Find Treasure! at the Pirate Scarefest (Oct. 27)

Such a bummer of a week — not only is it raining (again), but it’s the final week of the year for the Children’s Garden at the Missouri Botanical Garden, for the rooftop at City Museum, and for the corn mazes and other assorted Halloween activities we’ve been indulging in recently.

It’s a good time to introduce the kids to something fun that’ll last into the new year … like the Treasure! exhibit at the Missouri History Museum, now through Jan. 3, 2010. Tomorrow (Oct. 27) residents of St. Louis City and County receive free admission to the exhibit as part of the museum’s  Halloween Pirate Scarefest, a free evening of storytelling, activities, costumes and, yes, candy for the younger set. Party like a pirate from 6 to 8 p.m. — and learn about every form of treasure, from sunken ships to attic stashes.

Everything boo-tiful (now until Oct. 31)

Hey, we can see the sun today!  Woohoo!  And here I am at the computer … but I’m getting outside to work in the yard as soon as I remind you that Boo at the Zoo is on from now until Oct. 30. It’s a very non-scary, low-sugar-content nighttime option for little kids.  And yes, I know some boys M.’s age are going to The Darkness, and you can call me a mean mom all you want, but he’s not heading for any haunted houses this year.  Plenty of time for that when he’s a teenager — and can go without me!

I’m going to have to wrestle S. into a costume for the $1 discount off the $5 non-member admission (ages 2 to 12 only; kids under 2 are free).  Parking in the south lot is free, and the entrance is on the east end of the turnstiles nearest that lot.  Hours are 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. nightly.

Another little-kid-oriented Halloween event that started Friday night is Purina Farms’ Haunted Hayloft. It’s free (parking is $5 per car) on this weekend and next (Oct. 17, 18, 23, 24 and 25) at the Gray Summit exit of Interstate 44 West. There’ll be dog shows, hayrides, milking demos and magic shows by the International Brotherhood of Magicians. Hours are 4:30-8:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday and 3:30-7 p.m. Sunday.

If your kids are older and you’re looking for alternatives to The Darkness, check out one of these online Halloween event aggregators:

Kids in St. Louis

Parents Connect

Stltoday.com

Fox 2 News

Or if you’re the one looking for Halloween events:

Metromix

Riverfront Times

Missouri’s largest paint-by-numbers (Oct. 16)

Tailgating at yesterday’s Rams-Vikings game was an absolute blast — I had fond memories of such Sunday mornings in the pre-kids days, but this was the first time we accepted the challenging of bringing them along, and they did us proud. M. wanted his photo taken with the craziest Vikings fans he could find — good thing for him the place was crawling with ‘em! — and S. held off his nap until the start of the fourth quarter, when the game was all but over for the Rams anyway.

M. and I made up the menu together, and I have to give him credit for the best dyed egg idea I’ve seen in a long time: footballs and pumpkins. They were so cute that both boys actu ally ATE the eggs at the tailgate party. That would have never happened at home — in fact, when I tried to replicate the feat again this morning with the leftover eggs, they were like, “Don’t think so, Mom!”

It felt like a perfect way to kick off fall and officially start focusing more on indoor events, starting with a Paint-By-Numbers event I’ve written about in the past but that’s still among my favorites. The fundraiser for SCOSAG, the arts center for kids in Tower Grove Park, is Friday (Oct. 16) at Mad Art Gallery in Soulard. This year they’re shooting to make the biggest paint-by-numbers mural in Missouri. I can’t tell you what the picture will be, but you can see past murals here.

Tickets ($5 for adults, $3 for kids 12 and under) can be purchased in advance at SCOSAG or Mad Art Gallery, but we’ve had good luck simply purchasing them at the door. We typically go when it opens at 6 p.m. and pack up around bedtime, when things are starting to get a little rowdier anyway.  There’s a cash bar, but snacks and live music are free with the price of admission.

Trains, schools and a bit of everything this weekend (Oct. 8-11)

Today’s e-mail yielded several ideas for the weekend — love it when that happens! They included:

• The FallFest in Glen Carbon, Edwardsville and Southwest Illinois University-Edwardsville.  The communities are pulling out all the stops — I don’t remember ever seeing such a wide range of activities at so many businesses and locations on one slate.  Ghost talks, night bike rides, BBQ and blues, soccer, firehouse tours, storytelling, face painting, classic cars and “unique” vehicles … and tons more, on the Web site’s “Family” section, not to mention all the others] categories of events.  It runs Thursday through Saturday (Oct. 8 to 10).
• St. Louis Kids Magazine (of which I’m contributing editor) is hosting an education expo on Saturday (Oct. 10) in Webster Groves. I’m not intimately involved in planning it, and thus can take no credit for the wide range of schools and other organizations that will have booths there. As we’re going into the height of open house season for independent schools, I expect the expo to be particularly helpful for that.  It runs from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. in the community center; the site has more details.
• The Greater St. Louis Metro Area Train Show is happening just down the road, in Kirkwood. A $5 admission fee (free for kids 12 and under when accompanied by an adult) gets you in both Saturday and Sunday (Oct. 10-11) for a sale and swap and demo of all gauges, though the event is sponsored by the Mississippi Valley N Scalers. For the location, check the online flyer, which also has a number to call for more info.

