The Return to Reality

We’ve been living in the Chicago hangover now for about a week and a half. Things have been busy for us at work. The fair has really picked up pace, if you haven’t been seeing tv, print, or radio, you’ve really not been paying attention. I do like this project in terms of planning and building the hype. The Scandinavian festival has also taken a chunk of time. Top these events off with just being gone and it’ll make my work days and email box a bit full.

Last weekend was the first weekend Matt and I spent in the condo, which is more and more becoming unpacked. I’ve spent a few Matt-free weekends here and it’s such a hard trade-off for me. I hate being away from him but it’s so good to get some of these things packed and settled. I still don’t have a single thing hanging from the wall but I hate to put holes in my fancy, dancy new place. I hope to have those hung before September. Maybe I’ll be more okay with holes by then.

There was a hole that had to be put into the walls, much to my dismay. The shower in my master bath was leaking into the unit below me, unknown to me! So the plumbers came and opened the wall up to get to the shower. It was a bit of a shock to me and when they pulled the sheetrock out, I know my eyes bugged out a bit! Right now I’m waiting for the builder to get back in and paint the repairs but as far as I know, the leak is fixed!

This week I’ve been helping Mom and I think Dad got jealous. Mom and I are getting her guest room ready. We took down the chicken wallpaper, still don’t know why my mother put up wallpaper. We, Matt included, retextured her walls, and finally this week we pulled out the paint brushes. We are about half done painting. We hope to have that wrapped up next week. Dad, feeling like he needed help, called me Wednesday night and had me come rake a field. The hay crop this year is awful. The windrows were hard to find and even after combining two, some of them were still a bit sketchy to see. To top it off the field was rougher than heck, I don’t know how my father bumps up and down like that. I also feel like I’m getting old, I don’t remember rough fields bothering like that one did.
So my most-recent Matt story, I go out Sunday morning to the grocery store to pick up a few items for breakfast. When I come home I hear him in the shower so I get cooking. He comes out happy as a clam after all, he’s clean and soon to be feed. I look at the towel wrapped around his waist and I begin to chew him out that how can he use that towel, that is not for him, he needs to use other towels, etc.
He says, “why?”
I respond, “that’s my fancy towels, for display only.” 
MJR: “how do you know that?”
ALM: “because it still has the tag on it! I have fancy towels for looks only! That tag has been on there for a year because I hate taking the tag off new things.”
(I still have the tag on my couch, I’ve owned it for 2 years)
MJR: “I just grabbed it, how was I to know?”
ALM: “You couldn’t have just grabbed it; you had to have moved a fancy washcloth and 2 fancy hand towels. This couldn’t have been a simple ordeal.”
MJR: “I don’t understand display-only towels. I don’t have display only towels.”
ALM: SIGH: “We’ll you’ll have to someday, if you are lucky.”
And then I had to rip the tag off my fancy, once-used towel.

Best meal: ribs! Matt made ribs for my family and licked them clean. Matt also made tuna steaks the next day so that would have made it top meal if it weren’t for the ribs!

From the TV show, Friends:
Ross: All right, Monica categorizes her towels. How many categories are there?
Joey: Everyday use.
Chandler: Fancy.
Joey: Guest.
Chandler: Fancy guest.
Ross: Two seconds...
Joey: Uh, eleven!
Ross: 11. Unbelievable. 11 is correct.

Leaving is the hardest part

SO we came back.
We woke up early, I grumpled.
We finished packing our bags.
When I got out of the shower, breakfast was waiting for me, took a bit of the sting away.
We got on the L, took the blue line all the way out to O’Hare and I watched the city slink away from me.
I didn’t want to go and I know Matt didn’t either.
We boarded the two planes to get home.

What a great trip. I can look back now with nostalgia. I have already forgotten the blisters on my feet, the heat, the sweat, the awful room, the long walks, I can only remember the time with Matt, the laughs, the random conversations, the skyscrapers, the places, the sites, the grates in the sidewalk, and the food with the sensation of being full. We had a great time with these brief moments of it being just the two of us and the city, as it seemed the world was on hold while we were having fun.
Even my post is a bit nostalgic this time around.

