The Plaza.... via...The Shack!

As you might remember from my last post I put the audio of The Shack on our Ipod and was trying to convince John into taking a road trip to Kansas City for the weekend. With several incentives we took off Friday afternoon, listening all the way. Arriving in Kansas City only a little over 2 hours into the book (it reads 8+ hours) we stopped the Ipod and John said "yes it draws you in and is interesting"....we hadn't gotten to the part yet that I wanted to see his reaction.

We enjoyed the evening with our daughter, Debby, who drove over from Lawrence to join us for dinner. Saturday morning saw us running several errands and visiting Dean & DeLuca, checking out what we in Wichita have to look forward to....so we're hearing.

It was a beautiful weekend, weather wise. The Flinthills are verdant green pastures laced with yellows and browns in wildflowers and various grasses. A favorite destination for us in Kansas City is the County Club Plaza. I have many fond childhood memories of Kansas City as that is where I was born and where both my parents were from. Fortunately John enjoys the area also, so it's a fun getaway.

This past weekend was the yearly Plaza Art Fair.

Artists from all over the US come and display their mediums. There is music, food and lots of interesting looking people. I heard an estimate that 300,000 people attend the 3 day event. We spent the afternoon wondering through the displays, enjoying a lovely fall day. Dinner Saturday night was at The Bristol Seafood Grill.

A relaxing dinner started with steamed mussels, Caesar salad, grilled swordfish on a bed of orzo with Asian vegetables accompanied by a crisp, buttery chardonnay.

Sunday found us heading south and listening to the ipod. The drive was leisurely and lasted over 4 hours as we avoided the 4 lanes and took the scenic route home. We were able to get through quite a bit of the book. Enough at least to get the general idea and flavor of the story. Initially John's reaction was...."oh I don't know about this..." but as he continued to listen his thoughts changed. We turned off the Ipod and talked the last 30 minutes home, discussing some of the aspects of the book. At first hearing John said he couldn't see anything wrong with the theology, it mentioned some things he hadn't thought about before and it definitely takes God out of "our box." I want him to finish the book and see how Mack was redeemed!