Three good bets for the weekend (Oct. 2-4)

Our calendar is blissfully open this weekend, which means I’m happily debating the merits of various festivals … like the Morgan Ford in Motion event on Saturday (Oct. 3) at Morgan Ford and Juniata in South City from noon until 9 p.m. Six bands will play, ranging from pop to jazz and blues, and there’ll be food, art, etc.  A good, typical neighborhood festival that’s not too far from the house.

Or we may jump in the car Saturday (Oct. 3) for the Route 66 Festival on the Old Chain of Rocks Bridge, always one of my favorite venues, for classic cars and motorcycles plus live music on the Missouri side and a beer garden on the Illinois side.  Those crafty folks at Trailnet know how to get visitors to cross the bridge!  Actually, because parking on the Missouri side will set you back $5, unless you take the free shuttle from St. Louis Welcome Center at Riverview and Interstate 270, it’s a better idea to park on the Illinois side for free. It can be tricky to find it because the signs are not terribly helpful. The best I can tell you is to turn west off Route 3 at Hardees and go as far straight ahead as you possibly can, ignoring all signage about closed roads and the like. The festival runs from 11 a.m. to 6:30 p.m., and food is available on both ends of the bridge.

Finally, there’s the Taste of St. Louis downtown from Friday to Sunday (Oct. 2-4). It’s a free event to enter, but of course you’ll want to buy food — that’s the whole point.  There’s also lots of music, including a new international section this year. It’s at Soldiers Memorial (12th and Market), and I recommend going Friday for supper to miss the bulk of the 300,000-strong crowds that will be there Saturday and Sunday.

A classic for the end of summer (Sept. 25)

After coming off a long weekend — M. was off school Friday and we did indeed spend the day setting up a campsite, as I mentioned in my last post! — I’m finding it to be a thoroughly Mondayish start to the week!  Consequently, I’m looking forward to the weekend, where there are a gazillion things I want to do, starting on Friday night (Sept. 25) with the End of the Summer Party in Olivette, when Willy Wonka and The Chocolate Factory will be on the screen.  Yes, the classic 1971 version, not the 2005 remake with Charlie in the title. There are also inflatibles and free pony rides, plus video games on the big screen (this is getting to be quite the popular passtime at outdoor movies — next summer Frontyard Features is even doing a summerlong tournament around them). You can buy concessions or BYO, and don’t forget chairs and/or blankets. Things get underway in Stacy Park at 5 p.m., and the movie starts at 7:30 p.m. For details, call the city’s parks and recreation department at 314.991.1249.

Children’s laughter, gunfire and privations (Sept. 19-20)

So we made a snap decision to try to go camping this weekend, which we know from past experience is not a good idea.  St. Louis has too many camping enthusiasts — well, too many who’re more well-organized than I am and have made their reservations more than two days in advance!  So I’m on the Boy Scouts’ homepage, checking out their excellent “Where To Go Camping” handbook. Here’s a link to the section that includes campground info for Missouri, plus those in nearby counties of Illinois, Arkansas, Tennessee and Kentucky.

We’d ideally like to be somewhere not overly far from Chesterfield, where M. has a German dance performance during Strassenfest at 2 p.m. on Sunday (Sept. 20). I also wouldn’t mind checking out Pioneer Days at the Historic Daniel Boone Home in Defiance on Saturday and Sunday (Sept. 19 and 20).  Admission to that is $7 for adults, $6 for seniors, $4 for kids ages 4 to 11. You just have to love a festival that promises “sounds of music, artisans at work, children’s laughter and gunfire fill the air.”

I always marvel at anyone wanting to imitate life in pre-1840s conditions.  Modern-day camping has enough privations for me. And for the boys, too — as we discussed what to bring, with M. writing out a shopping list in the back seat of the car, he asked if we could get a three-outlet adapter for the car’s 110-volt outlet — since the current single outlet might not be enough to power everything!

Great glowing (Sept. 18-19)

The first time we went to the Great Forest Park Balloon Glow, M. was 3 and thought it was way, way cool. We arrived early enough to watch darkness fall and the glow begin, and he was entranced both by the scale of the enormous balloons and by the vivid brightness and heat of the flames. Then the crowd descended, he got a little scared, and I discovered that the former location of this festival was not particularly friendly for families wanting to leave early!