Credit needs to be given a bit at this time:
1. Matt was amazing with directions and maps. Ninety-five percent of the time we knew exactly where we were and he always great about mapping the day and ensuring we were heading in the right direction. It amazed me how well he navigated. I got mixed up whenever we came off the subway, but he kept things centered and it was nice to not have to worry about that aspect.
2. My mother who babysat the cats while I was gone- TonyDanza got a bit sick before I left, I don’t know if it was a virus or anxiety from me leaving, but I spent the morning we left at the vet’s office with him and had to leave him there. I was so nervous! Mom took care of him, picked him up, and then watched him and the loud-one while we were gone.
3. All those people that made suggestions on where to go once we got there. It was nice to have a few ideas and some beentheredonethat stories to take into account.

Will we go back? Absolutely.

We’ve made a few plans for us over the next couple years, or so. Part of the wonder of the trip was Chicago, part of it was the experiences we had, and part was being able to access each other without work and 100 miles getting in the way. We are so used to only having 2.5 days with each other, it was great to have an undivided 6.

We made it home and threw all the laundry in the wash to avoid the bed bugs we may have gotten from the skeezy hotel.

"Chicago is constantly auditioning for the world, determined that one day, on the streets of Barcelona, in Berlin's cabarets, in the coffee shops of Istanbul, people will know and love us in our multidimensional glory, dream of us the way they dream of San Francisco and New York."- Mary Schmich

That Toddlin' Town.

As I woke up Monday I had a very short pity party. Being that Matt and I have done this long distance thing for over a year and I hate “goodbye days”. I woke up and realized that this would be an almost "good bye" day, it was our last full day on vacation. Where did the time go? We’d been planning for 6ish months and all I had was 24 hours. It wasn’t really that long of a pity party but it set the tone to try to make the most of the time we had left in the Windy City. It was time to make memories AND we did!

Breakfast was great! We found this great place that I’ve only seen as a chain in Chicago, Corner Bakery and Café. It was well priced and the breakfast was pretty great. He had steel cut oatmeal and I had a baked French toast with this amazing bacon. With happy bellies, we headed off to the Art Institute of Chicago. I was excited to see Roy Lichtenstein’s exhibit. I have always liked the Romance and War pieces; they have the cartoon-like look with the narrative bubbles and the dots that extend throughout the image. My other favorite was Magnifying Glass, which takes a closer look at the dots that Lichtenstein is known for. Matt wanted to see the photography but his favorite painting that he wanted to see was American Gothic. I was also excited to see Nighthawks. Overall, art trip was a success.

From the Art Institute, we went to the Lincoln Park Zoo. The walk took forever and ever and ever and all I could think the entire time was if we walk this far to get there, how bad is it going to be on the way back?

The zoo was very nice. We liked the indoor houses that had displays. Our favorites were the tiger, the polar bear, the otters, and the beavers but the ones that probably made us laugh the most were the gorillas. We watched three pretty closely and one was lounging against a tree. Would reach down and eat a pinecone and then proceed to spit out pieces and repeat this cycle. When I commented to Matt that I was surprised that this gorilla was eating pinecones, he laughed and commented that they were not pinecones….EWWW! Suddenly the other gorillas that were eating cardboard didn’t seem some bad/silly! It was a cute zoo and we were disappointed that we didn’t see the seals, penguins, and some of the others that stayed in from the heat but all in all, a success. Also, I loved the meerkats. One crawled to the top of a 5 foot mound just so he could stare at us in the eye, which was just over the glass.

So next came the dreaded walk back that we decided to make better by making pit stops on the way back. Our first stop was the Lion Head, which we should have spent more time at. Matt enjoyed the beer while I had flavored lemonade. After we became rested and refreshed, we went two doors down to Kelsey’s where we enjoyed more beer and lemonade and cheese sticks. My favorite part of this leg of the trip was “the map bet”. Matt bet that I couldn’t find where we were at on the map and I determined while he timed me. When it was time up, I won that round of drinks! Ha, take that Mr. Knowitall.

From Kelsey’s, we took off to American Hotdog, where we enjoyed an official Chicago Dog, complete with pickles, tomatoes, peppers, relish, and mustard. We saw these made at Wrigley but we felt bad for the scoffing there as we’d done, these toppings were pretty good.

Next we had dessert at the Athenian Room, I’d wanted to share Baklava with Matt. This was an adventure as the restaurant had special requirements. There was a minimum $5 per person spend that was required and credit cards had a minimum of $10, which is all fine and dandy but the Baklava was $2.50! So we ordered what they called “greek caviar”. However, we still didn’t meet the minimum spending requirements!

