Chicago

So the fam and I took a trip to Chicago for the 4th of July weekend. We thought "hey, we have an extra day in the weekend." Though we've traveled to Chicago quite a few times for appointments, flights and other unfun stuff, we've never really been able to enjoy it. So the plans were set: we'd head up to Chicago on Thursday evening after work, sleep in Merrillville which is still Indiana, but only a little over an hours drive from the city, then spend the night on Friday (4th of July) in Chicago.
So we left Fort Wayne about 2 hours later then I'd hoped, we ended up checking into our motel around 10:30 pm, but it's all the better because that meant we had to spend less time in the lovely hotel 'La Quinta,' located in Merrillville, Indiana just off US 30. La Quinta came complete with an incredibly stinky room, set with 2 tiny full beds that accompanied our 3 adults and 2 kids, the activities kept us on our toes because the floors were so nasty that you didn't dare stand idle, but only used them to jump from one location to the other...which was pretty much the bed to the bathroom... After a restless night of Pedro sleeping with his mother and me with the kids which then became Pedro sleeping on the floor and Arly moving into her Nana's bed (because she kept falling out of mine) we awoke as soon as possible. Then we did our best to enjoy the free continental breakfast...ummm yuck is all I can really say. So we headed up to Chicago in high spirits to have some great fun at the 'Lincoln Park Zoo.' Surprisingly the car ride was really pleasant which is quite unusual driving with 2 toddlers in a multi traffic lane city, but we did good.

After over an our waiting in line to PARK THE CAR, we finally arrived at the entrance.

Now for those who do not know this is a free zoo, so that was definately an added benefit. We had a good time at the zoo, it was really spread out and it wasn't the FW zoo that we've been to 100+ times and could walk through blindfolded, but it was fun and different. We saw Lions Gorillas & Bears among some other typical zoo animals.....

After over 5 hours within the zoo ( I know it was at least that long from the parking bill) we decided to head back to our hotel. Now, I'll just say Mapquest and GPS systems are great; however when you miss one turn, your mapquest isn't too helpful any longer, but wait we have the GPS...but in a big city with lots of tall skyscrapers, the signal doesn't work. So for over an hour we searched for our hotel...but that's all okay because it gave us a chance to see the city over and over again, as well as an opportunity for Arly & Pierre to nap. After our hour search we found our hotel. It's called "Homewood Suites" and if you are ever in Chicago I definatley recommend it. It was awesome. It was a suite with a King Sized bed in a separate room and a pull out sofa in the main room. But wait, that's not all, it had a kitchenette complete with Fridge, Microwave, Sink and all...yeah that's right we didn't have to brew our coffee in the bathroom...oh and the bathroom was really nice too and Pedro was pretty excited about the large flat screen TV. We also had a nice view, it could have been higher (we were on the 13th floor), but whenever we wanted to know what time it was... all we had to do was look out the window:

That night Pedro, the kids and I decided we would journey the 1.3 miles down to the Navy Pier to watch the fireworks display. ....

Seriously it was fun, but way to crowded for my flavor, but hey I went to Chicago on 4th of July what can ya do. We had fun, but after the fireworks we were ready to go. So we followed the stampede (really there was a stampede) all the way back to the hotel. Poor Arly had gotten her hair caught on some woman's button on her jacket and we held up the line. I heard some woman say "what the hell it's almost 10 o'clock those kids need to be in bed" I had about enough at that point and didn't want to go a little crazy on her and let it go....but I wanted so bad to grab her by the hair and say "Listen you b*tch it's flippin 4th of July, as if you're parents put you to bed at 8 o'clock on 4th of July, and in case you didn't notice we are heading towards the flippin exit." But as I stated before I kept my cool...but it feels good to type that to other people to express what I wanted to say....Overall we had a nice fourth



So Saturday morning arrived very quickly and we were off to The Shedd Aquarium. No I'll just point out that the aquarium is NOT FREE! It's pretty "salty" for my taste lol...oh i crack myself up...get it...salty...salt water...ok sorry i'll continue. The aquarium was fun but for me not worth the money...I think I expected the dolphins to like talk and walk around the building or something...didn't happen obviously. I was excited though because after waiting in line forever, I seen a sea turtle (i love turtles) swimming around in an aquarium...so i said to myself "oh great I'll definately have to get me a pic of him"...but when we got to that area 2 or so hours later I couldn't find him...he was hiding I spose :0( Oh well next time... Overall the Shedd Aquarium was okay the dolphin show was lame for waiting for over an hour to see it (we missed the 1st show so I made sure we had seats for the next show) they did a few jumps, but most of the show was talking (I know that's good that the don't work the animals to hard but still....) ....

We headed home after the show and had a nice trip, surprisingly the kids stayed up the entire way home, which was nice because they didn't put up a fight come bed time.

However I really wish we would have pulled someone off the street to take one stinkin family picture...here are some of our multiple failed attempts: (notice Rafaela's mouth is open & Pierre crying in more than half of them.) hahaha,ahhh vacations...