Back-to-School Trip

Friday the 12th was Meet-the-Teacher for Alexee and Crosby.  We are very excited about both of their teachers.  We've heard that Mr. L is awesome, and we already know that we love Mrs. S from Alexee's 2nd Grade year (So happy to have her again)!!

As soon as we were finished with the school meetings we left for Kansas City for a back-to-school weekend.  We got there about 6pm, checked into our hotel and went to dinner at Cheesecake Factory. After dinner we walked to one of the nearby fountain areas.  It was such a nice night.

On Saturday we went to the zoo.  Lane and I enjoyed going there back in June and thought the kids would like it!

And we rode the Sky Safari several times.  We didn't know if Crosby would be willing to try it, but he loved it.  On just one sky ride across "Africa" the boys and I spotted four snakes on the ground below.  You can see a big black snake in this picture below Crosby's tennis shoes.  Scary!

Ricky the Rhino and the sleeping lions were neat to see up close.

We also liked the hippo, koalas, penguins, sea lions and the Wings of Wonder bird show. 

It was a fun day, but it was very hot so we were running out of energy by mid-afternoon and decided to move on to our next stop:  Trader Joe's.  Air-conditioning and free samples!  :)  We stocked up on coffee, figs, cookie butter, lemon wafers, biscotti, etc.  We went back to the hotel to rest for a few minutes, then we had dinner at Jack Stack BBQ.  Yum!  Sunday morning we had breakfast at Cheesecake Factory.  We tried two other local places first, but the wait was really long at both.  We were able to get a table quickly at CF, and the brunch was good.  I had French toast, Lane had a Monte Cristo breakfast sandwich, and the kids all ordered pancakes.

I love the landscaping in the plaza area, especially the yellow cannas--so pretty!

After breakfast we went downtown to the science discovery center at Union Station.  

Lots of fun activities and exhibits there!

Everyone tried the giant hamster wheel, and Rhett rode the sky bike.

Sunday night we ate at P.F. Chang's and finished the evening with ice cream from Cold Stone Creamery.  It was just a short walk back to our hotel so we sat on the patio to eat dessert.  The sky was so pretty.  It was a sweet weekend together, and a great way to end the summer break.

We drove home Monday morning, then Lane and Alexee went to pick Bogart up that afternoon from my Dad while I took the boys to get their back-to-school haircuts.  I started washing the large pile of laundry from the weekend, and the washing machine broke.  Ugh!  (Thanks to Lane's detailed Google research, his awesome handyman skills and the convenience of two-day shipping it was working again by Thursday!  I'm kind of crazy about keeping up with laundry.  We were very thankful that it was a fairly easy and inexpensive fix.)  Monday evening was also 7th grade orientation for Rhett at the junior high.  The principal gave a welcome speech in the gym, then everyone rotated through their seven class periods (5 minute versions) to meet all the teachers and find out what to expect for the first week of school.  Rhett has at least one or two friends in every class hour, so he was happy about that.  There are two lunch periods, but it seems that he has the same one as the majority of his friends so that was good news, too.  Several people have told me that the junior high is a great, positive environment with a strong emphasis on character, hard work and relationship-building.  I think Rhett is ready for it and will do great there.  

Ready or not, it's time to get back into the school routine!

Kansas City

While the boys were at Kanakuk Kamps and Alexee and Bogart were in Flippin, Lane and I went to Kansas City for a couple of nights.  It was a quick trip, but we had a great time!  We've been saying we'd go since we moved here two years ago, but the timing never seemed to work out so this was our first trip there.  It was an easy three hour drive, so hopefully we'll go again soon.  When we got there on Sunday we had lunch in the Power & Light District then went to the Nelson-Atkins Art Museum for the afternoon.

And we drove by the stadiums.  Lane always likes to do this.

The museum was really nice!  We didn't have time to see it all before closing time, but we enjoyed a few hours there.

The Ancient Egyptian gallery was one of our favorites.

Then we checked into Hotel Sorella and walked to dinner at Jack Stack Barbecue (both in the Plaza). 

We both really liked the beef burnt ends.  It was a lot of food, realized mostly when walking way back to the hotel in the heat in uncomfortable shoes!  ha!

Monday morning we had breakfast at the hotel then went to the KC Zoo.  We thought we'd just spend 2-3 hours there, but I think we actually stayed about 6 hours!  Favorites:  The penguins and koalas and the African Sky Safari.   (Disappointment:  The polar bears were never visible.)  :(

The penguins came right up to the glass.  They were so cute, and they seemed to like entertaining.

Views from the sky ride:

We rode this several times.  It was a nice break and cool to go right over the giraffes and zebras!

After the zoo we went to Trader Joe's, mostly to stock up on jars of Crunchy Cookie Butter, but we tried some other things too:  coffee, trail mix, lemon wafers, vanilla, figs, fig butter, sour gummy candies for the kids, etc.   I wish we had a Trader Joe's closer to us.  :( That evening we did some shopping in the plaza and ate dinner at Cheesecake Factory.  We ordered key lime and salted caramel cheesecakes. 

I was happy smelling candles at Anthropologie for an hour or so, and I also loved this stationery store. 

Pretty rooftop garden (view from our hotel window), fountains & statues.

This was a nice place to sit after dinner.

Tuesday morning we walked to Classic Cup Cafe for breakfast and sat on their patio.  (We really liked our hotel, but it was kind-of on the opposite end of the Plaza from every other place we wanted to go.)  It was a nice day and we enjoyed eating there.

On our way home we stopped at Powell Gardens (about 30 minutes outside of Kansas City).  It was crowded, but it very pretty.  The "living wall" rock garden and island water garden were my favorites.   

the island garden

I'd like to have all of these in our yard!

The trail circled around through a Wildflower Meadow Garden (which we decided was a fancy name for "the area we don't want to mow") to a memorial chapel.

It was a relaxing little trip, and we hope to go back before school starts and take the kids!
SaveSave

Disney: Days 6 & 7 Hollywood Studios & Travel

I'm way behind in finishing my Disney posts (it is actually February when I'm writing this...can't believe it has been two months since the trip!) and I'm ready to move on, so this will be brief!  :)  On Friday we went to Hollywood Studios.  Maybe no one else would admit it, but I think we were all a little bit tired by this point.  (I was definitely ready to go home!)  We spent a few hours at the park then went back to the resort to swim.  Alexee and Crosby finally had a chance to meet Minnie though, and everyone liked the Toy Story 3D ride and lunch at the diner.  

Sorcerer Mickey was cute!

Lunch at the 50's diner 

Toy Story!

Saturday morning we packed up, loaded everything in the rental car then went to Epcot for a few hours because our flight wasn't until late afternoon.  I didn't think to take a Magic Band photo until the last day!

The kids tried Coca-Cola products from around the world.  They decided they liked the U.S. version best.

Our last stop was the Cronut stand at Epcot.

The resort had such pretty landscaping...this is just a few of the pretty plants there.

It was a wonderful week together, and I am so glad we were able to go!  The kids have already started asking when we can go again.  :)

The trip home went fine.  It was a direct flight, but it still seemed to take a long time because we were  so anxious to get home, and we still had a 3 hour drive from the Little Rock airport.  We really wished we were flying into the airport that was 45 minutes from our house!

We couldn't wait to pick Bogart up from my parents!  They met us in a grocery store parking lot that night.  He had a fun stay with them (he slept on this little mat beside their bed), but I think he was really happy to be home too.

We missed him!!!