After more Greek food, we went to Marquees, a great corner bar perfect for people watching. There were high ceilings and some great songs coming out of the jukebox. After these drinks were down, we decided to take a stroll through the most expensive Chicago neighborhood, which was located in Lincoln Park. According to Matt’s sources, these houses cost on average $10mill per sale. We pretended a bit during our stroll. It would have been nice to see the insides of some of them.

We finished Lincoln Park off at Kincaid’s playing trivia. We even got a few however someone can’t get mad that I didn’t know what temperature water boils at, he didn’t get it right either!

We took the rail back with our hurt feet and complained about packing and I avoided it as long as I could.

Best meal: Hmmm…the bacon at the café or the hot dog, don’t make me pick!

“Yeah, I eat my own shit, so what, screw you.” – Gorilla at the Lincoln Park Zoo

Chi Town Surprises.

After splurging two days on breakfast, we woke up on Sunday and decided to save a bit by stopping at Dunkin’ Donuts, which was just down the street from the hotel. What a mistake, my meal was small, the coffee was not good, and they were better than the service. Made me want to march right back to Yolk and beg forgiveness for cheating on them. Oh well, we headed off to the aquarium.

Or so we thought. We walked up and saw the line coming out of the building. The line went down the huge stairs. The line went under a tent that had been set up for excited aquarium attenders. The line then curled around the corner and shot further out where we couldn’t see the end. So much for the aquarium. The picture to the right shows us at the halfway point of the line with the aquarium building behind us.

We headed to the Field Museum, which is beside the aquarium, it is more of a history with human perspective museum. We went through the History of the American people exhibit, which was ok. We also took in the extreme mammal display, which was one of the feature exhibits but my favorite was the Tibet exhibit and I also liked Matt’s favorite, which was the Egyptian exhibit. We both liked Sue (the mascot t-rex) and the elephants that were on display. I was disappointed to have missed the aquarium but the museum had some interesting things. When he asked how I liked it, I said, “It was okay, I would have preferred to go to the Museum of Science and Industry.” That’s when he got excited, “Let’s go, I had no clue you would be interested in going to that!”

In a cab, and away we went. This place definitely hit the spot and we could have spent the day there, EASILY. We first hit up the 505U-Boat exhibit and tour. Matt made a good choice and I really enjoyed it. We actually got to go in the U-Boat that was captured in WWII, which the exhibit had been built around. We saw the engine, batteries, the beds, kitchen, and just how small the space was. The tour guide was awesome and animated. It made it even more real to see the bullet holes that were at the top of the sub.

From the sub, we went to the whisper room, which still brings a smile to my face when I remember our conversation. We also took in the circus room, the farm room, and huge electric train set up. Of course, we had to take in the aviation section, complete with fighter pilot simulation. I determined I’m not the best gunner/Goose, I’m not so great being inverted. He definitely made me laugh, after we got out!

From there we headed up to a restaurant that I had heard about from the head chef of one of my favorite reality shows, Top Chef, the Publican. The cab ride was a bit dicey as the driver didn’t know where we were going but we finally made it! We got in and I was excited. The server informed us the menu was meant to serve as family style menu, so order to share. The top of the menu items were smaller while the portions and prices as you move further down the menu become larger. We found two meals midway down the page and went ahead and ordered. He got the steak tartar and I ordered the pork belly. We started with some oysters, as I knew that would make someone exceptionally happy. His tartar arrived first, we dug in. It was great, better than we expected. It came with an amazing egg and some fried kettle chips. The anticipation was high for the pork belly. I was excited to try it and I knew he was still hungry as the tartar wasn’t exceptionally filling. When the pork belly showed up I remember staring down at the plate. With shock. What I was expecting to be a 4 inch by 4 inch piece of meat showed up to be missing quite a bit as it was only 3 inches by 1 inch. As I stared, I heard Matt’s voice, “Where are we going to eat after this?” Don’t get me wrong, the food was delicious and the flavor was amazing and I’d eat that meat all day, we just had different expectations in our head when we saw the menu. I paid for the most expensive meal of appetizers that we’d ever had and we laughed our way to Greek town to have gyros at Mr. Gyros, which was a fast food Greek restaurant with some great personalities serving up gyros.

We left there filled up and began another walk. We walked through the neighborhood and then started heading back toward downtown. Next thing you know, we are heading up the Sears/Willis Tower elevator 103 floors to the sky deck. I’d been there back in high school during the day but they’d really upped the experience. Updated the look and information and I enjoyed it more this time around.

