Back from Chicago

Finally, I’ve caught up enough on my work, so I can blog about our trip to Chicago. I must say it was a wonderful trip, and such beautiful weather! Our feet were pretty tired from walking everywhere, as we decided against a rental car (that was a good idea). After being a pedestrian and seeing the drivers there, I’m quite sure that I could invent new curse words and also be put into a padded cell if allowed to drive there :-)

The worst part of the trip had to be when we arrived home to SLC Sunday night at 11.30. Not only was it late, and the vacation over, but we were waiting for our checked luggage to come out and thought that I’d get my car keys ready……………hmmmm………where are my car keys?????? Well, after frantically looking through my purse (which Bryan calls the abyss), my carry on bag, my checked bag, it became increasing clear just where my car keys were – CHICAGO! I was so smart and thought I didn’t want to carry them around with me, so I took them out and set them on the couch in the hotel room…..


***Note to others: if you unpack your keys, put them in your carry-on bag!***


So, we ended up renting a car for the night to get home, and then went back Monday morning with a spare set of keys. However, I will say that the Hilton Homewood Suites in Chicago was a very nice place to stay. From our room we had a nice view of the new Trump Tower being built. Also, when I called them Monday about my keys, they were kind enough to look for them, and then once they found them, FedEx’ed them to me, and I had them back yesterday - 24 hours later! That’s good service!

So, as I said, we didn’t rent a car, so we did A LOT of walking! It was way cool, we walked up and down Michigan Ave (aka The Magnificent Mile) and saw lots of cool, expensive things I could never afford. We also went to the Hancock Tower, which is not as tall as the Sears tower, but we were able to go up to the lounge they have on the 96th floor! Wow! It is amazing how tall these buildings are! We walked to a park there and you should have seen this park – it stretched on and on for many blocks. We also made it out to Soldier Field where the Chicago Bears play, and went to the aquarium as well.

While we were gone, Brittany was able to go to Arizona with Grandma and Grandpa to see Teryn get baptized and little Reese get blessed, and had a wonderful time while there.

And now, it’s back to the real world of work and moving! Selling my house is turning into quite the adventure. Its amazing how much crap you can acquire over a short amount of time (4 years), so this is good at least in the way that it is making me sort through things that I may not need anymore…..like the several pairs of jeans that no longer fit, and even if they did, they are quite out of style. But trying to organize it and get out in the next 10 days is going to be a challenge!

So, enough of my ramblings, I’ll post a couple of pics from our trip:

This is the 'Bean'. It's located in at Millenial Park, and looks like a giant drop of Mercury in the shape of a, well, bean... it was a lot cooler than i thought it was going to be.

A closer view of the 'Bean' - can you see me? It is pretty cool the way it reflects the skyline of Chicago

This is a view from inside the 'Bean'

And another one

A statue in front of Soldier Field (and it may jsut be me, but the lady sitting on the beach looks topless)

Me and my sweetie along Lake Michigan with Chicago in the background - the Sears Tower is the building farthest left

Wow! Look at that sail boat! That's a lot of freaking sails! The little sailboats in the front we think were sailing students - and then there's the huge yellow boat!

Okay, that's all I have time for right now, but i'll post some more pics as soon as I can.

Happy Birthday to Me!

Woohoo! Happy Birthday to me! 32 Years young today and counting!

I love birthdays, and I am so excited because only one more day til we go to Chicago!

My sweetie is taking me there for the weekend!

Woohoo!!!!

I'm selling my house!!!!

This past weekend

So, this past weekend, a couple of things, Brittany started learning her ‘routines’ for gymnastics so that she can start competing, not sure it it’ll be this fall or next spring, but her instructors said she had all the skills necessary, so here we go!

Also, on Saturday we were able to go watch Brittany’s big sister Jessica at a track meet in Provo. Of course by the time we made it there she was finished but it was still good to see her, and, Jessi had her best time of running 3.5 miles, at 29 minutes – way to go!!

Brittany and Jessi :-)

And in other wonderful news, I got an offer on my house!

A Little about us

So, as you may or may not know, Bryan and I are engaged to be married on December 1, in Jamaica and we are sooo excited! Although Brittany’s a little bummed that she doesn’t get to go. But, we promised she can do the whole ‘flower girl’ stuff when we have our open house here at the end of December.

We actually met in Orlando Florida, at the MGM part of DisneyWorld. Turns out we were both there for work, and we ended up meeting the last night of the conference; and as we started talking, we found out we only lived about 30 miles from each other. We work about 5-6 miles away from each other….and the rest, as they say, is history.

So, that was back on December 1, 2005, and this past April 14 (Brittany’s birthday, and my brother Bryan) my Bryan surprised me by asking me to marry him!!!

So, below is a couple pictures of my ring – it’s got a center diamond, with two sapphires (my birthstone) on each side, then along the curve of the ring, it’s also got sapphires; and then the top and bottom have little diamonds as well – it is so pretty! I love it! Bryan did such a good job picking it out!

Golf

We quite enjoy our golf outings, and last weekend we were able to get out a couple of times with Brent and Tracy, at Hobblecreek, then at Fox Hollow.

This year's trip was a much better outing than the last time we were down there, the weather was beautiful, and I didn't lose my club once! Although, the same can't be said of my golf balls. Last year we were there, the weather wasn't as cooperative (note the photos):

Brent, Tracy, my Bryan - last year at Hobblecreek

The cups were a little wet

This year, it was much sunnier! Although, last year was a ton of fun, even in the rain!

Labor Day Vacation and an end to Summer

Well, it seems summer is over now. Last weekend was a trip to the Lake, and a return to cold weather. The Lake was beautiful of course (I don’t think it could be anything but); we had a nice little rain shower one night, which got everyone up and moving pretty quickly. And we had cloudy and cooler weather with a bit of wind the next day; but still a good time was had by all I think. We got some boating in, tubing, hiking, and as always, a trip to Dangling Rope for ice cream!

We had a great time exploring canyons and tracing the little winding fingers back as far as we could until we were walking Brent and Tracy’s boat along the sides of the canyon – one person on each corner of the boat – but what views to be had! (as evidenced below):

Yes, we made it past this curve

The end of the road for us

Some more fun pictures from the Lake:

Me and Britt

Brittany, Hannah and Kira on the tube

The kids eating dinner on the rocks

And now, its back to work, back to school, starting gymnastics again and all that other ‘stuff’. With this cold weather, I’m actually getting concerned for our poor little vegetable garden – for not caring much for whether we had one or not; our first garden has turned out to be quite entertaining – Brittany keeps a pretty good eye on everything and is quick to help harvest the goodies. The best thing for her so far is the corn on the cob.