Chicago

We arrived in the suburbs of Chicago on Saturday night and had dinner at Weber Grill. The food was delicious! Everything is cooked over charcoal grills. Joe had a steak and we girls had burgers. Then we settled in for the night since we knew we'd have a busy day in the city.

Once we found parking in the city, we decided to do the tourist thing and ride the hop on hop off bus so we could see as much of the city as possible. Our first hop off was at the Navy Pier. My friend Amy texted me just in time that we should eat at Giordano's if we wanted an awesome pizza. We certainly did want pizza, so we tried a true Chicago Deep Dish. Oh my...it was heavy:) Megan, who was not having a good day, does not think that this is real pizza. Sauce is not supposed to be on top. When I asked her what was real pizza, she replied Little Caeser's. Well, guess we have failed there...or not, since it only costs $5!  She finally indulged and I think she liked it.

We looked around the Navy Pier and then hopped back on the bus. I'm really glad we did the bus, we learned quite a bit about the various buildings, museums and landmarks. Of course we had to hop off and grab some Ghiradelli ice cream, the last one of the trip. Then we hopped back on to head to Millenium Park to see the big bean. The girls were quite mesmerized by it. I was quite dizzy from it, but when in Chicago, one must see the bean.  After that, it was back on the bus to our last stop closest to where the RV was parked.

It was a fun day in the city and the weather was perfect. It was cool and breezy, especially on top of the bus. Chicago is definitely a place we would like to visit again when we can stay longer and enjoy some of the museums. It's a good thing some of our friends are moving to Chicago, so we will have an excuse to come up here again very soon!

Minnesota and Wisconsin Friends

We spent Thursday travelling to Minnesota to visit our good friends Steve and Karen. It was a long day of driving, but we were heading East, so at least we were going in the right direction towards home. We stopped at Falls Park in Sioux Falls for a lunch picnic. The Falls were absolutely beautiful, right there in the middle of town. Wish we had something like that back home. We arrived in Minneapolis around 8:30 and had a fun time catching up with our friends. Their oldest is only a month younger than our Anna, so they hit it off right away. The younger girls got to have a sleepover inside, which was a nice change for them.

Friday was a very special day, Anna's 11th Birthday!  Once I retrieved her from the house, she had a special breakfast treat and opened her present of all her favorite gf snacks. Then we all went to Mr. Steve's Chick-fil-A for breakfast and a tour. As a special birthday treat we went to Mall of America. We took their Anna with us. The 4 girls rode a roller coaster, in the mall!  Then our Anna finally got her ears pierced. We had a delicious lunch at Rainforest Cafe' complete with a volcano for dessert. 

For dinner we cooked out in the backyard. Then we carted the whole crew in the RV to a local park to see the waterfalls and walk around. We ended the night with a bonfire and s'mores. It was so much fun to catch up with our friends, see the kids play together and celebrate our special girl. She said this was a great birthday. Having a summer birthday can be hard because we never know where we are going to be, but she never misses out on the fun and feeling special.

We left Minnesota early this morning and headed to Madison, Wisconsin to see some other friends from church. They just had a baby last week, so I got newborn snuggles:) It was fun to catch up for a couple of hours before hitting the road to Chicago. I'll save the Chicago post for tomorrow though! We are one state closer to home!

Can you find Keegan? Six Westies live in our friends' neighborhood, Keegan met 3 of them and loved it!  So fun to see them all together.