Part 3 Chicago: Aquarium & Zoo

We went to the Shedd Aquarium & Field Museum downtown in the same day. The aquarium had a pretty impressive dolphin tank, but overall not worth the $70 to get in!
I was sad Tommy fell asleep for the dolphin show. Also, right after this picture Whitney blew out all over her back & totally ruined this outfit so Vic missed the last part where the dolphins danced & then had to go buy her a $20 tie dye onsie that she'll never where again! At least we were in happy go lucky vacation mode so it wasn't as frustrating as it probably would have been otherwise :)

They also had some REALLY CUTE penguins at the aquarium, check them out!

Here's my little penguin playing inside the penguin cave. They had a lot of really cool exhibits for the kids to play on... just WAY too many kids! I read online that it is much less packed on the weekdays, but we went on a Saturday.

Tommy was pretty timid by this penguin like he thought it was real... it was pretty cute :)

I always love the bright colored backgrounds for the smaller bright fish & jelly fish. It looks face it is so pretty!

Lately Tommy has been sticking his fingers in his mouth when he is nervous & he wasn't too happy to be seeing these giant whale sharks.

The aquarium also had a 4D Dora the explorer movie we went to. I went to one is Disneyworld that was pretty cool, but this one was even fancier. The chairs vibrated & leaned back & had fans & water for the person behind you to get sprayed & air blown on so everyone in the theatre got the full experience. Plus they had bubbles & snow fall from the ceiling. Tommy LOVED it & wasn't ready to leave when the movie was over!

By the time we got done with the aquarium & lunch we only had 3 hours in the Field Museum & saw maybe an 1/8 of the exhibits! This is by far the biggest museum that I've been to; it was really nice.

I usually think most museums are kind of boring, but this one really brought history to life & was really interesting.

I was a bit dissappointed not to see a wooly mammoth, but this guy was pretty cool.

Read on to PART 4! (I know the pictures are never ending... I took 500 total!)

Chicago Part 4: Millenium Park

Here is "the bean" as the locals call it... I laugh because Vic & I were walking through Grant Park which is HUGE & long and Vic was tired from walking & the humid heat so he just wanted to turn around, but I was determined to find "the bean"! I never explained to him what it was & that there was a whole nice park there so he was a little frustrated that I'd want to keep walking to find a bean. After we finally found it he thanked me over & over that we didn't turn around as we had a lot of fun there. :) Here he is in front of the big metal bean sculpture:
When you stand underneath it you can't tell what you are looking at, it is a crazy optical illusion.

They had these giant screens that would randomly make a smily face & shoot water all over the kids. The kids would go crazy when it shot out & we loved cooling off in the water.

Everywhere we looked there was pretty sculptures or art. Here is a pretty monument.

Tommy was crawling around & happened to twist around & look at me & it looked like he posed for a picture!

This was in grant park on the way to the bean, but I love seeing the same picture & skyline during the day...

and then at night! This park was totally romantic. I bet a lot of people get engaged here.

I felt like I was in a movie when we were out in this beautiful park and Chicago's symphony was playing such relaxing nice music.

They have a giant pavillion with chairs & then lawn with speakers over top the whole park. It is crazy how many people can come enjoy free music... SOO fun!

Okay.... just 2 more parts to go so please check back again in a couple of days to share in the fun!!! :)

Chicago Part 5: Toddler Paradise!

It's funny how much fun cheesy rides are when you have a 1 year old that LOVES them! We did 4 days dedicated to places Tommy would love.... not exactly what we normally would have picked, but I guess this is our life for the next 20 years: doing what makes our kids happy! :) Tommy went on his first ride. Just like the carousel he had a dead serious face & then didn't want to get off when it was over!

He really wanted to climb where the big kids went, but couldn't by himself so here I am trying to squeeze in there!

Tommy is in love with slides so we thought he'd think these were pretty great...

...but he much preferred these tiny ones like we have in our own backyard!

Him liking baby slides & scooting across bridges because he's too afraid to walk is what makes me smile at night. I often feel like he is progressing so fast & growing up, but when he does these babylike things I love it!

This is what made Vic & I decide to stop trying to spoil Tommy with kiddy outings & just go do the things that we had fun doing!!! (He's riding his first slow spinning tea cup ride)... still not sure why he didn't like it!

I am in love with the splash pads they have over there. They are everywhere & free. Tommy loved them & it was nice to not have to keep a constant eye on him like when we go swimming.

I hated to waist a day on vacation going miniature golfing, but the only mini golfing we have here is SUPER ghetto so it was fun to go to a nice place.

Tommy just hacks at his balls. It is pretty cute :)

Here is Tommy on his first big water slide...

