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Hey guys! The reason for the lack of posts earlier this week was because we were on SPRING BREAK!
Gracie's spelling interpretation of "Chicago"
We went to Chicago and had the best time. As usual, I ran out of time
and was throwing clothes into suitcases and searching for the Chicago
guidebook that I had checked out of the library months ago and renewed
over and over again. We managed though. The biggest problem I had was
not packing enough cold weather clothes. After two days of the kids
wearing the same hoodies as jackets and getting ketchup and
dirt all over them, we took a quick trip to Target to search their 30%
off racks.
Whenever we go on family vacations I have grand plans of what they should be like which are drawn from my family vacations growing up. I can remember my parents picking up my older brother and me from school in the packed station wagon and my mom would have road trip games all planned out for us to keep us entertained. She had every day planned from sun up to sun down and she always knew the answer to the question "what are we doing next?"
Well, that didn't happen for my kids. The trip from Indy to Chicago is only about three hours so I thought the kids would be fine without any planned car activities, but I didn't factor in their excitement and after hearing "when will we be there?" 300 times in 30 minutes, I was wishing we had loaded a movie or two on the Kindle. Then, once we were in Chicago I would start each day after my shower, sitting on the bed in the morning, looking at the day's weather on my phone then to the list of activities we wanted to do and figure out what we were going to do that day.
But it all worked out in the end. The kids were so sad to leave on Tuesday evening. Real tears and everything. I think that's a sign of a successful family vacation.
Because it's my blog, I'm going to share family vacation photos with you all :) We stayed at the Marriott out by the Midway airport and took the train into town every day.
Jim and I are huge fans of the show Diners Drive-Ins and Dives so we wanted to hit a couple of the places Guy Fieri had been to. We started our vacation with breakfast at 3 Sisters Cafe in Broad Ripple, Indiana.
I told the boys to look handsome for my photo. I love Jacob's "smolder" as my friend Kelly called it.
I had the Lemon Corncakes with Berries and Lemon Curd. It was delicious.
Our first stop was Legoland.
I had "liked" their Facebook page and was able to get a coupon that saved us $28.
Restroom sign
After Legoland we drove to our hotel and went swimming. We were looking for a seafood place for dinner and ended up taking the train into downtown Chicago and going to Shaw's Crab House. It was quite an adventure including making wrong turns on the street, getting caught in the rain, trying to hail a cab unsuccessfully, and taking the wrong train back to the hotel. But after we got that out of our system we were "L" experts the rest of the week.
Jim's lobster roll and one of my crab cake sliders
The next morning we went to 11 City Diner, which was excellent.
And headed to the Planetarium.
After the planetarium we headed to Michigan Ave. and hit the American Girl and Lego store.
Sunday we headed downtown to visit Willis Tower.
Naturals!
We were going to hit another DDD restaurant but when we took the train, bus and walked a few blocks to it we saw that it was closed on Sundays. I checked the guidebook to see if there was anything close by and sure enough Ed Debevic's was only a few blocks away.
Although, I have to say I don't think the kids were big fans. I think they were just too young to get the humor. They didn't think the waiters should be mean to us.
We headed to the Navy Pier - unfortunately it was pretty cloudy that afternoon.
Monday was my favorite day. We went to the Museum of Science and Industry and Medieval Times (we saved $42 with their Spring Break special!).
On our last day we met up with some friends and went back to the DDD restaurant that was closed on Sunday - Big and Little's. We had mixed reviews. I really liked my lamb gyro taco. The rest of the afternoon was spent at the Children's Museum.
Then it was the trip home with some sad kiddos. It was a great trip.
I suppose I should mention something wellness related in this post. I'm sorry to say that I did not stick to any sort of eating plan while on this vacation. I ate what I wanted (except chocolate) when I wanted. After the excitement of the first couple of shakes and french fries wore off, I started to remember what it felt like when I was 50 pounds heavier. Feeling the fullness in my face, feeling stuffed all the time. Feeling greasy. Just not feeling good. I'm doing better with food choices now that I'm home but I'm having a hard time with portions and not wanting to stuff myself. I'm giving myself two weeks to get this vacation weight off and I'm hitting Zumba tonight (it's been two weeks since I've worked out).
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