Chicago Day 3

Our third and final day in Chicago started late.

I left hubby sleep late, hoping he'd complain less about driving and I wouldn't have to on our 6 hour ride home!

While he slept, I obsessively organized, folded, and packed all of our things!

Then we headed toward Wrigleyville.  I couldn't go to Chicago and not at least SEE Wrigley Field!

We attempted to see a game there on Day 2, but it started while we were on our journey to the suburbs and our new car, so we missed our chance.  I think it's just a reason to have to go back to Chicago another day!

Our other reason for making this stop in town before we headed back to Ohio.

Southport Grocery & Cafe

To anyone going to Chicago, I HIGHLY recommend their breakfast! The cupcake pancakes were amazing, but by hubby's bruschetta was even better!  On our way out I got a cup of tea for the road, and it was the best blueberry tea I have ever had!

Then we started the 6 hour drive home, which I didn't mind, because none other than Caden & Caleb were awaiting us at Grandma's house! 

Chicago Day 2

We began again with a lovely breakfast at corner bakery!

Followed by morning tea on a stroll through Millennium Park.

 

The sculpture is by far the strangest thing I've ever seen hanging in a public park.

This piece or art work has a twin facing her on the other side of the area.

Our stroll through Millennium Park left us with time for our walk past the Art Museum on our way back to Union Station.

We wondered around Union Station for a bit looking for a place to purchase our tickets for the train ride to Naperville where our new car was awaiting us!

We finally got out tickets and headed to find a Chicago Style Hot Dog for lunch.

We found Gold Coast Dogs in Union Station.  I am NOT a fan of the Chicago Style Hot Dog.

We rode train on the upper level to our destination.  Hubby and I have a real conversation with each other without any interruptions and just connect!  It was wonderful!

Once we arrived at our stop, we called a cab to take us to the car from the train stop!  

We had or new car then and we were driving back into the city thanks to priceline for the awesome deal on our hotel!

We paid an insane amount to have our car parked over night and walked toward the museums.  

They were closing for the day by the time we got there, so we grabbed another cab back to the hotel.  

We received a great recommendation for dinner at Ben Pao!

Wine with dinner lead to the inability to say no to dessert!

After dinner we walked down to Navy Pier again for some Garrett's Chicago Mix Popcorn!

We stopped in for a drink at Harry Carey's Tavern!

We had a bit more fun at Navy Pier before calling it a night!

Chicago Day 1

We arrived in downtown Cleveland by 1 a.m.to catch our megabus!

We arrived in Chicago shortly after 6 a.m. to Union Station.

We walked with our bags to our hotel.  Thank you priceline!

Breakfast @ Corner Bakery

Then we headed for a stroll through Navy Pier.  

(This photos was not taken when we were there this time. There was NO ONE thereat 7 a.m.!)

Our awesome hotel people had it ready for us by 9:30!  So we headed there for some clean up time and to check out our room!

Shower time, because 5+ hours on a bus leaves you feeling yucky!
Then a stroll down Magnificent Mile where we found Buzz & Woody t-shirts for the boys.  They're going to wear them for their birthday party Saturday!  (Pictures to come after the shin-dig!)
Pizza at Gino's East!

 Then it was off to Blue Man Group in the Briar Street Theater!  This was by far the best show I've ever seen!  It was amazing!  I will definitely see it again if given the opportunity!
We very stupidly decided to walk back to our hotel from the theater on some bad advice from a local.  It was an hour + long walk through Lincoln Park and along the water front the whole way, which left us very sore, but we did see some very interesting sights along the way!

Our walk lead us back to Navy Pier for dinner at Bubba Gump Shrimp Co.!

Following dinner, we were EXHAUSTED and took a cab back to our hotel for a relaxing night and early sleep!

A post about Day 2 coming soon!

Oh crap...

After being out Monday for our fabulous weekend getaway in Chicago, I had a busy day of work ahead, and had planned on working late to do some catch up.  Around 4 this afternoon I'm talking on an account or two with one of co-workers, when I move my arm, and suddenly my FULL glass of ice water sitting on my desk to drink was down the front of shirt, in my lap, and all over my chair.  As it happened, I sat there starring at the cup that was just lying on my desk.  Co-worker stands there watching, and we followed up afterwards by chatting about the mess.  Using all the napkins of my co-workers to soak up things, I informed my boss of the mess, packed up, and went home feeling utterly stupid.  It felt like I'd peed myself all over again, only worse!