While some people may consider this to be a romantic experience I had the Cabo parasailing adventure in my head. My big, strong, tall, dark, and handsome was very nervous and at those type of heights, he can’t stand to be touched. AND how dare I lean over the inside rail, fully encased by glass, to take a straight down look. I felt a pull on the back of my jeans, “Don’t do that, that’s not right!” We could see the hotel we were staying in, the picture has it just a little to the upper right from the center. We looked around for a bit but then headed back down to a safer level.

We continued the walk home exhausted from the long day. Walking count may be up to 27 miles by now!

Best Appetizer: the pork belly, which was served with grits and cherries.

“What happens if the windows just suck in from the pressure and we plummet to our deaths?” MJR at the top of the Sears Tower.

Chicago Lights Unlit!

Watch for three things:
-Matt
-Amanda
-The Chicago lights




Enter the couple that took pity on us and our struggle to get all three into the pic!



"I think you just cut me out of the picture." ALM to MJR

Bet Your Bottom Dollar You Lose the Blues in Chicago

The windy city made a claim for their name. The gusts really picked up on our third day and unless we were surrounded by buildings, we felt it whip a bit.

Saturday, we woke up not as early as Friday and went to Wildberry Pancakes. Our non-early wake up cost us about a 40 minute wait for breakfast. We found this cute lil spot on the walk from the past night and after a quick stop by the famous Chicago-lights we made our way to it. It was a modern restaurant with a great menu. I had the breakfast burrito (again with avocado) and chorizo and eggs. Matt had nutella crepes with eggs, bacon, and toast. I also had a great big helping of strawberry pancakes. You can’t go to a place with pancakes in their name without ordering pancakes. 

Matt liked Yolk (the place we had the day before) better but I honestly don’t know what I’d do if I had to pick!

After a brief stroll through Millenium Park, we decided naps may be in order. I can almost hear your outcry and gasp. We are in one of the most amazing cities and we took a nap! I know, I know, “sleep when you’re dead” but that hour off our blistered feet wasn’t bad. I think our mileage count for the weekend to this point was about 8 miles.
We made up for lost time that night, don’t worry. We woke up and headed out to Greek town. Honestly, if we knew what we had in store we probably would have come out right when we arrived in Chicago. We ate at Greek Islands. It was wonderful. We had spinach cheese pies for an appetizer. For the main course, he had a baked eggplant dish and I had a chicken pasta dish, which were both big enough to share. His dish came with these amazing potatoes…he doesn’t like baked potatoes but I didn’t hear a single complaint about these ones. We finished the meal off with a dessert of custard, shredded filo, and wonderfulness. We had to walk a bit around the neighborhood, attempting to avoid our discomfort.

We got back on the “L” and head for Navy Pier, which according to all travel sites and books is wonderful and magical. It wasn’t. The bathroom had an inch of water, there were 9 million screaming children, and the “great shops” that were overpriced and unoriginal. Don’t get me wrong, we took a walk enjoyed the skyline which was beautiful and a great display of the city. We enjoyed looking over the lake and the horizon and we hadn’t had the opportunity until then. We could have done without the amusement park and the DJ. I did thoroughly enjoy the seagulls. We sat down to rest, take in the scenery, and we watched them swoop in and out. And then Matt got crapped on. And I laughed. More than I should have.

From Navy Pier, we weren’t ready to head back to the hotel but had “been there, done that” at the Pier and I wanted to get out of the wind a bit, which had really come up by this point. We ended up walking back toward the “L” and stopped in at D4 Irish Pub. Little place with a decent drink menu. It was Matt’s turn for the flight of drinks, except his chose local brews.
We left there and headed to “Local” or Blue Frog Local 22. We ordered the Mac and Cheese bites which are served with a honey mustard sauce that really was awesome! We were happy there until karaoke started. Matt was super excited to take me across the street to Shaw’s Crab House, their sign bragged of sushi, oysters, and martinis, which he reminded me were his favorite things. He got his fill of a variety of raw oysters and even convinced me to try a few. I prefer smoked but these weren’t awful, that is unless you chewed them. What was great was how they served them. I expected the plate to come from the kitchen, instead these were shucked and prepped right at the bar!
When we left the bar, it was pouring. We did a quick run in the Chicago rain to the “L” and laughed over our evening of gluttony and fun. What a great, Saturday.

Best Meal: Greek....still groan just thinking about it!

