Oh, and how awesomely easy is it to pack up JUST YOUR OWN STUFF? I have been wrangling the paraphernalia of 4 kids...I actually laughed out loud! So easy! You can see Mark feels the same way:
And we were off! But not before we took another photo of our happy selves with our camera:
Perhaps we like doing this so much because if you were to look through our photos for the last 8 years, it would appear that we are never in the same room together. Now we have proof we are married.On our way to Chicago, we stopped to see Mark's Grandma Lucille. I have never met her and it's been about 15 years for Mark. It was a nice visit and I was amazed at what a great memory she has. She was throwing out dates like nobody's business. The whole time I kept thinking that the kids would love to meet her, but I'm positive they would break several sentimental knick knacks in record time. It was nice to relax and chat without fear of destroying anything.
Soon we were back on the road and headed to Chicago. We arrived too early for check-in at the hotel, so we googled "Chicago's best philly steak" and went straight to Philly's Best (I heart the iphone!). These were SOOO GOOOD! oh, and seeing this picture makes me want another one.
Check out those eyes! Now you see why I called him "wolf-man" when I first met him.
AND...the BEST onion rings I have ever had. No joke. So good.
After lunch, we checked into the Doubletree Hotel. It was beautiful, right on the Magnificent Mile and a ten minute walk from Navy Pier.
Our room was perfect...huge buildings, lake Michigan and a view of the enormous Ferris wheel down at the pier.
It should be said that the best part of staying here was the warm cookies. Typically, one would receive a warm cookie upon checking in. Mark, however, insured that we had warm cookies at every opportunity...especially while watching 'Iron Chef' when we were hanging out and immediately before falling asleep. I counted SEVENTEEN cookies in our 4 day stay. Now that's value.
After checking in, we walked down to the pier to look at the cityscape and explore Navy Pier. Just as we got there, some low lying clouds moved into the buildings. It was really beautiful.
We walked down to the pier and bought tickets for a dinner cruise that night. It was a three hour cruise with a gorgeous dinner and a jazz band. A very adorable Irish girl sold us the tickets and gave us a better deal that her obnoxious counterpart we had encountered a hundred yards earlier. She told us she knew him and he was from "the city". She was a country girl and we liked her accent better. I suppose rednecks all over the world had best stick together. We walked back to the hotel to change since it was a "formal cruise". Luckily we had the clothes that we wore to the temple. We took a taxi back down to the pier (my first taxi..I know, I know, I'm a bumkin)
The ship was beautiful and our table was covered in rose petals in honor of our Anniversary. 
One of Mark's many "you're taking my picture" goofy poses.
The food was delicious and they brought out a crazy dessert plate with cobblers, bread pudding (so yummy) ice cream, strawberries, chocolate, whip cream and candles. It was nutso. The only thing missing was that mariachi band from Dora the Explorer. We couldn't resist the photo opp (although we'd already eaten a bunch of it):
After dinner we went up to the top deck and enjoyed the view of the city. It was still very cloudy and people seemed to be a little bummed about that, but I really thought it was very beautiful. 
After the sun went down, the ship dropped the anchor and we watched the Navy Pier fireworks. It was such a fun day and unusual for us to be able to do something like this. I love being with Mark and I was reminded how much fun we have. He's so attentive and thoughtful. I'm lucky!
hey, i thought melvin was mine all mine. what gives?
ReplyDeleteyou guys are too cute. gotta get me some anniversary kid free trip action one of these days. will that make us cute?