Chicago-Wisconsin Trip 2009

Colby and Austin got their first taste of flying last Thursday when we took off for Chicago on a trip to see Jared and Katelin and Jake and Nicki and their families. They were a little nervous, but once we took off, they were fine and loved looking at all the cars and buildings getting smaller and smaller. They alternated between reading, video games, and looking out the window and survived their first flight just fine. They both agreed that it beats the heck out of driving for 20 hours to get to Chicago. And of course Mel and I kept reminding them of how completely and totally spoiled they were for getting to go on this trip, so I don't think they dared complain. They were impressed by the tiny little airplane bathrooms and the fact that the nice ladies come around and give you a FREE drink. Woah. Some people are just easy to impress I think.

We took the L train from O'Hare to downtown Chicago. Frankly Melanie and I were pretty impressed with ourselves for that little adventure. We figured it out just fine. The boys definitely had a bit of culture shock, but thankfully they were quiet about it (good thing too since it was rush hour and there were plenty of interesting characters around).

First stop was the Sears Tower (no I will not now be calling it the Willis Tower, as some things just cannot be messed with). Austin was brave and ventured right out onto the new glass walkways on the 103rd floor. I took a little coaxing and Melanie had to outright drag Colby onto there. I admit it's pretty freaky taking that first step out onto the glass, but so worth it. Very cool and definitely worthy of bragging rights.

Turns out heights are not really Colby's thing. Who knew?

Austin thought this would be a cool picture on the glass. I would not normally lay on glass 103 floors in the air, but I had my 11-year-old son with me, and I've got an image to maintain.

Millenium Park at night is beautiful. They have cool fountains and sculptures and this huge jelly bean sculpture. Since we were there at night, the pictures of the jelly bean sculpture didn't really turn out, but it looks like this stolen picture below. Very cool.



From the time we purchased our tickets to Chicago and the time we arrived, my brother Jared and his family moved up to Minneapolis, so in an effort to see both families, who now live 6 hours apart, we arranged to meet at Wisconsin Dells, which is a VERY COOL place! Who knew such a thing even existed? It's a huge resort with three indoor waterparks. There are hotels and duplex style condos all around and in the middle there are three huge water parks with some completely insane rides. It was a lot of fun. There are restaurants and arcades and laser tag and all of that for when you get water logged after 15 hours in the pools and on the slides.

Austin loved the water park. Even when I got out to take a rest, he never skipped a beat. He was having a hard time believing he was at three Seven Peaks water parks in ONE DAY. Crazy stuff.

The coolest thing there, if you ask me, was this huge wave pool, and if you'll notice, the ceiling in this building is glass. Well, this glass DOES NOT BLOCK THE SUN. So you can be in the sun (and get a tan of course) INSIDE A BUILDING. Just my kind of thing.
I told Jared, as I was taking this picture that it was going on the blog. So don't feel sorry for him, he was warned. This is his method for drying off before we went to one of the restaurants to eat lunch.

The whole gang at lunch. There's some funny expressions if you look at all those faces. Take a look at Jared and his son John (right in the front). These two happen to be the best demonstration of "like father like son" I have ever seen. Just look at their expressions in this picture. Ha ha! The best part was watching Jake trying to manage his three high-spirited little ones while they ordered food and kept them entertained with ice, ketchup, straws, forks, napkins, drinks, ranch, salt shakers, etc. Fun stuff.

John was so excited that he was big enough to play laser tag with the big boys at 10:30 at night. The kids were all really good sports. They were up late every night and really did pretty good.

Austin takes his laser tag pose very seriously. Looks pretty ominous to me.

So Jared normally won't smile in any picture. He said something about hating pictures, but all I heard was blah, blah, blah as I snapped pictures right and left. So in the one picture the whole weekend where I said not to smile (seems weird when you're holding a gun), check out Jared's face. Some people.

Sunday morning we packed up and headed back to Milwaukee for church and Jared and Katelin headed back to Minneapolis (all worn out I'm sure). All the kids had fun playing together, and I'm so glad we got to see them! They are all growing up so fast ... I think that means we're getting old.

Jared, me, Melanie, and Jake. We haven't had one of these pictures in a while. It was so great to see them. We had an amazing time hanging out, playing with their kiddos, and staying up late talking and laughing. It's fun to see my brothers with their kids being such good involved dads. They really are so cute with their darling little kids.

Nicki, Katelin, me, and Melanie. Thanks ladies for the fun trip! You took such good care of us, and it was so fun to be with you and catch up and laugh. You guys are amazing moms and wives and wonderful friends to me. I love you all!

