends and family came to her party. We had so much fun playing with our friends. These are our downtown friends Matt, Evie and Noah Stark. We got to watch Noah attempt to walk. This kid will be walking any day now and he is not even one year old yet.





Reese got so many nice gifts! The present opening session was almost brought to a complete halt when the first present opened was a Cinderella book. It was almost impossible to get Reese's attention after this very special present.

Reese shared her new toys with her cousin, Jameson.

Levi, Aidan and Max played in the sandbox.


Lisa and Finnigan. A rare moment that Finni has a flower in her hair. She only lets me do her hair and Lisa wishes I would come over every morning and put matching bows or flowers in her hair. What can I say, I have the magic touch. I could be Finni's personal stylist.

Reese and Oliver shared their first kiss. We thought it would be cute if they kissed but then they didn't want to stop. So cute.

All Stars

Last week, downtown St. Louis was buzzing with all the activities surrounding the MLB All Star Game.  Tons of tourists and lots to do.  The Playboy Party was at the club across the street from our loft on Monday night and the music was so loud we could hear every word of the songs.  We didn't exactly enjoy this party.  The entire Gourley family was awaken by the "thump, thump" of the music at some point during the night and some of us never really got to sleep (this included the dogs).  Thanks, Heff.

We had so much fun at the Sheryl Crow concert (see The First Rule of Fight Club post). 

The day of the All Star Game Aidan went to daycare in his NY Yankees gear and Reese dressed in her St. Louis Cardinals dress.  They were so cute!  

Later that day, Evie and I decided to take Aidan, Reese and her son, Noah to the Stadium to try to at least see the first pitch from the gates.  We joined the crowd and tried to get a good spot to be able to watch on the tv screens that are in the stadium.  I took turns holding up Aidan and then Reese so that they could see what was going on.  

A Cardinals fan gave Noah and Aidan one of those foam fingers.  The Cardinals fan thought Aidan was the coolest until he saw his Yankees T-shirt and hat.  Sorry buddy, my little man was born in New York.  He likes the Cardinals, but his heart belongs to the Yankees.

Happy 35th Birthday Daryl

Doesn't this look like Aidan?

Daryl at around 10 years old. Nice velour sweater and fake Rolex watch.

Daryl and his Camaro. He used to pick up the ladies in this hot rod. You can almost hear REO Speedwagon playing in the background, can't you?

Daryl and the kids now.

Today is Daryl's 35th birthday. In honor of that, here are 35 things that I love about him.

1. He is just so handsome.
2. He loves and respects his parents.
3. He gave me two of the most amazing children ever!
4. He loves city living.
5. He claims to hate soda, but will steal a sip or 10 from me anytime.
6. When he packs his suitcase, he rolls his clothes.
7. It takes him 45 minutes to get ready, but according to him, he will be ready in 5 minutes.
8. He still holds the door open for me
9. He is an amazing artist – he paints, sculpts and draws
10. He brought me to New York
11. He will tell me if something looks bad on me
12. He is 4 years older than I am
13. He no longer gets upset when I fall asleep during movies.
14. I love his signature. It took him years to perfect it.
15. He still has a t-shirt from Germantown High School. He wears it sometimes even though it is falling apart.
16. He knows dates and places of all the wars and other random history facts
17. He reads my People and Us Weekly magazines and has beat me many, many times in Pop Culture Quizzes.
18. He changes "code brown" diapers.
19. He taught Aidan to say "drop a duce!"
20. He makes up his own lyrics to songs. Aidan is following in his footsteps.
21. He eats all the cookie dough pieces out of the ice cream and then leaves the rest for me. (This one should probably be on a different list)
22. His shoes are always shined and his belt always matches his shoes – thank you Grandpa Roam and the Marines Corp.
23. He smacks my bottom whenever he gets a chance, which is usually at a totally inappropriate time.
24. He paints and draws with Aidan & Reese.
25. He teaches Aidan how to wrestle, even though Aidan will play soccer and baseball.
26. He stirs his coffee with a butter knife, not a spoon.
27. He loves to ride motorcycles and does not pressure me to ride with him because he knows that will never happen.
28. For the sake of our marriage, he is slowly trying to get sushi back into his diet after an unfortunate incident at I HEART MR. SUSHI.
29. He calls or sends me a text just to tell me how much he loves me at random times.
30. He loves to dance at weddings
31. He can do the "worm." He almost broke his nose at Adam & Jen Berton's wedding, but did not retire "the worm."
32. He introduced me to two of my very good friends, Melissa and Evie
33. He loves his nephews and my nephews and makes it a point to spend time with them when we can
34. He holds my hand
35. He loves me for who I am

Happy Birthday, Baby. I love you!

Oops, I did it again...

Reese peed on the potty on Sunday, TWICE! She looked a me in disbelief the first time it happened, then looked in the potty, and then said "Mama, I did it!"

My baby will be two years old this Sunday and she wants to use the potty already. I don't know if I'm ready for this!

She's so tiny, I have two fears -

1. she will fall in all public toliets because although "baby got back" - in proportion, she is still tiny.

2. they do not make underware, big girl pants, panties (whatever you want to call them) in a small enough size - see #1.

I'm not ready for the Potty Party Boot Camp just yet, but let's see what happens. Princess Reese always does things her own way so anything can happen. Stay tuned.