3 Days Without:

I'm proud of myself in the fact that my hubby and I just returned home from a long weekend in Chicago enjoying ourselves and did well without distractions!

We both survived for 3 days without:

• Any form of internet,
• Books (other than our map of Chicago siteseeing guide),
• Netflix or TV (mostly, we did watch a teeny bit in the hotel),
• And only about half a dozen calls home to the kids!

Hopefully soon I'll blog about our trip and the great time we had, but now it's time to fix my cravings for email, twitter, the Twilight series, and maybe some TV!

The day I peed myself at work.

During the summer before my senior year of college, I was interning for an amazing company.  (It happens to be the same company both my hubby and I work for now.) For some reason though, this day, I had been busy or distracted and forgot to pee during the afternoon.  It was around 4:30 in the afternoon, I left at 5:00, when I realized how badly I needed to go!  So I hurried to the bathroom.

This day, I happened to be wearing a nice black pencil skirt and my favorite thong.   Every other time I'd used the restroom that day, I pulled up my shirt, undid my belt, undid the hooks and buttons, undid the zipper and pulled my pants and thong down.  Well this time I had to go REALLY bad.  And I thought to myself, what the heck have I been doing all day!?  It's a skirt, I can just pull it up!

So in the rush that I was in to relieve myself, I pulled up my skirt sat down and started to pee.

Mid pee, I had my "OH SHIT" moment.

I had forgotten to take my thong down.

Of course I left them on and finished peeing before laughing at my self.  Then I started wondering what in the world I was going to do.  My options:

• Option 1: I can throw my undies away.  Concern:  It's my favorite thong, and who wants to see someone's underwear lying in the trash can at work!?
• Option 2: I could wash them/dry them out in the sink.  Concern:  What if someone else walk into the bathroom and sees me washing out my thong in the sink!?
• Option 3: Wear them, knowing I have a clean change of underwear in my car.  Concern: What if I smell like piss!?

I picked option 3.  I used some toilet paper to dry them up, and on I went with the last half hour of the day, planning to change them as soon as I got to my car.

Well, wouldn't you just know that it just so happened to be the first night my now husband ever asked me to do anything after work, and he walked me to my car!  (You can read about how I met my hubby here.)  My next thought was that I could change them when I got there.  But no, he was standing at my car waiting for me.  What was I supposed to do, reach into my bag in the backseat and shove undies in my tiny purse to carry into a bar to change with him standing there?  And if I did, again, what would I do with the dirty undies!?

So I sat outside in the hot sun with several coworkers and my now hubby with piss covered undies for a hour or two, hoping to find an early excuse to leave!  Of course, we ended up leaving at the same time, and he walked me to my car, killing another opportunity for me to get clean underwear on.  I'm getting fairly self-conscious at this point, but my next stop was my friend Allison's apartment 40 minutes away.  You'd better believe the second I parked in her parking lot I changed my undies!

My Blighted Ovm Experience

I found out I was pregnant in January.  Shortly there after we discovered it was a blighted ovum.  After doing our best to wait for it to pass naturally, we scheduled my first D&C for the week of my birthday.  (Awesome a timing right?)  A few days after my 24th birthday I had my first D&C.  Things seemed to go fine, and I was slowly adjusting and getting back to normal.

I was having some constipation issues though.  It wasn't the first time I've had this issue after an embarrassing ER visit a few years ago!  At least I knew how to help improve the situation this time.  Well, when the issue was finally resolved, another appeared and there was some serious problems.  I lost a lot of blood from sever bleeding and off the ER we went.

We stumped the doctors.  They didn't know what was going on.  After tests and more tests, I was sent home in the middle of the night to return straight to my regular doctor first thing in the morning.  She was also confused.  We heard the terms weird, shocked, and scratching heads.  She consulted with another doctor in that practice before trying to consult a specialist in a larger city.  After several hours of waiting in the office, a second D&C was scheduled for that afternoon.

The second D&C was a success and they double checked their work via ultrasound immediately after.  It was quite a rough ride for us, and not the way you'd hope your first pregnancy would go, but we've survived, and I feel stronger than ever now.  I can only say that because it's been nearly two months now for me to heal emotionally and physically.

I may not be ready for another baby now, or anytime soon, but I am ready to explore life with a new appreciate for what God's blessed us with.

Halloween 2009