We had the absolute best time seeing our best girl and enjoying the festivities at the University of Missouri Homecoming weekend!
Todd, Grant and I flew to St. Louis the night before (Thursday night) and stayed about halfway between St. Louis and Columbia since our flight got in late. We wanted to have most of Friday with our girl. The boys made a Natalie sandwich when they saw her!
Natalie had class so after we saw her apartment, we drove her to class and walked around a bit. We started at Tiger Spirit where we got some merch. We all needed gold shirts because that was the chosen color for Homecoming against the Gators. Todd got a cool hat, and I also got this amazing pin! I come from a family of Gator grads and fans, so this was a fun game for me.
Then we sauntered over to the Francis Quadrangle where the flowers were blooming in front of the Columns and Jesse Hall.
This really is a beautiful campus!
Natalie was literally in Spanish class in the building to the right of this picture (just offscreen) ha!
You can see the columns still standing at Academic Hall before the fire of 1892. The building was probably double the height size of them at the time.
We walked over to the Ionic Columns which are all that remains of the original Academic Hall. People fought to keep them as a memorial, and once they were deemed stable enough to remain in place, they were allowed to stay. What a cool tradition!
Thomas Jefferson also has a connection to the University (stop me if you've heard this one before because I've definitely mentioned this in other posts) - so Todd had to have a heart-to-heart with him about the current state of the economy.
The University of Missouri was the first public university west of the Mississippi - which at the time, was within the land area bought by then-President Jefferson in the Louisiana Purchase. Jefferson's gravestone was at Monticello for about 50 years before they transferred it here to Mizzou (after the family purchased a new one). You can see there is a new plaque here in the center. The original is in Jesse Hall (see below!)
The original was heavily damaged in the 1892 fire at Academic Hall, but the Smithsonian was able to restore it in 2014.
I mean, this is really just a lovely day - it sure beats the below zero temps we were feeling when we were here as a family back in February of 2025!
All is right in the world when my babies are together with me. We fetched Natalie from her class and went to Shakespeare's Pizza for some lunch!
After lunch, we went back to Natalie's apartment. Grant's birthday is at the end of the month and we only got him one gift - tickets to see Kanye West in Houston on Halloween night. It was Natalie's idea, so we decided to give him his gift early.
I don't think I've ever seen this kid so happy in his whole life.
We finally decided to head over to the Decs in Greek Town, passing this Mizzou Homecoming sign at the Bookstore on our way there.
Natalie and Grant in Tiger Plaza.
All of the sororities and fraternities put up these displays - the theme this year was cartoon characters and the phrase "Forever Faurotious" - a nod to Farout Field at Memorial Stadium.
We found the Kappa Delta display!
The Kappa Delta house is right there at the entrance to the Homecoming House Decs (don't worry, their display was in the backyard!)
I absolutely love that KD had a Jetson's theme! Not only did I absolutely love the Jetson's as a kid, I named my car George Jetta JUST because of this! Natalie's little sister Emilia was Judy Jetson and it was SO cute!
But you know I had to go to the Zeta house! ZLAM! (Even if you didn't even give my amazing daughter a change - that's your loss!)
We even saw Truman zooming around Greek Town!
All of the Decs and the shows the fraternities and sororities put on were so cute!
We stopped by the Pi Phi house to see their cute show too!
Who doesn't love a good Cat in the Hat story!?
We had to get some Clementine's Ice Cream after our evening in Greek Town (but Grant had wicked heartburn so he didn't join us) - I had the best BANANA MOON PIE ice cream, which you KNOW is one of my favorite things on the planet! It was a perfect end to the day!
And the next morning, we (three) got up early to head up to Columbia from our hotel in Jefferson City (waaaay cheaper to stay there) where we picked up Natalie and headed for the annual Homecoming parade!
The first parade was in 1911 and I wonder ... was Truman there? (Maybe... but his name wasn't Truman because he didn't get his name until 1984!)
