Conversation heard in the house today....

Heard from upstairs
Maggie: OOH. That's disgusting
Me: Ben, stop showing Maggie pictures of brains
Ben: I wasn't
Me: Then why is she saying that's disgusting?
Ben: She looked in the mirror.....

Now we are up to 119

 I took the kids to the City Museum yesterday.  Being the evil mother that I am, I took the route that passed by 2 cakes.  First, we got Harris Stowe State University, founded in 1857.  I wanted to get this one because I got my U.S. citizenship there

 Then we got the cake at Jefferson Bank and Trust, which was founded in 1892

 Today I went to work for a while and afterwards I ran down to Lafayette Square where I got the Lafayette Park cake (I like the Happy Birthday banner in the background)....

 ...and the Lafayette Square Plaza cake 

I was on my way home and realized I was close to Ameren (they electrified the 1904 World's Fair).  They had both cakes together, I was so glad I went there

I really would like to get 125 before the end of the year if possible

Christmas Day 2014

Christmas Day always makes me realize how much the kids have changed in the past year. Running to the Dollar Store and picking up a bunch of cheap things to wrap has definitely gone out of vogue and is not an option any more. Sam, Ben and I had already got things that could be classed as Christmas gifts already, so it was all about Maggie this year.  Maggie still believes in Santa, so Ben has been very good at trying to keep her believing.  It is still fairly easy to buy things for Maggie and this year it was a lot of How To Train Your Dragon and Frozen-related stuff.  Luckily (?), Disney is happy to part you from your money in the quest to make your children happy.   

Ben and Maggie insisted on sleeping together.  Not sure if that meant they would be up earlier or not, but they were up at 6:30.  I think Maggie was as excited as Ben this year, she finally got there....

By the time I got out of bed, they had the presents distributed and Maggie was tearing into the paper.  Maggie had by far the most presents to open and she didn't waste any time

Ben managed to pace himself a little bit

Caroline also stayed over so that she could be up in time to see the present opening ritual.  She looks like she's thinking that wasn't such a good idea!!!

Richard is staying out of it and watching from a safe distance

How could we do Christmas without the mustache mints????

After the present opening frenzy, we did a bacon cook-off and compared our usual Trader Joe's bacon to some Danish bacon that we got at Costco.  I'm not sure what the overall verdict was, but I know Caroline liked the subtle taste of the Danish.  I think I still like TJ best.  There is a lot more fat comes out of TJ bacon, so Danish is much leaner.....

Jan and Julie came over around noon.  They were flying to Tucson at 5, so couldn't come for dinner this year.   As usual, they found some very interesting gifts for Ben and Maggie.
Caroline wanted to cook the turkey this year, so I took a back seat and spent most of the day cleaning up!!!!  We went for a quick walk around 2 and then finished dinner preparations.

Arline came round for a short visit after dinner, so we had a full day.  Another successful Christmas gone by....

Christmas eve with the Bosch family 2014

Caroline and I made mince pies on Tuesday.  They were supposed to be for Christmas Eve, but were all eaten before then!!!  I'm pretty hopeless at making pastry, but these came out OK

Christmas Eve was at our house this year.  Milly and Rich were in town for Christmas, so we had quite a houseful (by our standards).  I forgot to take any pictures so had to rely on Ben for most of these.  For some reason, people ended up on the stairs (lack of chairs perhaps?).  Rich is not looking too happy!!!!

Caroline and Ben are best of buddies!!!

and so are Caroline and Jane

Here, we have Maggie in the picture with us

The night got sillier as it went on (lots of alcohol flowing and food eaten).  Anne and Sam decided to wear the wrapping paraphernalia 

Then they went into the Greta selfie pose......

Another successful Christmas Eve get together accomplished

Winter break 2014

I bought some Groupons for use over Winter break, one of them was for Incredible Pizza.  We went on Monday, the first day off school.  Wow, that place is a rip-off, but the kids absolutely loved it.  It was an expensive day, but worth it to see them happy.  They spent most of their time in the laser tag room.  Ben loved it because he won most of the time!!!  They look serious....

