Anniversary Weekend Celebration: Chicago

On Tuesday, October 2nd we celebrated our second wedding anniversary. I really just cannot believe it has been 2 whole years already. They say time flies when you are having fun and it honestly has flown by. I've heard that it doesn't ever slow down, especially once you have children...I guess I have been warned!

Last weekend we took off for Chicago (about 3 hours away) for a little anniversary get-away. Stephen's parents were nice enough to stay at our house and take care of sweet Louie so I was actually about to relax and not worry about the fur ball every second. Thank you Dave & Bev for taking such good care of him for us!

On the way to Chicago we stopped in Michigan City to hit the outlet mall. The damage was minimal...as it turns out, shopping isn't as much fun when you are pregnant! Stephen did get some new tennis shoes though and that was the purpose of the detour, so I could it a success. We arrived in Chicago at the perfect time to check into our hotel-The Palmer House Hilton. Rant: I have loved this hotel in the past and this is the 3rd time I have stayed there. This time? It did not impress me at all. Also, I didn't sleep well...now, I don't know if that's the hotels fault or my pregnant body's fault. That has yet to be determined. We did decide to try a new hotel next year though! :)

After checking in, I had planned for us to hit the Willis tower but that just didn't happen. I was feeling so tired and Stephen must have been too because he did not object when I suggested to stay in the room and rest/nap. It was so nice!

After resting up, we headed out to our dinner reservations at Texas De Brazil. The walk there was beautiful along the river:

Have you ever been to Texas De Brazil? Oh my, it was DELICIOUS. I may or may not have dreamed about the meal for a couple nights afterwards. No lie. Here we are waiting for our table:

You have to have desert on your anniversary, right?

Walking back from dinner was even better than walking there. The city is just beautiful at night. Seriously, check these out: (taken with iPhone so the quality is not the best, sorry)

Sunday morning we woke up and checked out of our hotel. After checking out we stopped in the city for breakfast at a little corner cafe. We ate here last year and loved it, but this year they seemed to be out of almost everything. It ended up being good anyways and we enjoyed eating outside in the cool weather. Fall has arrived and I am loving it!

After breakfast, where do you think we headed? If you guess Ikea, you are right! We planned on spending some time shopping for a few things for throughout the house and for sweet Baby D. The trip was a total success and we were there for several hours. I really don't see how you could go to Ikea and not be there for at least 2 hours. It's just crazy huge!

Sunday night when we got home the first thing we did was love on Louie. We also settled in to watch The Amazing Race before bed. Monday was coming fast after a busy and fun weekend! As it turns out though, I took a sick day from work due to pregnancy sickies so Monday was actually a nice day spent sleeping in and watching many, many episodes of Grey's Anatomy for me!

Tuesday at work, these beauties arrived:

Aren't they beautiful!?

Tuesday night we decided to use a gift certificate we had for a restaurant in town. It was nice not to cook or clean! We took some pictures before leaving and even made Louie join us for one!

Stephen will probably want to kill me for posting the above picture, but it makes me laugh each time I look at it. He makes the funniest faces when I am testing lighting for photos, it just cracks me up!

And lastly (and not anniversary related), a photo of one of our front tress. It is changing colors and so beautiful! Now it is almost all orange and will soon turn to yellow! I just love fall!

Well, if you made it through this super long anniversary re-cap-congratulations and thanks for reading! I am behind on my weekly bump date, but I hope to have that ready to post tomorrow. Hope everyone is having a great week!

Chicago Pt. 3

If you missed Pt. 1 or Pt. 2, you can catch them here & here!

On Sunday, we slept in a little bit before getting ready to (sadly) check out of the Palmer House. Have I mentioned how great this hotel is? Seriously, it is da-bomb! After we packed all our things and expanded the one suitcase be brought with us on this trip (necessary to get home), we checked out and looked for someplace to get some grub. AKA, breakfast. Corner Bakery Cafe to the rescue!

Apparently I did too much shopping and could not even fit it all in our suitcase...woops. In my defense, gift wrap could not fit in the suitcase regardless AND it was a great deal!

The home of our yummy breakfast and cute sidewalk table :)

We ate our breakfast outside at one of their cafe tables. I thought that it was really neat because we were sitting almost exactly below the L tracks so there were several trains that passed over us. The city is a really neat place!

Their cookies and muffins looked oh so yummy, but we stuck with egg sandwiches. Mine had bacon, eggs and sliced avocados on it. I can tell you this: it will be on our personal menu at home because it was so good! I actually bought avocados at lunch today to this very purpose :)

I love his V-neck shirt. It took a little convincing to get him to like it, but now he loves it. Yay!

Goodbye, Chicago!

