Last few days in Chicago

We said goodbye to Summer and headed back for a few more days in Chicago.  Stacey arrived while we were there and so we got to see her new house . . .

 and go out for a fabulous dinner with them!

The rest of the time we just played with this little darling . . .

 Landon is so good with the grandkids.

Can you tell how much I love this little guy?!!

It was all a great trip - so I wanted to document it.  Better late than never right?

The Wisconsin Dells

After a few fun filled days in Chicago - Tiffany, Madden, Landon, & I headed to Wisconsin where we were meeting up with Summer and her kids for a few days of family fun in the Wisconsin Dells.  The Dells are famous back there - sort of like a kids version of Las Vegas or it reminds me of Myrtle Beach too.  Mini golf courses everywhere, more indoor waterparks than you have ever seen in your life and a whole bunch of weird cheesy other sites.  One thing that I really wanted to do there was ride on the Wisconsin Ducks.  So it's the first thing we did when we arrived and met up that afternoon.

 They go from land to water and back and forth showing you the interesting landscape there.  The same boats they used back in WWII.  It was a lot of fun!

 A great outing that had all ages happy . . .

Pretty much the rest of the week was spent at the Waterpark (mostly indoors because the morning we ventured outdoors it got too chilly for us.  Give me the heated pools and waterslides any day.

 In fact, we were so busy watersliding we hardly took any pictures there.  I have more photos of just simple cousin bonding time - Alex was so good to Madden . . .

 See . . .

 And here we have a serious bath tub bonding experience going on.

Of course all Hunt reunions involve food - didn't document that very well either (and nothing compares to the food in Chicago - but the kids were easy to please.

It was a great time for the cousins, sisters and brother and of course Grandma/Mom to spend all together.  The kids said some hilarious things.  If I wasn't writing this post 5 weeks later I could include quotes - but trust me, they had me laughing a lot.  It was a great trip!

Chicago - the adventure begins

A month ago I was in Chicago with Landon (his first time) visiting Tiffany, Randy & Madden.  First thing on our to do list was getting re-acquainted with this little guy -

He is a lot like his Mom was when she was his age - he lines up all his cars in different patterns - so Tiffany, it brings back memories :)

Next day we took Landon in to see the big City. First stop was the Sky Deck - I've never done that before. You basically walk out into a plexi-glass cube that juts out the side of the Sears Tower on the 103rd  floor.  It's the tallest building in the western hemisphere.  It was freaky - especially because I have a thing about heights - but the view was like nothing I've ever experienced before.  

Took a water taxi to Navy Pier -

                                            We showed Landon the famous "Bean".

and the fountains

Then appetizers and dessert at the Signature Room on the 95th floor of the John Hancock building- what a view!

and this was all just the first full day.  More to come.

Other Chicago highlights . . .

We did a lot on this trip - we took turns going kayaking out on the lake.  The Chicago skyline really is beautiful and we had gorgeous weather for a day at the beach.

On Saturday we went to a Cubs game - I even borrowed a shirt from Tiffany because apparently to go to a Cubs game you have to be dressed in real Cub's colors.  So here we are -

I have never seen such die hard fans.  Everyone was decked out - you'd think it was the last game of the world series.  It was quite and experience - and I was fascinated by the bleacher seats on the rooftops of the homes outside of Wrigley Field.  It was a fun day.

What are the chances?

John has known for a while that Paul was coming out to Reno in early September for an interview.  He was looking forward to taking him golfing and hanging out.  Long, long story short - John managed to get all the son-in-laws and our 2 boys - that's all the Hunt family men up to Tahoe on the same weekend for a guys golf trip.  Seriously - what are the chances?  5 sons, 4 states, 2 job schedules and 3 school schedules.  I don't know how he pulled it off but they all had a fantastic time.  Here's the evidence . . .

These guys all love to golf -

and eat and hang out together.  They all had a blast together.

It takes a lot of golf to make these guys look this tired.

but apparently it's all worth it - they had a great time and are always planning the next guys weekend.

I took a break . . .

I have obviously taken a break from blogging for over a month now.  I had the best of intentions - but between being gone for 2 weeks visiting all my grandkids (and having a bazillion photos to sort through) and then starting a new job the day after I got home I got behind.  And even though the job is part time - I am struggling with keeping up with everything with 30 hours less a week to do it in.  I am sure I will figure it out - and we will put these last few weeks of fast food, expired milk, no blogging, etc. etc behind us.  I mentioned to my husband that my To Do list for today didn't look like much of a holiday.  So he suggested I chuck the To Do list for the day and we go do something I wanted to do.  EXCELLENT IDEA!!!

I love to explore and go see and try new things so we headed out this afternoon to go to this Public Market place I read about in Napa called Oxbow.  It was a lot like a smaller version of the Ferry Building Market in San Francisco.  I thought it would be more of a gourmet grocery shopping kind of a place but it was really a lot of cool little interesting eateries.  We had to hold back as best we could because I had planned for us to have dinner down the road at another place I read about.  It's called The Boon Fly Cafe -

and we went there mainly because I read about their Boon Fly Donuts with chocolate dipping sauce -

They were delicious - and I came home happy.  I still have plans to get the blog updated with all the end of the summer activities but for today this won the day.

What's new with me?

So here's what July brought my way . . .

Aren't these girls awesome? They had a swim party at the Aikele's, followed by a slumber party at my house followed by an all day trip to San Francisco, then back to my house for a dinner and devotional to end our mini conference.

The more time I spend with them the more I love 'em!

It was a memorable and fun day for all.

The next week I was off to drive 4 boys to Rexburg for AFY. Then I headed to Michele's to hang out the next 4 days with these two . . .

Boston and Naomi made friends with a stray kitty, played in their new sandbox, rode bikes, snuggled, told stories, and made a trip to Toys R Us with Grandma.

Aren't they cute?

I hated to say goodbye . . .

but these boys (Landon, Kyle, Johnny, & Tanner C) were waiting for me in Rexburg. They said their week was AWESOME! and it was the best week of their life . . .

I was so glad - especially as I drove for 17 1/2 hours straight that day just to make it to Truckee at 1:30 am where we crashed for the night and headed home the next day. I LOVE these boys - so I'd do it all again, but I did determine that BYU-Idaho was located WAY the heck out there. I can think of a lot more convenient places to put a major LDS university - like ANYWHERE near an airport!!! Just saying :)