Milly and Rich were arriving on Tuesday, so Ben didn't want to go too far from home.  I did manage to get them out to get some last minute shopping done.  Ben found this in Pier One, I suspect it's a Christmas decoration, but it looks good on his head....

We went to Global Market, looking for After Eights, but we didn't find any.  After driving to Kirkwood, we got the last 2 cakes there that we hadn't got already.  The first one was Kirkwood Train Station.

Then we got The Magic House.  Note that Maggie is wearing T shirt and shorts and it's December (actually wasn't that warm, but not too bad)

Maggie and I went to the Galleria to look for a last minute present for Sam.  She insisted on sushi

Caroline and I made some mince pies for dinner, she is forcing me to practice making pastry!!!!

Yes, another two....

We got the Brown Shoe Company cake tonight. Our #110. Wish it hadn't been dark because the shoe in the background is really cool and you can't see the cake at all

We had gone over there to see the Golden Cake.  It travels around and was the prototype used to make all the others.  Maggie got to hold it.  #111

Our biggest cake outing to date-17 cakes!!!!

 June and Maddie joined us today and we went down town to get some cakes.  There are a lot there, so I was hoping to get 21 of them.  We weren't quite that successful, but we did get 17 of them.  We parked by Kiener Plaza and this was our first cake, our #93.  Kiener Plaza was named for 1904 Olympic track team member Harry Kiener

 It was just a quick walk up Market St to get our next cake at City Garden.  This was opened in 2009 and is a really good space with 24 sculptures.  It is at its best in the Spring/Summer of course, but there is always something there to see

 St. Louis City Hall was #3 of the day.  The building was completed in 1904 and was inspired by City Hall in Paris

 Peabody Opera House was our next cake

 The Campbell House Museum was our next cake, built in 1851 as the first house in Lucas Place.  It is an impressive building

 By the time we got to St. Louis Public Library, the girls were getting thirsty, so we went in to find a water fountain.  I am so glad we went inside.  The building is fantastic and we found a really nice little cafe on the ground floor.  We will definitely go back and explore this building, I just spent the last 30 minutes reading about it

I even got a free book when I was in the library.  They had pre-publication books on the tables and this one sounded interesting to me

 After refreshment, on to more cakes.....Next was Christ Church Cathedral, I like this cake because of the stained glass effect.  It was established in 1819 as the first Episcopal congregation west of the Mississippi

This is our #100!!!!!  The Old Post Office.  Since we will never get anywhere near all 250 cakes, I think this will stand as our "achievement cake"  June insisted I was in the picture for this one

 We found the Walking Figure on a side street.  I like it!!!!

 The Wainwright Building is among the first skyscrapers in the world.  We thought the cake was a little boring until we realized the design on it is exactly the same as the frieze at the top of the building.  There are so many really cool buildings in St Louis and a lot more that were lost to demolition because no one cared enough about them

 This is about the happiest the Glum Twins looked all day!!!!  This is at the Hilton near the Ballpark.  Fort San Carlos, site of the only Revolutionary War battle fought west of the Mississippi (the British lost!!!)

 Maggie and Maddie are still smiling as we got the cake outside the Drury Plaza at the Arch

 This is their "Tie Dye Cake" at the Old Courthouse.  We saw this one when we were driving around looking for a parking spot and they were looking forward to it.  It has chains around it to represent the Dred Scott ruling and the slavery history in the area

 Old Cathedral, or Basilica of Saint Louis, King of France

 We finally made it to the Arch!!!!

 We met this lady who got her #250 at the Arch today!!  I took this picture for her

Under Ead's Bridge MetroLink station (do you get the impression they have had enough by this point???!!!)

 WHY is the Laclede's Landing cake suspended this high up?????

 Finally, our 17th cake of the cake and our #109.  Missouri Athletic Club.  This was opened in 1903 and housed dignitaries and athletes for the 1904 Worlds Fair and Olympics.

Quite a full afternoon.  The girls were really great, we walked a long way, it was pretty chilly and we took a lot of pictures.  Maddie is NEVER going to go anywhere with me again!!!!