4th of July in Kansas City

Hope everyone had a great 4^th of July!  We went to Kansas City for the weekend, as we have the past few years for the 4^th and hung out at the Country Club Plaza.  We had a pretty low key 4^th overall on the Plaza so rather than go into great detail, I’ll just hit on a few fun things we did and share some great pics I got of Annie. 

One of the highlights was doing a picnic in the park, there are a lot of great restaurants on the Plaza but we were kinda boring and ordered room service and ate at the hotel quite a bit of this trip but we did do a picnic, taking out food from Chuy’s, which was a really yummy Mexican restaurant.  The food was really good, fresh and not greasy at all.  Annie loved her cheese quesadilla and gobbled it down in-between pointing at all the dogs in the park.  She’s become quite the pointer when something catches her eye.  She also really enjoyed the big fountain in the park and in true toddler fashion, threw her sippy cup into the fountain for me to fish out.  I should have seen that coming…

Lunch in the park

Loved this fountain!

Blowing bubbles with Dad

Another highlight was just walking around the toy store Zoom on the Plaza.  What a fun toy store!  Tons of toys and has a great wide variety.  We wanted to hit the toy store upon arrival so that we could pick out a toy to keep Annie occupied at the hotel.  When it comes to toys, I’ve become particular because she doesn’t play with a lot of her toys she has now and we have limited room to be adding more to the pile at home and I prefer toys that are more developmental and will provide interest because she does seem to get bored with basic toys.  We spent literally an hour trying to see what she liked/didn’t like.  We finally decided on a toy called Stack N’ Sort because our little Annie is quite the sorter.  It was a toy that has a bunch of cups that could nest together, or turn upside down and stack over 2 feet high and it came with a bucket, perfect for her obsession with collecting items in buckets.  And it was perfect for the pool too.  It was a win/win and a hit at the hotel, probably the best decision we made during the entire trip!

Another highlight was the time spent at the pool.  We stayed on the InterContinental.  This hotel has an awesome pool scene.  Live music, a pool bar, it’s always packed and lively and the best part is it has 2 separate pools, one that is only a little over a foot deep, the perfect wading pool for Annie’s size.  And my word, she loved it!  Giggles and smiles galore, I got tons of great pictures of her at the pool.  I didn’t get any pictures at the 2^nd day at the pool but she had a blast both days. 

See what I mean?  Perfect Annie size pool!  This entire pool is this deep, never gets deeper. 

Ready for the pool Mom! 

We debated on whether we would watch fireworks or not.  We decided it wasn’t worth the fight of keeping Annie up and since there are no fireworks on the Plaza, we would have to load up and drive to go see them, we do have the perfect spot in KC to watch fireworks, it’s at the Liberty Memorial, there are no fireworks at this location but it’s a high point in the city and you can literally watch 10+ displays going on at the same time, we stumbled upon it a few years ago and it’s basically the only reason we go to KC specifically on the 4^th now.  I really missed that we couldn’t get to do that this year.  We ended up just watching the New York ones on TV and falling asleep at the hotel before KC fireworks would have even kicked off. 

Wish I wasn't waving at the camera, darn could have been a great picture! 

Pointing at something interesting I'm sure

Checking things out 

We did a little shopping but not a ton, I got my Potbelly’s milkshake on both days (mmmm!) and hung out at the hotel quite a bit; it was a low key trip overall, next year hopefully we can see some fireworks but I’m sure of one thing, Annie really enjoyed her little vacation!