Our Fun, Family Trip to Chicago

This past weekend, Jake had set up a few meetings with customers he has in Northern Illinois. He had 2 on Thursday and 1 on Friday morning. So we thought it would be a great opportunity to incorporate an extended weekend getaway right before the kids started back to school this week.

We loaded up and headed out early Thursday morning. The kids and I just waited in the car while Jake had each of his meetings that day and then we checked into our hotel that afternoon. After checking in and doing a little swimming in the hotel pool, we went out to see a movie and have dinner. We went to see Incredibles II, which was great and then had dinner at Giordano's Pizza which was great as well! I highly recommend both!



The next morning, while Jake was at his last meeting, the kids and I got ready and had breakfast at the hotel. We then packed up our things and headed about an hour and a half from where we had been staying, to Gurnee, IL. We spent the entire day Friday at Six Flags Great America. We have season passes so we were able to get in free. It was a great day to be there too. The lines weren't terrible and we were able to ride several rides multiple times. This Six Flags had a ton of rides that Avery could ride, which was great! She's right at 42" and there still aren't a lot of rides at our Six Flags in St. Louis that she can ride yet. It was wonderful that Six Flags Great America had so many rides that she could ride. She even got to go on a roller coaster that went upside down 4 times!! She loved it and rode it 3 different times. Our kids are such little dare devils. We had such a fun day!!

 

The park closed that evening at 10:00, and we headed to a new hotel, close to Six Flags. We got our stuff unpacked and headed to bed. We were exhausted from spending the entire day at Six Flags.

Saturday morning we got up and had breakfast at our hotel and then drove about 20 minutes north into Wisconsin to visit the Jelly Belly Factory! It was such a fun little tour! You load up on a little train and they take you through and tell you all about the history of the company and show you videos about how the jelly beans are made. Afterwards we got a free sample pack of jelly belly jelly beans and bought a few more flavors for the kids.

After that, we got in our swimsuits and headed to a nice beach on Lake Michigan, about 20 minutes from our hotel. It was so cool for the kids to see a lake that looks like an ocean! They were amazed. It's also cool because in May we were in Florida and swam in the Atlantic Ocean, then this past weekend we swam in one of the great lakes, next month we'll be in California and will swim in the Pacific Ocean and then in January we'll be taking a cruise from New Orleans into the Gulf of Mexico. So all within a year, we'll have been to all 4 sides of the United States. We didn't really plan it this way, but it just happened to work out and we're pretty excited about it. :-)

After spending part of the afternoon at the beach, we headed back and did some swimming at the hotel.



Then we headed to Gurnee Mills Mall for dinner at the Rainforest Café and we walked around the mall for a little while.

This store called "It's Sugar" was so cute and I just had to take a picture of it with Avery because her nickname is "Sugar!" So perfect.

We went back to the hotel afterwards and just hung out and did a little more swimming before going to bed.

Sunday morning we got up, got ready and had breakfast at the hotel before packing up and heading into the city to visit Willis Tower. The kids were amazed by the size of the city and the buildings! It was such a fun experience, besides the hour wait we had just to get up to the sky deck and then the other hour long wait to get out on one of the sky deck glass ledges. However, all in all it was a lot of fun and Jackson said it was his favorite thing we did on the trip!

After leaving the city, we started our drive back home to St. Louis. Along the way, we stopped at this adorable little diner called "Old Route 66 Family Restaurant." The food was good and it was such a cool stop. Right across the street was an old Texaco station that was really cool to see.

These murels were painted on the side of the restaurant. So cool.

We had such a great trip to Chicago and we already can't wait to go back.

Back To School Photos

Jackson and Avery are both enjoying their last full week of Summer Vacation this week. We are celebrating with a long weekend trip to Chicago to visit Six Flags Great America. :-) We leave this Thursday and come back on Sunday. Then we'll be gearing up for "Back to School!"

Jackson will be a first grader this year!!! He's going back to Long Elementary and his teacher's name is Mrs. Craden. He's very excited to start back to school and that makes me so happy!

Avery will be in Pre-K this year. Her last year of preschool!! :-( She is going back to Lindbergh Early Childhood Education and she is going to be in the Caterpillar Room with Ms. Darr and Ms. Beel. Jackson was in this same class for Pre-K so I'm excited for Avery since I really loved both of these teachers. Avery is going half day on Monday/Wednesday/Friday. Avery is also really excited to go back to school this year!!





We're hoping for another great year of school and looking forward to all the learning and growing they'll do!

Playing Baseball Under the Lights

Jackson's last game of the season with his Rangers team was this past Monday night. They got their medals before the game, which is always exciting. It was his first time getting to play an evening game under the lights! It was a nice evening to watch him play ball and as always, he did great!



Sunflowers!!

My sister and I met up at a local, public sunflower field this past Sunday evening to get some updated pictures of the kids. I had never been to a sunflower field before, but it was a dream of mine ever since I started my photography journey. Despite the fact that it was super hot and super crowded, we got some great shots and I'm excited to share them with you today.

Our main goal was to get a cousins shot which we were able to accomplish! After that we had some specific shots we wanted to get as well but anything else was just icing on the cake. We managed to get most of what we wanted, despite the sweat dripping down our faces and the bees trying to attack us! Ha. My nephew Emerson (red overalls) was the only one that gave us some trouble (terrible twos, ha), so unfortunately we didn't get an individual shot of him by himself, but we got just about everything else we wanted so that's pretty good. :-) I can't say that I blame him for not being too willing to cooperate. It was HOT!!



5 on Friday!

Happy Friday!
Today I'm linking up with Christina, April and Natasha for Five on Friday!

One

We got Jackson's baseball pictures back recently and he looks so handsome and grown up!

Two

Last week I happened to have my camera at work because I had a photo session in the city right after work and before I left for the day, there happened to be a rainbow and I was able to get a quick picture of it. So pretty.

Three

Last Saturday the weather was beautiful, so we took advantage of it and headed to Six Flags for the evening. We have season passes so we love to go out there and spend some family time together. They have their Mardi Gras Parade going on this month which was fun to see and the kids got a TON of beads! While we were there, Jackson asked if we could go to Hurricane Harbor sometime soon, which is the water park at Six Flags, so since I was off Monday, my Mom and I decided to take the kids there. We had so much fun both days!

The kids at Hurricane Harbor on Monday!

Four

We have an upcoming Disneyland trip planned for the last week in September so I ordered a few shirts for us for the 4 days that we'll be there.

These 2 are for Avery and I.

This one is for Jackson because he LOVES Space Mountain!

These two are for Jake and I. ;-)

Five
Mine and Jake's 11 Year Wedding Anniversary is tomorrow. :-) While we don't have an elaborate trip planned like last year, we are planning to spend a night out together. I can't believe it's been 11 years already. It's been a great 11 years and I am so happy to be sharing my life with Jake!