Kansas City

Today (July 19th) marks 7 years of marriage for Austin & me.  To celebrate, Austin took me on a weekend getaway to Kansas City.  He planned everything.  He was already there for work all week, so I dropped the kids off at his parents' house in Waukee and met him after work on Friday.  After touring his office in Overland Park we headed to the company condo a few blocks from the Plaza District. 

Dinner was an amazing meal at Fogo de Chão, which is a Brazilian Steakhouse.  There is no menu.  Your meal consists of a large gourmet salad bar and a flurry of waiters continuously offering you 15 amazing cuts of meat straight from the grill until you tell them to stop.  It's a carnivore's dream come true!  My favorite by far was the filet mignon.  We saved just enough room for some superb Crème Brulee for dessert with a special message from the chef. :o)  After dinner we took a loooong, much needed walk around the Plaza District.  Then we stayed up late watching the latest Harry Potter movie on TV, which I hadn't seen yet.

After a lazy morning we enjoyed lunch at the most famous BBQ place in Kansas City, which is saying something for a city famous for its barbecue!  Anthony Bourdain from the Travel Channel listed Oklahoma Joe's as one of the 13 places to eat before you die.  It is literally located in a gas station convenience store.  We waited in line for 45 minutes for the best pulled pork & beef sandwich and bag of fries I've ever had--complimented by a large glass of strawberry pop. :o)  By the time we left at 1:15pm the line was even longer and was all the way out the door and onto the blazing hot asphalt parking lot.  Crazy!  It was worth the wait, though.

After recovering from lunch with a nap, we headed out into the sweltering heat to walk around downtown KC.  We browsed through some of the specialty shops at the Crown Center.  Then we walked around Liberty Memorial Park, which is the only national monument dedicated solely to WWI.  It was quite the workout and very impressive on the outside!  We didn't go in the museum or up the tower because it was almost closing time. 

There were also some great views of the Kansas City skyline from the memorial.

I learned the Kansas City is known as "The City of Fountains" and boasts over 200 on the official registry.  This is the one in front of Union Station and the Science Museum at the foot of the Liberty Memorial.  It is a programmed fountain that uses gun powder to shoot extra high at points during the sequence.

This is the one kids play at in front of the Crown Center shops.  During part of the sequence it is set to music.  With the heat index nearing 110 degrees that day it was a very popular spot!  The picture does not do justice to the fountain or the number of people there.

I think we each sweat off about 3 lbs. in two hours!  I also did not realize that Kansas City was so hilly.  I have apparently grown soft with our flat neighborhood in Waverly because my calf muscles were absolutely killing me all weekend.  I guess I better start taking more walks around the hospital at home again!

Dinner on Saturday night was at the Brio Tuscan Grille back in Country Club Plaza.  I don't know if it was the BBQ for lunch or the heat in the afternoon, but I wasn't even hungry until after 8:00pm, which would shock people who know me well.  It's a good thing, because there was a long wait list, and we didn't even get seated until 8:30pm.  While waiting, Austin & I went to the Apple Store around the corner and played with the iPads and MacBook Pro laptops.  I think Austin sold me on one of those for our next computer. :o)

I did not even get out of bed until 10:30am on Sunday and it was glorious.  Furthermore, my wake-up call was not a little voice saying, "Mommy, you need to get up and get me some bres-beck!"  We ate leftovers for lunch and reluctantly packed up to head back to reality.  We arrived in Waukee to pick up the kids at 4:00pm.  We had supper with Austin's parents and then headed home. 

By all accounts the kids were fabulous for Grandpa & Grandma Lorenzen.  They had fun swimming at the pool, playing at the park and even survived a big thunderstorm.  This was great news since it was my first time leaving Lincoln overnight and the first time Emily stayed overnight away from home without me.  I guess it's a good thing that I rarely thought of them at all and only when I was being grateful for the fact that I was not dragging kids along with me!  Instead, it was a wonderfully relaxing time where Austin & I felt like newlyweds again without a care in the world.  It was also fun to see the places Austin spends a lot of time working, including a drive-by tour of the office buildings of a lot of clients.  I look forward to more fun trips to KC together!