Spooky, Awkward and Amazing.....

You meet the cutest and sweetest folks when travelling the loop.  We arrived at Grafton, IL, the day before Hallowe'en along with several, slower boats whom we play leap frog with along this adventure.  They were so concerned that the Lttles wouldn't have a wonderful hallowe'en that each of them found some sort of candy for the kiddos.  Many thanks to the Andros, Lorna and Irv, and the sailboat with the wood stove (whaaa?  yep.  It smelled soooo welcoming).  They were all so so sweet and made sure that the Littles had some candy from each of them  Not only that, but the owner of the marina at Grafton heard that we had Littles aboard and insisted that we have their courtesy car for Hallowe'en night and pulled two large goodie bags out of her purse when I showed up at the Marina shop on Hallowe'en morning.  Thanks Jan, you're a peach.

we did a little decorating... 

Anyhoo, we ended up sharing the car that day with a nice couple since we were all headed to Walmart. As we were walking to the parking lot,  I headed to the nice black passenger van and our new friend Lorna started to giggle; "nope, not that one. It's *that" one". It was big, boxy, a faded maroon, and quite possibly from the set of "that 70's show".  I expected to find shag carpeting inside, but instead found the ceiling upholstery falling down and holes in the floor such that you could see the roadway passing by. 

the luxe courtesy car.

Tess leaned over to me and said "Momma, their car is really dirty". We all had a good laugh and explained to her that it wasn't Lorna and Irv's car, that we were all just borrowing it. And yes, it was really dirty. 

This isn't a plug; I'm simultaneously showing off and reassuring most of you that yes, we do take safety precautions.   Look at these awesome car seats we found at Target.com. I put one next to my iPad mini for perspective. Great for travel, Uber, etc! Gotta keep the Littles safe! Not comfortable enough for long trips, but when faced with "courtesy cars" you'll be glad you have them. 

Let's talk about this courtesy car a little more. I don't mean to be ungrateful because everyone at the Grafton Marina was  very nice and we didn't have to deal with Uber (which actually might not exist in this neck of the woods). Jan suggested we take the car for trick or treating as the roads were narrow, it was cold and all the houses were a little ways away. Guys. Here we are on Halloween in this creeper van driving slowly though neighborhoods teeming with small children. I was sort of mortified and worried we were going to have the cops called on us! 

The Littles didn't care we were in a creeper van.  They had a wonderful time and scored huge pails of candy (oh, and yes, I had thought ahead enough to pack their costumes and candy buckets from home).  Then Todd surprised us with a "haunted dinner". Apparently the hotel in town ("Abigail's") had seen some shady characters in it's history (Al Capone was one example) and had experienced some unanticipated checkouts. After dinner, we were given a tour and told of a girl ghost named Abigail who supposedly would run in the halls, would frequently move objects and give some folks the sensation of having someone play with their hair or touch them in the middle of the night. Tess didn't want to leave until she found Abigail. Maybe next time. 

The next day we pried our frozen ropes off the docks and headed to Alton. These two stops were not very far apart at all but Alton had rental cars and we were planning something big. Our neighbors at home, the Graetz family, had told us that they loved a museum in St. Louis and that we absolutely had to go. This was confirmed by the Littles' godfather "Wob". 

St Louis has no Marina at all despite being on both the Missouri and Mississippi Rivers. There's a good reason for that, but that's for later.   If you want to be the best parent ever, take your children here for a long weekend. Seriously. Do it. https://www.citymuseum.org/. Tickets are only $21 for the day, they are open until midnight and it is utterly amazing. Take flashlights - the kind you can wear on your head are even better. Why? Because from the moment you walk in, you will be climbing and crawling through structures and in tunnels and loving every moment. I can't express how wonderful, amazing and astonishing this place is. We were spellbound. Art really makes one happy, doesn't it?

Be prepared... Adults don't always fit in the spaces...I wrote my phone number on the kids' wrists!! There were tunnels that went short distances, but some were long and hid slides that went a few stories! 

yep. I really don't love heights, and this was on the roof of the building!! Someone had to follow Ryder.  But I just couldn't bring myself to do this next one:

there are just so many awesome photos!!

Please try to go.  You won't be disappointed, we promise!! And, bonus, we didn't lose anyone!