Agrrrr

Disclaimer: This next post may be a bit on the "politically incorrect" side.

Look Mom! I'm a pirate! AGRRRRR.

Hope I didn't offend any of you peg-legged pirates out there.

Chicagoland adventures continued.........

What to do, what to do. What do you choose when there are so many things on your list? This Saturday it was our turn to clean the church in the morning so we didn't have time to travel very far. So we decided to learn a little bit more about our new home town, Plainfield. So, we headed over to the Plainfield museum. It was supposed to be open but unfortunately it was closed. I did however get a picture of the storm cellar (aka tornado hide-out).

It's a good thing they have one since this tower is right behind it.

Is it just me or does this baby have "tornado come and hit me" written all over it? Well, at least Conal agrees with me on that one.

Since the Plainfield historical museum was out we decided to head over to one of the many "forest preserves" that they have in the Chicago area. I have to admit, I was a little skeptical about a forest preserve right in the middle of a city. I was pleasantly surprised. They are really cool. There were tons of trees (no leaves right now though), the birds were singing and it was very peaceful. Here we are at the beginning of our little walk:

And here were are at the end. Notice how happy everyone looks.

I'm sure that everyone was wondering why I was wearing my hood when it was such a nice day outside. It was the only way to keep the sweet little munchkin in the back from pulling and eating my hair.

I imagine that this place is very green and beautiful in the spring and summer and very colorful in the fall. We will definitely have to go to one of these during every season.

We ended the day at a local favorite called Nabby's. Good food. Good times. On to the next adventure...........

Going Green

Don't worry. This isn't a post to guilt trip you into doing your part to curb "global warming". This is all about St. Patrick's Day. We Chicagoans take our St. Patty's day seriously. (side note: did I just call myself a Chicagoan?)

Nearly every town and Chicago itself has a St. Patrick's Day parade. This year we went to the Naperville parade.

Conal got see his favorite, the bagpipes:


I got to see the Irish dancers:
(by the way Riverdance was here early this month and I didn't find out until it was too late =( )

The kids thought this see-through bus was pretty cool:
And they thought this was even better:
They got more candy then they did this past Halloween.

When we got home the kids decided that they needed to put on their own parade. Why they ended up in the window well is beyond me. We'll have to ask Conal about that one.

Oh.......and by the way. They really do dye the river green!

Dark Knight set---check. The Drake Hotel----check. Lincoln Park zoo take two----check!

The good news is that we checked 3 things off of "The List". The bad news is that I added 4 new items. Ha Ha.

We started our Saturday by driving around downtown Chicago to see some of the places that "Dark Knight" was filmed. I just have to say that I really liked being downtown. Chicago really is a cool city. The kids loved seeing all of this stuff even though they haven't seen "Dark Knight" and probably won't since I find it mildly disturbing.

First we have the tunnel where that big chase scene happens. I have to add that the name of this street is "Wacker". I find it very fitting. Sorry about the quality of the pictures. It's dark down there and we were moving pretty fast!
There is a discrepancy among Chicagoans about which building Batman is standing on top of at the end of the movie. It is either the Sears tower:


or the Hancock building which you can see here behind the Drake hotel which was also on my list. The Drake hotel is where the final scenes of "The Fugitive" take place. I love that movie.

I have to add that the city looked really cool yesterday because it has been raining for two days straight and there was a bunch of fog downtown. Sometimes you couldn't see the top of the skyscrapers and sometimes you couldn't see the bottom.

I'm adding this picture for anyone who likes history like Conal and me. This building (the brick tower thingy) is the only building that survived the huge Chicago fire in 1871. Hey mom---that means this was there when your grandma served her mission here in 1919.

We also saw the Chicago river that they supposedly dye green on St. Patrick's Day. Hmmm. It already looks green to me! I guess we'll see in about a week.

After this we headed over to the Lincoln Park zoo. We went there with my family when they were here but Garrison and Jackson (who looks at animal books all day long and makes animal sounds) didn't get to go so we went again.

Here is Jackson with the tiger. He kept saying "Look! It's a tiger" over and over. It was pretty funny.

Here is Macy's ride at the zoo. She was so good! She never made a peep.

Apparently she was really comfortable.

It was a fun day, even with the rain. On to the next adventure!

The List

One of the things that I like about living near a big city is that there is SO much to do. There are a lot things in the city and suburbs but also a lot of things to do with in a day's drive. Everytime I talk to someone they mention something new that I want to do. Here is what I have so far but I reserve the right to add to it:

• Lincoln Park Museum and Zoo
• Nauvoo and Carthage at least one more time
• Kirtland Temple and church history sites
• Thunder over Louisville
• Washington DC
• Navy Pier
• Dark Night set
• Drake Hotel
• Amish country
• summer downtown Naperville activities
• the childrens museums (there is one in just about every town!)
• St. Patricks Day festivities----Do they really dye the river green?
• take a cruise on Lake Michigan
• go to the Lake Michigan beach
• visit Wisconsin
• visit Minnesota
• visit Michigan
• visit Tennessee
• visit Penn
• visit North Carolina again while Mandi still lives there and have another GNO with the North Carolina girls.
• church history at Independence Missouri
• Lincoln land
• Abraham Lincoln historical sites (one good president came out of illinois!)
• Ronald Reagan historical sites (ok TWO good presidents came out of illinois)
• the planetarium
• Chicago Field Museum
• Chicago Science Museum
• Chicago History Museum
• Brookfield Zoo
• Go to the top of Sears tower
• Wisconsin Dells indoor water park
• Far West
• Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library
• Mall of America
• Michigan Ave. at Christmas time
• Chicago river at Christmas time
• the aquarium

I guess we better get started.......some of these things take more than 1 day!

edit: I already have to add to the list. I need to go to a Cub's game. Thanks Jessie!

The past or the future

Only time will tell.

Thanks for the plaque Mandi!

I guess we know who rules this house........

Or maybe she is just a really good sport when her older sisters play with her.