Fun Times in Chicago!

This past week I was able to cross something off my bucket list--visit the great city of Chicago! Unfortunately, any more than about 5 minutes in a big city goes beyond Greg's definition of HE%#, so it was an interesting experience for our little clan.

The plan was to leave Nauvoo Monday morning and make the approximately 4 hour drive to the big city. Everything was going great until a garbage truck decided to back up repeatedly, beep, and make all sorts of weird noises at about 5:30 AM right outside our hotel window. Sadly enough, after about 5 minutes of this, Garrett woke up and wasn't too interested into going back to sleep. Considering we had ten adults and 2 babies crammed into one family "suite" that wasn't so "sweet" when it came to sleeping room, I knew I had to get Garrett out of there before everyone was awake. We took a lovely walk through the streets of Nauvoo until Garrett finally fell asleep. He had a lovely snooze in his stroller while we got packed up and ready to go.



Thanks to Willy's great driving and Jan's expert navigating, we arrived in Chicago. There is a building that has pieces from famous buildings all around the world. Of course, we were impressed to see a piece of granite from the Salt Lake Temple.

We walked down to Navy Pier and enjoyed some great views of the city.

We all loaded onto a boat and took a cruise down the Chicago River for a tour of Chicago's famous architecture. It started raining but was still super cool. I would definitely do it again!

Big G and Little G in the big city!

We enjoyed some AMAZING Chicago-style stuffed pizza at Giordano's. I will dream of this stuff! We were exhausted after dinner and returned to our hotel to get some much-needed rest.

One day in the city was enough for Greg and Willy, so they planned to hang out at the hotel on Tuesday and drive back to Milwaukee with Brian, Cathy, and Annabelle early that afternoon. Mike, Eric, Matt, Jan, Mal, and I were excited to see more of Chicago, so we headed back downtown for more fun. There wasn't going to be enough room for Garrett to go home in Brian's car, so the little G-Man ended up coming with us. Jan drove like a true Chicagoan trying to keep up with Mike. We knew if we lost him we were in trouble, so Jan did what it took (including cutting others off and running two red lights) to stay on his tail. WAY TO GO, JAN! I kept telling her Willy would be so proud if he could see her expert city driving skills.

We started by visiting the Museum of Science and Industry. We especially enjoyed the dairy farm exhibit. We never see cows and tractors at home, so it was really neat to see them glorified in a museum. :) There were lots of really cool things to see and it was fun. Garrett really enjoyed it--especially listening to the presentations via telephone. As we were getting ready to leave, Brian and Cathy called and had somehow worked some magic and talked Willy and Greg into visiting the museum for a bit before they headed back to Milwaukee. Unfortunately, they arrived just as we were leaving, but we did enjoy a few minutes and pictures with them. We had a whole city to conquer, the clock was ticking, and our time at the museum was up.

We passed this beautiful fountain on our way to the Shedd Aquarium.

I was really excited to visit the aquarium with Garrett. He loves animals and the fish at the doctor's office, so I figured he would love it. As luck would have it, he fell into a DEEP SLEEP on the 15 minute drive there and managed to stay asleep getting out of his car seat, into the stoller, walking down the street, and about halfway through the aquarium. He rarely stays asleep when we get him out of his carseat, so I knew he must be really tired and didn't have to heart to wake him up. He had a good nap and woke up in time to see plenty of fish. We were bummed because they were remodeling the penguin, whale, and dolphin exhibit (the coolest animals in my humble opinion), but it was still awesome and we were glad we visited the aquarium. (Of course, the grand opening for the new exhibit is this Saturday. ARGH!)

You will notice the two turtles "on a date" as Mike said. Everyone around us got a kick out of that!

We left the aquarium for an amazing Italian dinner at Maggiano's. Definitely the best Caesar salad and lasagna I have EVER had. Garrett enjoyed sucking on about 15 lemons at dinner and ate half of my lasagna, so he was fueled up for more fun in the city. We visited the top of the Hancock Building and enjoyed the awesome views of the city.

We did some window shopping along Michigan Avenue and finally headed back to Milwaukee. It was a long and exhausting day in Chicago, but well worth it! Garrett is definitely a born traveler--he was such a good boy all day! He loved being in his stroller and seeing so many new and exciting things.

We flew home Wednesday afternoon and sailed right back into the swing of our regular routine. Garrett slept through most of both plane rides, leaving everyone around us to ask if he was always so good. You can see people get a bit wary when you walk on a plane with a baby, and we were also definitely nervous, but everything went well. Greg enjoyed sitting by a lovely widow who was flying to Utah to visit her grandchildren. She was a delightful lady and definitely helped to make his flight (and mine) much more enjoyable. We had such a fun time and I am already missing the great company, good times, and constant help with Garrett. :)