“We have a problem, he likes oysters and I don’t.” ALM to the Shaw waiter
“I’d recommend crab cakes then which will suit you both.” Shaw waiter to ALM
“Oh no, he’ll have the oysters and I’ll have the Pomatini martini, so really that’s the solution.” ALM to the Shaw waiter
“Oh, so we don’t have problem?” Shaw waiter to ALM
“Nope, we are both happy that way!” ALM to Shaw waiter.

Buy Me Some Peanuts & Crackerjacks.....

DAY TWO: this was one of my favorite days. Cubs Game Day.

That morning, complete in our blue and red, we took off for breakfast, which came as a recommendation from one of my coworkers. We had breakfast at Yolk and we were not disappointed. It was a lighthearted little place with a ton of light and a fair share of yellow. We sat at the bar, I had the California omelet, complete with avocados in it, with strawberry-orange juice, and he had the smoked salmon scrambler and we had to have a share plate of French toast. So good. The bread for the toast had to have been made fresh, too. So I had a predicament as he finished. I suddenly understood Matt’s cantstop attitude that he had with the deep dish due pizza, I couldn’t stop eating breakfast. I don’t know if it was the eggs, the fresh toast bread, the juice, what…it was so good. I always get upset that ND restaurants do not give the breakfast its proper respect and I couldn’t let this moment pass itself up. It’s a good thing we had a bit of walking ahead of us on the way to the red line and the Addison stop.

We decided that in order to save costs and play “local” we’d take the “L” (the subway) as much as possible. This not only saved us money but also footsteps. We bought all together 2 3-day passes and 2 1-day passes, which turned out to be perfect for what we needed. We got on and waited for our stop at Wrigley. We got on and so did 9 million other people. It’s a good thing that neither of us get nervous with crowds or claustrophobic easily. We sure got hot and sweaty though. By the time we got off at our stop we were dripping, warm, and ready to have a little space. It didn’t damper the sights and sounds of Wrigley. It was awesome to see the sign and the stands and the crowds and all the cubs logos. I was surprised at the amount of red sox fans that showed up to the game and we were a little disappointed by the amount of red sox fans that sat around us. Our seats were wonderful but they weren’t horrible, I was happy, I had some space finally, I had a view, and I had a beer. Matt wasn’t as content as I was to sit and enjoy batting practice he had to go and move around. He went and explored and I just took it in. My favorite part of the day was when he decided to come back to me and in his arms he had 2 foam fingers and 2 baby cub bats and one of the best smiles I’ve seen. Made my morning!

The game was great and the energy was high. I loved looking around the stadium and seeing the outside roofs with their own sets of packed bleachers! Final score was 3-0 but some of the best stuff was when we decided to leave the drunken red sox fans and head down to watch the game from the concessions after belting out “Take me out to the Ballgame”. I spied right at the base of the concessions, 2 chairs that I managed to talk Mr. Straightlace into swiping for the remainder of the game. Right behind the catcher….awesome view! The guys that we sat behind also were great, 1 cubs fan and 1 red sox fan, and they definitely were good sports as we watched the cubs bring down the game.

So the best parts were: that smile, the experience, and the HOT DOG…with just a little bit of grilled onions.

That evening we did a bit of walking around and took in Dave and Busters. I had never been and wanted to see what they were like. It was okay, something to experience one and now I’m good. I kicked butt in the horse race, skee ball, and most other games but he did bring home the bacon when it came to some of the tickets and he scored me a FANCY watch that I proceeded to wear for the remainder of the trip.

We ended up walking back to the hotel but not before having to make a few pit stops and even take in a Houlihan’s, which served me up a flight of martini’s.

This girl can’t complain about a day like that despite the sweat and sticky that I felt.

Best Meal: UGH…this one is tough but I think the Chicago Dog at Wrigley Field takes it.

“What kinda change you get in there?” Homeless man sitting outside of a grocery store that we walked out of.

Take me back to Chicago.

Like it or not, we are back. AND I don’t LIKE it! We planned Chicago in the afterglow of our Cabo trip and the only thing that I regret is not figuring out how to stay longer. In true “Adventures of” blog fashion I’ll break down the days.

We left on Thursday, our initial plan was to take the direct flight out of Bismarck to Chicago but because of some aviation politics, we were victims and had to be routed to Chicago through Denver, and I think in the past I’ve expressed how wonderful the Denver Airport is. Oh well, you can’t win them all!