...if you zoom in on the picture you'll see that he wasn't too happy about it!!!

We still had lots of fun doing the "toddler" stuff though!

Read on to my last & final Part 6 :)

Chicago Part 6: Zoo

Here is the FINAL post for our fantabulous trip to Chicago!!! We went to their main zoo & it was SUPER nice! Tommy's favorite animal was the dolphins dancing. It was really fun w/ loud music & tons of dolphins lined up to do one thing right after the next. They said they wanted a bigger show this year because it was their 50th year of doing it.
My favorite animal to see was the gorillas. I don't think I've ever seen one in real life & I knew they were big, but they still surprised me with how big & muscular they were when I was right in front of them.

Victor's favorite was OF COURSE the monkeys. He is so obsessed with monkeys & would get a pet one if I'd let him!!! Here he is pretty excited to enter into the South American jungle.

It was really huge with tons of trees & waterfalls. These monkeys are WAY spoiled compared to monkeys in other zoos! I have never seen such monstrous exhibits like these.

It was fun to see so many of them too.

Here is the asian exhibit as you walk in. I just couldn't get over how lush they make it all for all to enjoy.

I don't remember what this part was supposed to be, but it was right before the zoo closed & it had been a SUPER hot humid day so most people were gone & we had this area all to ourselves. I suddenly understood how if we didn't book it out of there that we might get lost/locked in the zoo for the night!

Since it was late we pretty much had the polar bear to ourself too & he was putting on quite the show for us :)

And finally to cool off we took off Tommy's shirt & let him run around in the splashpad. His face was shear joy the entire time. I wish we'd only found it sooner during the hottest part of the day! Overall, we really enjoyed this zoo. :) :) :)

4th of July

This post is a little out of order, but I wanted to post one of my favorite holidays! I love dressing silly & all RED, WHITE, & BLUE! I always feel so much pride being able to live in the land of the FREE. I've always loved this holiday, but I love it even more ever since I lived out of the country & realized just how great our country is! Here is our family decked out for the 4th :)

I didn't plan on being in IF for the 4th, but they celebrate it so well & since we don't have a parade I thought we should go for Tommy's sake. He was really into it & didn't want to look away from all of the excitement.
One of my favorite things is making festive food so here is what I created for this year. My sister Katie helped me put it all together for her fiance's family BBQ.

I saw a picture of this on someone's blog & didn't know what they did for the star part cuz it was at a weird angle so I made up my own... blueberries on fruit pizza & then did star shaped fruit pizza for the other platter... Vic's favorite.

Here is my adorable little firecracker. It was fun making her booties, headband, & bracelet for this special occassion!

My 2 kiddos... Tommy just stares at the camera and refuses to smile at it these days no matter what sort of jumping jack, crazy tongue face Vic makes!

Summers are for barbacues!

We went to the neighbors BBQ last night and I put Whitney in this outfit for the first time & I was just tickled pink with it! Every day I am just amazed at what a little dolly she is & so fun to dress up :)
Last weekend we went to my Grandma's birthday BBQ on my dad's side. I've never been that close to them so it was really fun to get to know my cousin-in-laws a lot better. I have some really fun relatives! I wish I lived closer to get to hang out with them all more often. Here is Whitney with her Grandpa (my dad!). They look so sweet together.

Tommy loved getting spoiled & having Grandpa push him around in this car. If these things were only 5 bucks then I'd run out and get one asap. They are the smartest invention to have a long handle like that!

Here is Tommy with his first pinata. He liked it a lot better when they gave him a baseball bat to use. He is a natural baseball fan (possible infuenced by his daddy!)

Once the pinata was broken Tommy got a sucker & didn't care about the rest of the candy... he was interested in the toys though & happy to have some new bath toys :)

I helped my sister make stuff for her wedding & it was nice because Tommy was entertained by my mom's cat Yoshi. Poor thing got chased all around the house by him. I have allergies to most animals so he is never around them & thinks they are SO fascinating!

We got some free stickers in the mail so I gave them to Tommy & it is the first time he showed interest in them. He loved putting them EVERYWHERE! His favorite place to put them was Dad's hair. I should have taken a picture of the 2 of them together!

We went to our friend's house today to "swim" and Tommy was in love with their slide! He had so much fun until he was beyond exhaustion. He fell asleep before we even got him in his crib. He jumped down the stairs part & acted like it was a slide. I thought he'd cry, but he loved it.

...just look at that little daredevil's face. He gets such an adrenaline rush when he does scary things. It is so funny that they learn stuff like that so early!

Needless to say our summer has been so much FUN!