Last year organizers moved the glow to Central Field, the wide-open area near the Jewel Box, and eliminated the drive-thru viewing option. There are still crowds — it’s one of the few free events I can think of that draws absolutely every demographic group at 7 p.m. on a Friday night — but without the bottlenecks created by traffic barriers, things flow more smoothly in all directions.

The glow on Friday (Sept. 18) and the following day’s balloon race, also at Central Field, are free to watch. Saturday (Sept. 19) is when the festival aspect of the event will be offered in full force: the kids’ area, the food, the entertainment stage, the skydivers (scheduled to arrive at 3 p.m.) and, finally, the launch of the Energizer Bunny “hare” at 4:30 p.m. and the 70 “hounds” 15 minutes later. You can see the race from many vantage points in the city — we’ve watched it from the interstate overpass near our house — but watching balloons ascend up close is pretty spectacular.

Wild weekend roundup (Sept. 12-13)

In the nearly two years I’ve been doing this blog, I’ve noticed that four or five times a year there is one weekend that’s crazy-full of events. Usually they fall early in February, April, June, September and December. Something about seasons changing, I suspect. The coming two days are perhaps the most crazy-full ever, and it’s impossible for me to choose which events to highlight because so many sound so good:

• The Hispanic Festival is back downtown at Soldiers Memorial Park (closer to me, so I’m happy, but probably the folks in North County feel differently!) with food and crafts and music and activities for the kids.  I like the schedule for the stage — bands are interspersed with dancers and other performers so there’s no time lost to breaks. Saturday and Sunday (Sept. 12-13)

• Due to a my own crazy-full week, I wasn’t able to promote the Best of Chesterfield as I should have, because the organizers were asking anyone interested in attending the free event in Herman Stemme Office Park to register in advance. So … it runs from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. tomorrow and it’s worth a late-notice effort, because the music lineup is great, and the food samples are only $2 to $7. Proceeds benefit the Howard Park Center, which helps kids with disabilities. Saturday (Sept. 12)

• Another festival that’s near and dear to my own heart (seeing as how it’s put on by an employer of mine!) is the St. Louis Kids Magazine Health and Education Expo at the St. Peters Rec Plex, a fabulous facility that’s open all day for free classes and activities as part of the Family Fitness Festival and Fun Run. Saturday (Sept. 12)

• The parade season is winding down, but there’s still one more chance to do your beauty queen wave at passing floats during the Fenton Founder’s Day Parade at 1 p.m. Saturday (Sept. 12)

• If you want more fire trucks than a parade has to offer, check out the Great Fire Engine Rally at the Arch grounds. The parade is at 10 a.m., but the excitement level rises at 11 a.m. when the firefighter challenge begins. And there are demos throughout the afternoon. Saturday (Sept. 12)

• Also at the Arch grounds is the annual ParkPalooza. It’s a weekend celebrating all our national parks, and activities are tailored to the locale — in our case, the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial. There are 10 interactive stations about outdoor recreation, Mississippi River culture and history, fitness and nature. Saturday and Sunday (Sept. 12-13)

• And if NONE of those events float your boat, hope is not lost — there’s also a free outdoor samba concert in Benton Park at 5 p.m. on Saturday (Sept. 12). It looks to be cooler than the last one, so people may not confine themselves to the shade along the basin’s edges — maybe folks will get up front and center by the band, Samba Bom, and dance! There’s food available for purchase from local restaurants as part of the Taste of Benton Park event, which benefits the park itself.
  

Twilight Tuesdays are back again (Sept. 15-Oct. 6)

Yesterday evening we’d planned to be at the Missouri History Museum’s Twilight Tuesdays kick-off concert for the fall season … and I’d planned to blog about it earlier in the day. But instead, I was dealing with the aftermath of a scary asthma-type breathing episode with my 3-year-old. He’s fine today, happily, and I think he might have even been OK for the concert, but I was a wreck.

So we’ll have to settle for the four remaining concerts of the series — Sept. 15 with Dr. Zhivegas, Sept. 22 with Legacy Jazz Quintet, Sept. 29 with the Fabulous Motown Revue and Oct. 6 with Boogie Chyld — all of which should be great shows. If you haven’t been to one of these, my tips are as follows: Plan to park in the lot near the Forest Park visitor’s center or along the street southwest of the museum (unless, like us, you arrive extra-early at 5 p.m. so the kids can run wild in the playground for an hour before the show — at that time, there are usually still spots in the museum’s lots). Seats with a good view of the stage start filling up about half an hour before the concert’s 6:30 p.m. start, but many families and groups prefer to be back a ways, which gives them more room to spread out. My boys like to see the instruments and lights, however, so we’re usually off to either side of the curved walkways on the museum’s north face. There are no restrictions on food or beverages, and we usually do a nice picnic. But food and beverages are available from Patty Long Catering. If the concert is threatened with rain, they’ll make the call of whether to go on or not at 3 p.m. and make it available at 800.916.8212.