North Carolina Pictures

During June, we spent a week in North Carolina to visit with my parents.

City Lake Park

This park had a VERY impressive playground. It was a bit intimidating for a young toddler, but the big kids like John had a great time! Unfortunately, I didn't get many pictures of it.

Waiting for the train

Riding the train with Daddy (and Papaw in the background)

Grandfather Mountain

NC Zoo--Asheboro






A Return to Reynolda Gardens in Winston-Salem





Mt. Airy, NC (AKA "Mayberry") Hometown of Andy Griffith
I have to laugh at myself (Christy) for being a fan of the Andy Griffith Show because I absolutely hated it as a child. However, watching the show with John during his lunch break has become a pretty regular part of our schedule these days. I guess the humor in the show comes with age.


Hanging Falls State Park






Greensboro Science Museum





On The Road Again...
We've driven to my parents' in NC 3 different ways now, and the VA/WV route is by far our favorite way to go. The traffic wasn't nearly as bad, and the mountains through this area were beautiful.

Eating at Max & Erma's in Huntington, WV....This is the day Luke figured out how the straw

North Carolina in June----Dad's Pictures

Here are the pictures my dad sent us from our visit to Kernersville, NC in June. We all had a great time there. It was our first visit where we really were able to go out and do some things since Luke is older now, and we're way past those nursing days. John and I had fun being tourists, and Luke had fun being spoiled by Nana & Papaw.

This was a bit intimidating for Mommy, but Luke has no fear.

Wheeee...Nana and Papaw have a steep driveway. I believe this was his first wagon ride.

We visited MANY parks in NC, so unfortunately I can't remember the name of all of them. However, this was one of our favorites because of the beautiful landscaping. KY has much to learn from NC when it comes to parks. Most of the city parks we visited had carousels and a miniature train to ride on, in addition to very nice playground equipment.

Luke and Daddy on the carousel at the zoo. This was Luke's first visit to the zoo. It was a lot of fun, and the weather was great!

Luke and Mommy on a carousel at one of the parks.

The official sign of toddler-hood...the red & yellow car. Luke has one at our house too. I recently caught him running the car to the end of the driveway, into the street. He's a bit ambitious with his driving. Unfortunately, when he's at the wheel, he can only go in reverse.

Kansas City, MO in May

The Tuesday after Mother's Day, Luke had tubes put in his ears, and then we left the next day for John's training in Kansas City. We were a bit nervous about going out of town right after the procedure, but Luke did great. As a side note, he's been MUCH healthier and has had no ear infections since we had it done. He had his first cold without an ear infection recently.

The Arch

On our way to Kansas City, we stopped in St. Louis for lunch at the arch. Believe it or not, I had never been to St. Louis before.

Our Destination
We stayed in the Westin Crown Center in downtown Kansas City. Hallmark headquarters are located in this complex, hence the name, so there was quite a bit to do around our hotel.

We ate several of our meals at the Crown Center mall. Our first lunch was at Fritz's, which is a burger joint. Its claim to fame is a train that goes around a track near the ceiling and delivers your food order to your table.

When the train stopped at our table, the tray lowered down to us and we took off our order.

Luke was pretty impressed.

Our Hotel Complex

Our hotel room looked out onto the Crown Center Plaza which has a fountain. Every night there was a water show set to music that played about 3 times. We never grew tired of watching the display.

Luke hanging out in our hotel room after a nap.

Our Excursions

Dinner at Stroud's Restaurant....recommended by Southern Living. You won't actually see us eating in these pictures. It was a beautiful evening with great lighting and several photo ops, so we played while we waited to get in.

On John's day off, we walked to the Farmer's Market for breakfast where we ate at Succotash, another Southern Living recommendation.

After meandering around for a bit, we walked back to our hotel and went to Union Station which was right across the street. It houses Science City, an attraction which was lots of fun for all of us. The train exhibits were pretty neat, plus Luke enjoyed pretending to be the train engineer....lots of buttons!!!

So, this is an old train car, and Luke's in the bathroom. I couldn't get the potty in the shot too, but it was right in front of this seat. I guess you had spectators when you used the potty on the train???

A big bonus for our trip was that we did quite a bit of research on the area before leaving, and we happened to know a couple of friends from church who had lived in the area. They recommended some places to go/things to do, and this was one of the recommended stops, Deanna Rose Children's Farmstead.

This was our absolute favorite thing we did. First of all because it was free, and second because it is extremely kid-friendly.

It was set up like a petting zoo, but it is so nice and unbelievable to us that something like this could be free.

They run on donations. You could buy food to feed the animals (a moneymaker for them), and you could actually go in some of the cages to feed them and play.

We have videos to post later that you're sure to enjoy.

Here's a link to a website where you can read more about the farmstead and take a look at some of the different areas it houses. http://www.360kc.com/Attractions/DeannaRoseChildrensFarmstead.html