The Other Four Seasons

I've stayed at the Four Seasons in Philadelphia, I've coordinated weddings at the Four Seasons in St. Louis, I dream of working at the Four Seasons in New York. I heart the Four Seasons.

This summer's Edward Jones regional meeting was held in the Lake of the Ozarks, Missouri and we stayed at The Lodge of The Four Seasons. I get so excited when I hear the name "Four Seasons" until I realized that this is not THAT Four Seasons. I was still excited to spend the weekend with our Edward Jones family, so off we went.

Our first stop before checking into the hotel was a restaurant right on the water. There was a panoramic view of the lake and the most delicious food! Daryl parked right on a cliff and I had a little (actually BIG) panic attack. I started to hyperventilate because all I could see is water beneath us. I demanded that Daryl move the car immediately and Aidan said, "Mom, you have to relax! It's okay."

We checked into the hotel later and reconnected with old friends and met some new families. Daryl and I attended our respective meetings and the kids went to their "meeting" as Aidan called it (aka daycare).


The kids love seeing each other each year and its great to see them play so well together.

We made friends with the Womacks, who were attending their first meeting. Reese immediately made friends with Samiyah, their youngest. She went up to Samiyah and said, "I'm Ariel and you are Tiana." It was the cutest thing ever! Aidan has been going by the name "Batman" for a few months now, Reese now has her own secret identity and a sidekick!

The first night is the family dinner, its so casual and fun! The kids took fun to the next level by doing sprints in the hallway of the ballroom after dinner. All the parents were standing back smiling and dreaming of how well all the kids would sleep that night. It backfired on us... Aidan and Reese were so excited to be staying in a hotel and must have gotten and second and third wind... they would not go to sleep!

They finally went to sleep and the next morning, I woke them up early for a walk along the marina. When we got to the water, Reese yelled out..."Nemo, where are you?"

This is the "beach" on the property. I'm pretty sure they just use it for weddings. It was nice to put my feet in the sand, but I wouldn't really classify this as a beach as it is the size of my living room.

I'm a little obsessed with taking pictures of Reese's toes in the sand. I took a similar picture of her foot when we were in Florida last summer.

Nicole and I took the kids to the outlet mall after my marina walk and after breakfast.

Reese was all about the wristlets at the Coach outlet. I was so proud.

Our girls. I hope they grow up to be good friends.

How cute is this?

This one is for my nephew Guy! We saw these at one of the kitchen supply stores and I had to take a picture.

This night's dinner is the formal dinner where everyone is recognized for their achievements. No kids allowed and each table has a host and there is theme. This year's theme was the Olympics and each table was a country. We were asked to be a host. I was so excited. I was at Hobby Lobby 20 minutes after Daryl told me we were chosen to host! Daryl and I teamed up on this project and merged our talents to bring it all together. We ran into a few challenges working together, we'll call them creative differences. Daryl carved the base out of Styrofoam, I made French flags, and gold medals for all our table guests and our Eiffel Tower had lights on it.

A close up of the back of our table complete with champagne, Chanel and Louis Vuitton bags, fromage (cheese), croissants, and French postage stamps.

The Switzerland Table

Jamaica, hosted by our good friends The Yoders.

At the end of the night I was disappointed to hear that there wasn't a contest for best table decor. WHAT?

I made these tutus for Reese and I to wear and my outfit was complete with the beret. I went a little overboard (not me, right?), but I honestly thought there was a contest and I play to win!

The Gourleys take Kansas City

Since Daryl started working for Edward Jones, one of the highlights of our summer is the Edward Jones Summer Regional Meeting. This year's meeting was held in Kansas City, Missouri and we stayed at the Intercontinental Hotel & Plaza at Country Club Plaza - sounds fancy, doesn't it?

Daryl lived in Kansas City for about 10 minutes as an infant and I had never been. I am always excited when I get to visit a new city and the meeting planner in me starts going as soon as I know I'm going somewhere! I searched on the Internet and even requested a brochure from the Kansas City visitor's bureau. We got back on Sunday and I still haven't received my brochure - I guess Kansas City didn't want me to visit, but I showed them!

     Mr. Karaoke

At the EJ family dinner, the entertainment was Karaoke and they were selling raffle tickets to benefit the United Way. This Karaoke experience was a little different than the Clinique meetings that I used to attend. At the Clinique meetings, you could not get people to give back the microphone. At this meeting people were actually giving donations to the United Way to not have to sing! Because none of the adults would sing, Aidan took that opportunity to dazzle the audience with his "ABC's" - twice.

One thing that I was really looking forward to was spending time with Andrea Yoder. Her husband Jeremy started with EJ last year and we have become really good friends with them. While the boys were at meetings, Andrea and I did some sightseeing with the kids. We walked around Country Club Plaza. We loved all of the fountains and went into a few of the shops. There is a Burberry store there and I was so happy to be in there! It really made me miss my good friend Holly and our tea time at the 57th Street store.

I also took one for the team and ate at Arthur Bryants. For those of you that are not familiar it's a local chain of BBQ restaurants in Kansas City. I really do not like BBQ, but Daryl loves it and when in Rome... While waiting for our table I got yelled at by one of the busgirls. The place was packed and there was a six-top table that had the scraps from the last guests still on it. We had 5 people so I motioned to Ms. busgirl to ask her to clean the table when she could. She gave me a dirty look and the conversation went like this:

Ms. Busgirl: Do you really need this table? How many are you?

Me: Um, uh, we have 5

Ms. Busgirl: Ugh! (points to clean 4-top table). Just sit there and pull up a chair. (Ms. Busgirl exits)

Okay then. I pulled up an extra chair and we dined at the 4-top table. She eventually had to clean the table to a more deserving family (ironically they were another EJ family) that had 6 people. No wasted seats in this place. The food was delicious and they serve ice cold Coca-Cola in a giant souvenir cup - this place is okay by me.

Earlier in the day Andrea and I had gone into a popcorn shop and purchased popcorn and some Jelly Beans. Not just any jelly beans - the really disgusting ones called BeanBoozled. After the awards dinner that evening, we encouraged (aka tricked) a few people into trying the Jelly Beans. Some of the flavors include baby wipes, vomit, pencil shavings, and moldy cheese. Just to keep you guessing you could get lucky and get peach, juicy pear, or licorice, but most of our victims got skunk spray, boogers or the previously mentioned flavors. Good times.

    The Duck Derby

By the looks of our photos and the list of how many places we visited, it would seem that we were there for a week. Nope - just 3 days. We went to Union Station, Crown Center, Nelson-Atkins Art Museum, Country Club Plaza, and we even saw the Duck Derby.  I didn't quite understand what the Duck Derby is and I still don't.  You purchase a rubber duck (yes, just like Ernie has), the proceeds go to charity and your duck participates in a race down the river and you can win prizes from gift certificates to a Harley Davidson.  We watched this "race" and it takes 30 minutes for the ducks to travel 1/8 of a mile so you can imagine that it was a real nail-biter!  The Gourleys were bored after 5 minutes and we moved on.  Back to St. Louis we went.