We went for a drive to downtown Milwauke on Sunday afternoon and just walked around. The Packers were playing, so the whole city was like a ghost town. I couldn't believe how dead it was. We only saw a few dozen people the whole time. Apparently they really hunker down for those Packer's games.

Our main reason for venturing to downtown Milwaukee was of course to see the Bronze Fonz. You just don't pass up opportunities to see stuff like that.

Who knew I am about as tall as the Fonz? Now that's information I needed to have. Too cool.

Interesting sculpture by the river. They are bowling balls and other weird stuff hooked by chains. Very weird, but it seemed like something I should take a picture of.

This is one of those bridges that opens up for barges to come through. We got to see it open up the next day when we came back through the city. You don't exactly see those in Utah. Every time we go back to the Midwest, I'm amazed at the amount of water. There are rivers and lakes all over the place. Both Milwaukee and Chicago have huge rivers going right through their downtown areas. Can you imagine that in Utah?

Austin hanging out with the Sadie, Ty, and Brooklyn. Nicki was enjoying having the big boys around to climb in the back and buckle the kids in, and it was nice to have extra hands around to hold onto them and catch Ty when he escaped. It was fun for our boys too.

At Miller Park, where the Milwaukee Brewers play, there is a TGI Friday's on the concourse looking out over the field. We had lunch there on Monday. Very cool.

I love baseball. We went to a Brewers game here a few years ago, and it was a lot of fun. There's just something about a baseball game ...

This happens to be the coolest used book store on earth. It's in Milwaukee. It's called Renaissance Books, and you would not believe it! It is something you just have to experience. All I know is I could spend HOURS there. There are four floors and they all look like this. The building itself looks like it is about to tip over. The stairs are crooked and tipped and seem to be coming away from the wall just a bit. It is honestly a little unnerving even to be in there.... but I LOVE IT! There are books EVERYWHERE. The shelves are packed and there are boxes and stacks everywhere. You honestly have the feeling that you can't sneeze or even move quickly or it will all come tumbling down. There are old books and new books and rare books ... everything. This is where I got my 1912 edition of Mark Twain a few years ago. We didn't have as much time this go around, but I still found some fun things, including a 1928 copy of "The Passion for Life" by C.S. Lewis.

We took the water taxi from Navy Pier up to Union Station, and then we were supposed to walk just a few blocks to the Blue Line pickup for the L train back to O'Hare, but I was the one who got the directions from Jake, and I sort of got my North and West mixed up. So we walked a few blocks out of our way, got stressed, acquired directions from two street vendors, and barely made our flight. It was a little too close for comfort, but we survived. Melanie yelled a little. I figured in a city that size, someone has got to be able to give us directions. You'd be surprised at the amount of people we stopped to ask who were like "Huh?" Seriously people. You're killin me here. One lady gave us some excellent directions off a map that was upside down. That was fun. It was nice thought I suppose.

Anyway, our trip was crazy and fun and amazing, and I can't wait to do it again. It was fun to go with Austin and have that time together. Melanie and Colby made great traveling companions. At Giordiano's, I got tricked into biting into calamari under the guise of it being an onion ring. Jake thought that would be funny. One bite in, and I knew something was not right. Nice Jake. It definitely reaffirmed my strict "No Seafood EVER" policy. Gag.

It was hard not to miss Dave being in all those places where he would love to be. He served his mission in Chicago and loves to go back and visit. We've been once together, but I think we might have to go again. There are so many things to see and do that I'd love to do with him. I'm grateful he was willing to send me off to have a good time and took good care of the house and kids while I was gone. Dave, Jason, and my mom took great care of the remaining 7 kids at home for five days, and they all seem to have survived relatively unscathed. Thanks to all of you!

We consumed approximately 58,000 calories in five days (thanks to Giordiano's - the best pizza on earth), visited the Harley Davidson museum and spent enough money on souvenirs to earn a free puzzle (whoopee), walked a ton, rode the train a lot, saw lots of interesting people, laughed a lot, drove up and down the Magnificent Mile five times (but don't worry Jake wasn't lost), learned a lot, met a lady in a church in Milwaukee whose daughter lives a mile away from us in Eagle Mountain, got lost, rode the hurricane water slide (i.e., death by water slide) way too many times, got a tan inside a building, had several hours to read a good book on the plane (when does that EVER happen?!!), and had an AMAZING TIME! Can't wait to do it again.