Kansas City!

Getting ready to head down to the 4th of July parade in St. Charles, MO

Hello from Kansas City, MO! The last two days have been jam packed with fun, family and adventure. We awoke on the 4th of July in St. Charles, MO, about 3.5 hours east of Kansas City. When I was booking this place, I had read all of these great things about what an adorable, quaint and unique little place this was. When we pulled in for the first time, I would not have used any of those words to describe this campground. It was small and with no trees, but it did have concrete pads (basically nice big concrete parking spots), which is very nice for RV parking, and I was told there was a nice playground just outside of the back gate, which we immediately explored and it was really nice. It wasn’t until the next morning, on the 4th, that we discovered what a little gem we had found!

We knew that the Katy Trail was right behind the RV park, which was very close to the Missouri River. What we didn’t know until Shawn went on his run that morning was that this trail took you right along some beautiful views of that river, and right into the adorable town of St. Charles, after only a mile of running. A little fun fact about St. Charles? It is where Lewis met Clark as they set on their expedition and there are cool signs and monuments all over the town to commemorate the history. So when Shawn got back from his run, I set out to see it all for myself. It was so cute and the little downtown reminded me so much of Fredericksburg with its shops, antiquing and overall size and feel. When I got back, we quickly decided that we should stick around for the 4th of July parade. What better first parade experience for the kids than a total middle of America 4th of July parade?

We only had one problem. That damn Tahoe. It was dead (again) from us ( and by us I mean Shawn) leaving the key turned in the ignition while we towed it. So, we were going to have to walk. We grabbed our jogging stroller and were kicking ourselves for not bringing our double jogger when all 3 wanted to get in. What in the world? They NEVER want to get in the stupid thing at home…so much so that we didn’t even take it to the beach with us this year, and now they ALL want to get in? Jude got dibs and the other two walked, pretty much without complaint, the 1.5 miles to the parade and we made it just in time to see the last 20 minutes or so, and it was so fun. Luke was beside himself once he figured out that they threw candy to the people on the sidelines. That kid has a sweet tooth like I’ve never seen. We stuck around for lunch downtown before heading back. I popped into this very cool home furnishings store and of course found something I just HAD to take home to Richmond. What I didn’t really think ahead about was having to carry it the 1.5 miles back to our RV. Shawn and the boys had gone ahead of me in the stroller and Macy stayed behind with me. We were about .02 miles in when we both realized we were hot, tired, in uncomfortable shoes, and really did not want to carry this big box the whole way back. I did get some good laughs out of my daughter, who is learning to be quite dramatic, when she said, “Mom, I am just so miserable. My feet are dirty and I can’t stand that and I am just so not enjoying this. I could just punch myself in the face.” I just had to laugh because it was just so bizzarly random and I would like to believe that Shawn and I have never said that before so where on earth would she get that from? Either way, it cracked me up and passed the time and we were so happy to get back! We did have a nice note from our neighbors (yep, Dick and Jane) because our water hose exploded while we were at the parade and they kindly replaced it with an extra they had. See, what did I say about these people? (and of course our water hose exploded. Why not?)

The kids slept most of the ride to Kansas City and we pulled in right around dinner time and all of our family was here waiting on us. Shawn’s sister (who lives here), his brother and his wife and two children and my in-laws. Ahhh. My in-laws. The experienced RV’ers who have been taking our 14 calls a day. The ones who know how to fix things. Yay! We made it to them! In less than 24 hours, my father in law has already managed to fix a few things, one of which was that storage compartment that kept blowing open while we drove. We were also able to get our roadside assistance here to break into the Tahoe and jump it for us. Yay! We were back in action.

After staying up late to watch the fireworks (which we learned Jude does not like!), we spent the day today at Worlds of Fun, a local amusement park that is attached to where we are staying, and we did have a great time. Macy & Luke rode their first roller coasters (Macy did some crazy ones!) and all 3 got to do bumper cars, each in their own car. I wish I had it on video. Jude thought he was the coolest thing ever. Once he was settled into his car, he turned to the kid in the car next to him and said “You weady??” This place could also be known as Worlds of Good People Watching because it was up there with some of the best I’ve seen.

We have another full day and night tomorrow before setting off to Colorado on Monday. I think I’ve decided that it is MUCH more fun and enjoyable to actually stay at a place for a few days as opposed to the quick overnighters. As Shawn said the other day, no wonder this is a thing that retired people do. You need a TON of time to get from A to B, and even more time for all the things that go wrong! Speaking of which, I should mention we were able to secure a 3rd row Tahoe seat today from a gentlemen named Marcus that I found on Craigslist while driving yesterday. We met him at a random gas station in downtown Kansas City this morning. Once we made the exchange and commented about how amazing craigslist can be, he said “Shoot. You probably thought you were coming here to get robbed.” True story.

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