Slacking a little bit

So Since Bryan has been in school for two weeks now, our time "doing" things has diminished a little bit. BUT I still have things to share. Last Saturday we had nothing much to do...we tried going to Millennium park, but soon realized that unless we wanted to spend over 10 dollars to park that was not going to work.

So instead we decided to take a little driving tour of the parts of the city we had not seen before. We came upon a bridge that was "open" so we took a little video and some pictures. We have always noticed that these bridges have the ability to be raised open to let barges and big boats come through but we had never seen one open before. So it was a grand experience for us.

And then as we drove more, we just happened to come upon the OPRAH studio. That was pretty crazy!!! It was just in the middle of a bunch of houses and you would never even know it was there unless you saw the sign...

which we did happen to see (I should say Bryan saw first)

So we now know where Oprah is taped. quite interesting.

After this we decided to try and find a park for Kambria to go and play at. So some more driving. We passed the Polish museum...which I thought was cool...

Maybe one day, Kambria will allow me to go inside and see...

And then at the park, we saw some pretty cool trees with very potent smelling flowers. So Bryan had to make sure to take some pictures.

We also saw soem REALLY big dandelions, which Kambria thought were flowers, and I know MaryEllen would say..."Those aren't flowers they are weeds!!" but they were too big to pass up taking the picture. You cant really tell how big they are, but believe me, they were BIG!!!!

Rainforest and mothers day celebration...

So I told Bryan that I did not want a "gift" for mother's day. I do not want to have to take anything else back home to Colorado. So I told him I just wanted to go out to dinner. So we decided to go to the Rainforest Cafe. We had been wanting to go there,but it was kind of expensive for our budget right now. But as a mother's day gift, we justified going. I do have to say that I, nor Bryan, was very impressed. The food was not that great, the waitresses/ waiters were not too friendly, the host was not good and overall feeling was that we were not important.




Now I may be judging a little harshly, but when we FINALLY sat down after a 40 minute wait, while there were PLENTY of empty tables, and we told our waitress it was our first time there, I kind of expected her to explain the menu, give some suggestions or something....we got NOTHING!!!!



So after a while we finally made our choices and waited for our food. The only thing we did enjoy was the decorations. And so did Kambria.



So next time we go out...instead of trying to entertain Kambria I think we will go to the cheesecake factory, where we KNOW there is good food!!! enjoy the pictures.

This is not the best picture, but Kambria enojoyed the fish tanks!
The crocodile...
The frog..

Kambria waving to the camera.
The elephants that Kambria loved but was somewhat terrified of too...
The gorillas
The waterfall
The BIG dessert called the Volcano. It had a sparkler in it and everything. It was very yummy too!

Mother's Day

This is a picture of Kambria eating peanut butter crackers...she eats the peanut butter and leaves the crackers. she here she is on mothers day having eaten all the peanut butter and holding the crackers in her hand. of course the wrapper is in her mouth!!!

Mother's Day...one day to recognize how much we truly love our mothers!! And now I get to be a part of this day in such a different way...being remembered as a mother.

But first I have to pay tribute to my own mother. I have not always thanked her enough for all she has done and CONTINUES to do for me. It was quite the experience living with her and my father again as a married person, I am sure for both her and me, but now that I am on my own again in Chicago, I do have to say that I miss them a lot...especially my mother. I feel like I always had someone else of the girl gender that would understand me and would be able to calm my soul when I had had a rough day with Kambria. My mother is truly an amazing person. I don't think I truly recognized what my mother really did for me growing up until I became a mother myself...and none-the-less to a girl...and one who is especially like me according to the stories I have heard. I am so grateful for the advice she continues to give me and helps me become the person I want to be. Thanks for everything mom!!!

MOM---

Because of you, I seek after excellence in all things.

Because of you, I am excited by learning. (just not as much ;o))

Because of you, I love and appreciate beautiful things.

Because of you, I know and love the Gospel.

Because of you, I know what a good marriage looks like.

Because of you, I have talents to share.

Because of you, I am strong-willed.

Because of you, I want to be a good mother.

Because of you, I feel loved.

Because of you, I am glad to be me.

I truly honor you, Mom. I love you!

So what I did for mother's day...

Bryan made a wonderful breakfast...omelets!

He took care of Kambria and we went to church.

We came home from church and took a nap...then got up from the nap and had a wonderful dinner of tortellini and grilled zucchini. We even had brownies and ice cream!! (they were the left overs from the rainforest cafe!)

And then we got to talk to my mother and Bryan's mother. It was a great day!

A big mile stone...