The Mizzou cheerleaders were hyping up the crowd with a little M-I-Z!
Then the Color Guard went by, followed by the Mizzou band!
They were, naturally fantastic!
The parade is a mix of Homecoming floats (most made by the fraternities and sororities) and other local celebrities and cool vehicles! Here we have Natalie's sorority - Kappa Delta's float! (Natalie: "I did not pomp this year" - too busy with her classes, right???)
I got all nerdy and excited when Mizzou Meteorology went by - what? I didn't even know they had a met program! Let's go!
The parade was seriously awesome - Grant and I were really excited when we someone threw Swedish Fish and a Milky Way at us, which are our favorite candies, respectively. Afterwards, we went back to our "tailgate" in the hospital garage - I spent WAY too much time in this garage over the summer so it was nice to have a fun moment here. Todd and I had a couple of drinks, we listened to some music and then we headed out for some fun on campus!
Our first stop after our tailgate was for some walking tacos (for the kids) and to stop and watch Mississippi State play Bama for a bit.
Mizzou has their own Bud Light cans!
Next, we walked over to the Kappa Delta house to use the restroom and sit in the shade for a bit. Grant was on his phone and I thought he looked like Cousin It!
Oh there's Grant! It's all the Bailey's - ready to go see Mizzou beat the Gators! (Ok at this point, we were still very skeptical since the Gators were ranked #8!)
But we weren't done tailgating so we stopped over at Natalie's friends parents (!!) RV where they made us some food and gave us drinks. They were the BEST! I liked our shadows here - I think Natalie and Todd are having a very deep conversation here and somehow Grant and I just got stuck in the middle. And so did that guy's shoes.
Next up, we went over to the Phi Kap house which was packed with people! For $5, you could get some food and drinks here too! Sorry Nat, your eyes are closed in the other pic I have of you here!
Ok fam, let's head to the stadium!
We walked through the long tunnel on the way to Memorial Stadium, and it's very echoey in the tunnel so someone always yells M-I-Z and everyone follows up with Z-O-U!
Grant is learning the art of a long armed family selfie.
We had so much fun at the game! We had pretty good seats, even if they were sort of in the Gator section.
Grant got the worst heartburn from Shakespeare's Pizza yesterday, so we teased him that we were gonna get him a few more slices.
The band took the field before the game with about 20 minutes until kick off.
Yay fireworks after the National Anthem!
Todd snapped a family selfie too - I think he really took this picture because some Gator fan in front of us had an Aaron Hernandez jersey on like no one would know Hernandez used to be in prison for murder. But Patriots fans know this!
My Melanoma King needed to protect his neck and the side of his face so we gave him all of our shakers.
Me and my babies - even Grant had a great time at this game!
MAYBE it was because the Mizzou Tigers put a literal beatdown on the Florida Gators! Here they are scoring in our endzone!
They also did a super HD panorama photo of the stadium and we were able to find ourselves. It's like Where's Waldo ha ha.
We left with about 13 minutes left in the 4th quarter because we wanted to beat the crowds to the bars so we could get some dinner. I think we can sufficiently say the Tigers were going to win at this point!
The final score was 45-17 and it really was the best day beating the #8 ranked Florida Gators!
It was a happy homecoming indeed!
We walked back through campus and up to Big 12 (aka: Campus Bar & Grill) for some sandwiches. We were thankfully able to get Grant in (he is 100% not drinking here, I can promise you that!) We watched the end of the Auburn game where they got punished by the Vols in Knoxville 24-14.
We were all exhausted after we ate so we dropped Natalie off at her apartment and then went back to the hotel to crash. In the morning, we had some time to grab Nat and head over to Waffle House, a new Bailey family tradition! Gotta get that bacon, egg and cheese sammie before we headed off to St. Louis to catch our flight home.
We are going to miss our girl, but we had the best time at Homecoming! Mizzou really knows how to do it right!
Until next time, Columbia!
