Baptismal Anniversary and Vacation Agenda

Today is Mike's Baptismal Anniversary!

What? You don't know what I am talking about?

Well, in our family we celebrate birthdays just like everyone else does. We ALSO celebrate baptismal anniversaries. In fact, we think the day we were baptized into God's family is even more important than the day we were born. It is a day when we celebrate God giving us new life as Christians, forgiving our sins and making us fresh and clean. It is a seriously paramount event!

Seriously paramount or not, we have some fun with it. We try to find gifts that really have nothing to do with baptism, but give them some kind of religious meaning. For instance, one year Mike gave me a sprinkler. That was kind of funny because we had many discussions about baptism, should it be by immersion or sprinkling?  Another year I gave him a package of three pairs of undershorts. It's obvious, isn't it? Three for the Trinity (Father, Son  and Holy Spirit.... central to Christianity) and white to resemble the purity we achieve through the forgiveness of our sins. 

I struggled a bit with a gift idea this year but I came up with three...again, representing the Trinity. 

So, new LIFE given by the DIVINE gives us a HEAVENLY hope for eternal joy (oh shoot, I should have added an Almond Joy Bar) with him!

Ha ha ha!  I'm so clever.... or pitiful, depending on your point of view.

Now, I've not forgotten that I have oodles of vacation stuff to tell you. First, I want to document our agenda. You likely don't care what we did day by day but I'm afraid if I don't document it, I will forget something later on. So...

Wednesday April 23 - We drove to Denver, stopping in Cheyenne to wander around the mall a bit. Mostly we were killing time so we didn't arrive in Denver during rush hour traffic.

Thursday - We flew out of Denver, arriving in St. Louis early afternoon. We bought tickets on MetroLink (light rail) for a week of rides on their train/bus system. We enjoyed a full week of no worries about driving or parking a car!   We ate at Mike Shannon's (he used to be a Cardinal player then announcer). We'd eaten there on previous trips and remembered it to be a family type of restaurant, casual and moderately priced. It was loaded with memorabilia and was really a baseball museum. It was fun to wander around and see all the things on the walls. When we entered this time, it all felt different. It was very upscale and  the menu pricing was very, very different. The food was delicious but we both felt it was all wrong. Finally, we asked. It turns out that the restaurant we remembered had burned and the new Mike Shannon's was a very different kind of restaurant. It was nice but we felt kind of sad. We shook it off, though and then we attended a Blues Game that evening.  They won! Mike smiled! 

Friday we went to Union Station, an old train yard turned mall. Later we walked down to the Arch but the lines were long so we moved on to LeClede's Landing. Then, we went to tour the Edward Jones Dome (where the St. Louis Rams play during football season) and ended up at a Robotics Competition. MORE ABOUT THAT LATER! Friday evening we attended a Cardinal's Baseball Game, the first of 5.  MORE ABOUT CARDINALS LATER!

Saturday we went for a long walk, in the rain, to tour the Campbell House. When we got there they said their staff needed a lunch break and could we please return in an hour. Seriously? We'd checked ahead and their site said they were open but oh well, we'd only walked an hour or so in the rain to get there. We went back to Union Station and then later attended another Cardinals game in the rain....brrrr...MORE ABOUT THAT LATER AS WELL. Saturday evening Mike went to another Blues game, which they won. He's happy that they are now in the playoffs. I met with a friend I'd never met before. Yes, you read that right. MORE ABOUT THAT LATER.

Sunday, we walked to a bar and went to church in the basement. DEFINITELY MORE ABOUT THAT LATER! Sunday afternoon, you guessed it, another Cardinals game.  Sunday evening I think was when I went swimming in the pool featured in the movie, UP IN AIR. I didn't see George Clooney there, though. Mike rested as he wasn't feeling great...head cold.

Monday we toured Busch Stadium. Yep, MORE ON THAT LATER. Later we toured the ARCH, definitely more on that later. After the ARCH we toured an old courthouse that had some interesting history. I'll tell you more about that later as well. Monday night was another Cardinals Game.

Tuesday we rode a trolley to tour City Museum. That was one of the weirdest places EVER! You'll hear about it again as well. I took MetroLink back to Union Station while Mike rested, still not feeling great. We attended another Cardinals Game that evening. Yadier Molina batted a ball right to me. More about that later as well!

Wednesday we rode MetroLink back to the airport. It was a hot day!

After some delays, we returned to Denver. It was a cold day! Due to bad roads and accidents all over Denver, we stayed another night and drove the 4 hours to home the next day.