Lately Kambria has been dressing herself...or should I say trying to dress herself. This is a picture Bryan could not help but take. It was REALLY funny. She has done a really good job with putting her pants/shorts on, but the shirt part of dressing herself is not so easy for her.
This time she thought the shorts should go on her head...She even posed for the camera after she realized we were laughing at her and she thought it was funny! The other big mile stone is that she went poo poo in the potty. She has been very interested in sitting on the potty lately, but of course it is just sitting...
But this time she ran to the bathroom saying poo poo potty and she went in the potty!!! I think it had already come, and then went she sat on the potty it kind of fell off, but she did it! She was so happy with herself and was jumping up and down. It was a cute and exciting milestone for her.

Chicago History Museum

So Kambria and I went to the Library last night after dropping Bryan back off to his library so he could study. We FINALLY got a library card...you have to have a mailed letter that is post marked with your new address that is within the last 30 days and a photo id. So we had to wait to get mail...which we ended up mailing ourselves a letter...only to see if we really could get mail...and ended up getting 3 pieces of mail the same day...

So back to the story. The reason we wanted a library card was to of course check out books for Kambria since we didn't bring very many books, but also you can check out museum passes that get you into 13 of the famous museums around town for FREE!!!

Yes, that is right for free! You can only have one pass out at a time and you get that pass for a week. No one can reserve or put these on hold, so whatever is available at the time you go to the library is what you get. So the history museum is what they had. So Kambria and I went today. This is a picture of the entrance of the museum. It is a low rider car with all sorts of street signs hanging above it.

And then there is a wall next to it with all sorts of sign on it too..

This was one of Kambria's favorite areas. It is the children's area...she could actually get our and run around. This is one of the first bicycles. She was a little nervous to be up on it, but did it for the picture. She enjoyed "riding" the small wheel better...

There was also a play Chicago dog that was made of material.
she did not enjoy sitting on it for very long.
So this is the history part of the museum. Kambria sat in her stroller and ate crackers while I tried to read about it. Here is a picture of some of info available.

This is a picture of one of the first elevated trains in Chicago
And this is called the Pioneer. It made it last trip in 1948...only due to some "modern" advances.

Kambria loved climbing on it...more so because she could and did not get in trouble for doing so. ;o) The rest of the museum had some very interesting facts and displays, but Kambria was not too interested, so it cut our time short. Oh well. It was fun to go and see and do...and none-the-less for FREE!!

a forgotten post...

So I forgot to post about one of the activities we did as a family on Saturday May 3rd. We went to the kite flying event down at Humboldt park. We forgot the camera, and we only stayed for about an hour... so these are the pictures from the kite flying that we took on Bryan's phone...

And here is a picture of the kite that we helped Kambria make. It did not fly very well, but it was fun to see her so excited to fly a kite!

This is a picture of the back of the kite. So as you can see, they had instructions on it, but it was basically a paper bag.

And this is the drawing we helped Kambria with...if you look hard you can see her scribbles on it. It was fun to see her so excited.
There also happened to be a Mario cart display. It was too cold by the time we got to it, that we decided to just take a picture rather than try it out. And Bryan thought this was a pretty cool postal box. It is 3 seepio from star wars, but it is a mail box...that people actually use too!

Trains and classes

These are the tulips that have bloomed in tha past two days that are just in front of a building next to us. The tulips are EVERY WHERE here right now and are just gorgeous! We love seeing all the different colors and varieties.


May 5th ...
This is a picture of Bryan on his first day of on site classes. This is the sign that sits in front of the building. It says "Rehabilition Institute of Chicago." Northwestern University Prosthetic-Orthotic Center. Isn't he just so professional!!!! He even has his name tag he has to wear to get into the building!

This is one of the many signs around stating it is the #1 rehabilitation Hospital in America!!! Way to go Bryan for getting into their program!!!!
And I have to share with those of you familiar with the game Ticket to Ride. Kambria has even found a love for this game. We let her play with the small cards, and the "extra" trains. And she really thinks she is playing the game. She loves trains now that she sees one everytime we go outside since the "el" (elevated train) is just a few blocks east of our apartment. So the next few pictures are of her "playing" the game. She is intensely deciding which route to take...

She has decided and is putting them on them table now...
And then she says..."WIN!!" with such enthusiam!!! It really is quite cute!

This is our adventure for today...May 6th. Kambria and I left the house around 10:30am and walked to the closest Library to try adn get a library card, now that we haev recieved some mail here in Chicago to prove we live here. And we get there only to find out theya re closed today fro an inservice meeting. AGH! That was frustrating!!! So we continued on our walk to meet Bryan for lunch. So we found a cute little park that is only about 2 blocks away from Bryan's school. It was fun to have Kambria playing and then when "Daddy" got there she was even more happy! She is DEFINITELY a daddy's girl. She is always so worried when she does not know where he is or when he is coming back.

So these are the pictures from our park experience today.

Kambria decided she was done swinging and started to "get out" according to her. She can't fall out of the swings...it just looks like it in the pictures.
Swinging away with Dad.
This is how close we are to Lake Michigan...litterally across the street! How pretty huh?