What do you do on a rainy day with kids and a strange town?

Saturday was a wonderful day. It ended a lot differently than what I originally planned. I woke up to get ready to go to an air show at the Columbia airport with my little brother Mike. It was sooooo dark outside for being 7:30 am. It had been raining already and it originally said the rain wouldn't be here til later in the day. So, after saying goodbye to Justin and Brandon as they were on their way to fish and camp and see friends, we decided to go ahead and meet up and we were on our way to Jeff city. Sure enough it rained all day. The show was cancelled, so now we had to get creative with the kids with what to do. So, this is what we did...... First, we went to the mall and played on the toys forever! Then we went to eat lunch. Next, we went and looked at cards in a grocery store and watched Hayden and Alyssa push each other up and down the aisle in a car cart. They were laughing so hard and having such a good time. We went shopping and had Hayden model clothes for us (He soaked his clothes and I didn't have spares so he got new ones) and he thought it was so fun. He is a bit of a show off. We went to Petco and Hayden begged to pet every dog we saw. He only pet 4 out of the 7. We then went into Barnes and Noble. They always love it there. Hayden goes straight for the train set and Alyssa straight to the tables with the books. It was so sweet to watch Alyssa with the books. She would move from one spot to another and would just sit anywhere with the book she found to look at. She would actually make up stories to go with the pictures she saw and went through the whole book. I love to see her love for reading.I hope she can stick to it. Hayden could play with those trains all day if I let him.I love Barnes and Noble. It has something for everyone. It was getting close to dinner, the rain had stopped, so we decided to get pizza and find a park for the kids to play at. We eventually found a beautiful park called Riverside park, because it was right along side the Missouri River. There was a lookout point and you could see all of the big boats going up it and the amtrak trains going by. The toys were great because it had this raised platform that made all of the water run under it, so nothing was wet except the grass. Exactly what we were looking for after all of that rain. So the whole day was mostly geared around keeping the kids occupied and happy but, it was just great because it was so carefree and relaxing I didn't feel rushed to have to be somewhere or worry about anything, and they were so good the entire time! I don't know that I had to get after them once the entire day. That is a miracle. Thanks for hanging out Mike it was great! I took tons of pictures on my phone because Justin has the camera, so as soon as he gets home with it I can post pictures with this.