We got to Chicago early evening and took a cab to our hotel room. Our cab ride was one hell of a ride! We cut through a few neighborhoods, took the express line, almost clipped off a biker, drove on the shoulder of the road, drove 90 on the interstate, and watched two BMW’s almost collide. When I saw Matt’s hands clench the seat in front of me I tried not to stress or think what’s the best way to hold on in case of a crash. We did make it safe but I’ll admit, I was a bit nauseous. 

The next adventure was the Travelodge on Harrison and Michigan. I’d like to say this was a quaint and cozy hotel but it was a dump! We walked in and were worried about taking our shoes off! It was a good thing the room was small, that allowed the hotel room to stay cool from the window AC unit. Also, I don’t think people appreciate how nice it is to sit on the bed and be able to reach everything from that place. The furniture was OLLLLDD and beat up, the only art in the room was put up twice, the curtains were awful and I didn’t want to touch them and standing in the tub was like standing on a half-inflated balloon, there was an air bubble in there but I wasn’t sure when it was going to move. One day, Matt yelled from the bathroom, “What are you watching on TV?” I was completely confused; I didn’t even have the TV on….the noise he was hearing was coming through the bathroom vent! We got over the initial disgust with laughter and agreed that we’d always remember this little dump with the sponge paint walls and only one night stand (which was on his side). Oh, did I mention that when we got arrived, there were 4 fire trucks and the bomb squad outside.

We did head out that evening after the 2 disasters of the cab ride and the hotel shock. We were determined to have deep dish pizza! Pizza Due, whose sister pizzeria, Uno, created deep dish. Matt was in heaven and devoured ¾ of the pizza. It was so thick and the tomato was great, I also loved the appetizer of the garlic bread that we had. The pizza took 45 minutes, but it was worth it. It was also a good thing that we had about a mile walk to work off that pizza-greatness. We slept like a rock that night!
Best Meal of the day: Deep Dish: cheese, sausage, pepperoni, mushrooms, onions, and green peppers in that CRUST!

MJR: “I got to finish it, I can’t not eat that final piece”
ALM: “You are going to regret it”
MJR: “Maybe, OMNOM NOMNOM, it's so good, om nom nomnom.”

Camping Catch-Up

So now that I’ve recovered from the terrible camping weather, I’m back to the weekend. Today was a great day. Woke up next to my favorite man, who was in town to pick up his brand new pickup. We’ve been looking for quite some time. I say “we” because I’ve driven through more car lots looking for white short box Ford quad cars than I care to admit. The smile on his face was worth the hunt today. I know that he knows what he likes and goes after it but sometimes I wish he wasn’t just so particular! He took me for a quick ride before he took off to Dickinson.

I’ve been having fun with cars lately too. I’ve had battery problems for years now, it’s been a real pain in the butt, but I’ve gotten pretty good at operated a battery charger. Now I’m having all sorts of fun with body modules, fuse boxes, batteries, coded security keys, car starters, and more. I’m hoping to have this problem figured out soon, but we’ll see. The last step in this diagnosis was cutting out my car starter, not what a girl likes to see but I’d rather see that then this car keep draining batteries and making me late for work!

I didn’t have to deal with cars today but was able to spend time with mom this afternoon. We took in Target and Big Lots, had some time to visit and problem solve some space issues with the condo. It was a great time and it’s days like this that make me glad to be a bit closer to home, despite being so far from Matt. I guess you could say I got the best of both worlds today.

The afternoon fun was made possible because we are officially on summer hours at work. We start the day at 7:30, take a half hour lunch and leave at 5. On Friday, we go from 8 to 12, giving us a bit longer weekend. It feels great!

I’m spending the first weekend in the condo. With June hitting and our schedules picking up, I decided to stay here since Matt’s got a busy work weekend. He’ll pick me up on Thursday for a wedding that he’s a groomsman in Minot and we’ll stay up there until Sunday. The week after we take off for Chicago, I think both of us feel like it’s not real yet. I haven’t done enough research yet…best get crackin!

Best Meal: I've got to brag about my Campurritos...camping + burritos. I found a recipe on pinterest, they are pretty simple: eggs, sausage, onions, seasonings, in a burrito. I was so happy with how they turned out for trip out. I don't mean to toot my own horn, but Toot, toot!

"That's great advertising when you can turn Chicago into a city you'd want to spend more than three hours in."- Jerry Della Femina