On the way home to Indiana, we drove a little bit out of our way to hit IKEA. Have you shopped there? Well, I had browsed their website several times and received their catalog at home but this was my first time in a store. Oh my! They have so.much.stuff that it is crazy-but so fun! I actually saw lots and lots of things that I liked and would like to add to our home, but we only spent a little bit of money on some much needed items like kid cups (for when our nieces come over-now we won't have to give them glasses!), a wok for Stephen to make his yummy stir-fry in, and some serving utensils. If we ever go back I want to buy a day bed and maybe this couch:

But I would like your opinions...am I crazy for wanting/getting a white couch? I mean, the possibilities of what we could be getting ourselves into is pretty endless, especially if kids arrive in the future-yikes! What do you think? Keep in mind that the cover is removable and washable AND we could purchase additional covers for backups...Also, do any of you have IKEA couches? Do you like them? They looked great in the store showroom, but will they hold up well at home when used daily? I do like that each piece has a 10 year warranty...I think if we bought these and used them for 10 years we would definitely get our monies worth!

So, let me know what you think!

I really wanted to eat while we were at IKEA (I had not idea they have a cafe!) but we were not hungry...I did have a low blood sugar though, so we did get a Coke and some Swedish chocolate. Yummy! I think we (or at least I) will be going back to IKEA to make some larger purchases someday. Let me know if you have a truck we can borrow...hint, hint Mom & Dad!

We made it to our home sweet home Sunday evening during a nice rain storm and just relaxed before unpacking. It was just a great weekend with so many memories!



Chicago Pt. 2

Happy Tuesday, Folks!
Let's see...where did I leave off?
Oh, right after our delicious Chicago style pizza.
Got it!

If you missed Pt.1, get caught up here.

After stuffing our faces with pizza and filling our bellies past capacity we headed out for a double decker bus tour. I have done this tour in Chicago before and I know that it is the best way and most affordable way to see all of the city in a short period of time. If it does not rain. Well, it rained. A lot. We made it to a couple stops and got our free sample of popcorn (yummy!) before we made it to the top of the bus. I'd say we had about 3 minutes up there before the sky opened up on us...oh it is a memory for sure!

Here we are in front of the Chicago Theater in the Theater District before the rain started!

I loved these fountains in Millennium Park, and there were so many kids/families playing in them. So fun! Oh, and the faces change every few minutes and they are all faces of people who live in Chicago!

We (I) snapped pictures while waiting for buses frequently!

The bag in Stephen's hand was our free sample of popcorn. We were both surprised at the size and how good it was!

Sitting on top of a double decker bus in Chicago in a thunderstorm...I'd be okay if we never did that again!

But I got to use my zebra umbrella!

Wet and cold waiting for the hotel elevator to take us to our room where dry clothes were waiting for us. We stayed inside for an hour and waited out the storm before venturing to the bean...

This is not actually called "the bean", it is the Chicago Cloud Gate which was built in 2006 to reflect the cities skyline. It is a must see if it is your first time to Chicago, or if you just think it is cool (which I do).

After visiting "the bean" we boarded the bus to see Sears (Willis) Tower...but it started raining again! We made the most of it though!

I was really looking forward to going up Willis Tower because it has changed since the last time I visited Chicago. Now they have the skydeck, which seems to be a glass cube that jets out from the side of the building so you are basically standing on clear glass over top of Chicago. Sadly, there was a 2 hour wait to go to the top :( Since it was raining, and kind of foggy we decided quickly that it would not be worth the wait since we were not sure how great the view would be. Maybe next time we visit Chicago we can make it to the top!

This is Stephen checking the weather to see if we should even try walking somewhere for dinner...we really were over getting rained on AND we were running out of clothes!

After that letdown, we headed back to our hotel on foot to change into dry clothes (again) and make dinner plans. Usually when we are traveling or on vacation, I want to eat at new places-or places we can't eat often at home (Chic-Fil-A falls into this category). We ended up eating dinner at Flat Top Grill because it was right by our hotel and we knew we would enjoy it because we have eaten there before in Fort Wayne. It was great and dinner was delicious!

After dinner we did a little shopping at TJ Maxx, where I got some super cute gift wrap and a lovely cake stand. After that shopping trip, we headed back to the hotel and ventured around the beautiful lobby some before heading up to our room and ordering room service for some dessert!

I have said it once, but I must say it again: the Palmer House Hilton lobby is BEAUTIFUL! There is so much detail in the design that it is just breathtaking. This is the second time I have stayed here and I would be okay if we only ever stayed here while visiting Chicago! The room service was so speedy, but delicious? No. Neither of us really liked the apple thing and I especially did not like the ice cream. Stephen did like the ice cream though...I can't remember what the flavor was. It was a little to fancy for my taste!

And that concludes our Saturday in the city. Sunday will post tomorrow, so check back!

Toodles!