Michigan with the Larsen's

Last weekend, we went to visit my parents for the weekend. But, this time we brought our pals, Scott and Jen Larsen. My parents live on lake BellaVista in Rockford, MI, and Jen was so excited to go out on the lake in a boat. Unfortunately, the weather was only in the low 60s so it was way too cold to go out on the lake. We made the most of it anyways, and spent some time at the Orchard eating donuts and drinking cider. Then made our way over to the winery and paid $3 to taste 6 wines of our choice. We even got to keep the goblet as a souvenir!

On our drive from Chicago to Rockford, we stopped at mine and Ben's usual seasonal stop, Sherman's Dairy, to get some delicious homemade ice cream. At this dairy, when you order a "baby" size, it is twice the size as another dairy's large size! No kidding! We finally made it to my parents, just in time for a nice cookout on their newly finished deck.

Of course, we spent the rest of the evening watching a movie in my dad's home theater...with the nice leather theater seats and movie projector. Always a treat (especially for Ben)! The next morning we woke up to go to the Orchard and winery, where I lost my favorite sunglasses while trying on some goofy reading glasses. But, all was lost when we stopped at Starbucks afterwards to get Scott his daily coffee and they were all out of travel lids! Scott's world almost stopped! We found an alternative lid, and continued on our way.

We headed to downtown Rockford, had lunch, checked out a few shops, then went rollerblading on the trail along the river. Exhausted, we headed back to my parents'. I then took a nap while Ben and Jen competitively played about every game you can play on Wii. Of course, Jen beat Ben in just about every game... Killed him in bowling! I was quite proud of her. :)

We ordered pizza from Marinades' (a local pizzeria) for dinner and spent the rest of the evening playing card games and watching another movie.

Sunday, we attended church, played more cards games, and thought we were heading home right after lunch. But, our plans changed when we realized that the Bears were going to playing while we were on the road. So, we thought it would be a better idea to stay and watch the game on the home theater, THEN head home. We didn't get back to Wheaton until pretty late.

All that to say... we had fun last weekend!

You can view the rest of our pictures from the weekend here: Michigan with the Larsen's Pics

Da Bears!

We've been extremely busy the past few weeks. So a quick update...

Two weeks ago my family (little sister, mom, dad, big sister, brother-in-law) came to visit during my birthday weekend. It was the first time we've been together since my wedding! It was wonderful to hang out and laugh the entire weekend. Oh, and to give you an update from the last blog (where I asked for prayers on my parents safe commute)... Well, it took them 7 hours to drive a usual 3 hour trip because of the flooding! On the way home, they had to stay in a hotel because east-bound I-80/94 was shut down. My poor parents! They are so easy-going though, they certainly made the most of it!

The following weekend (last weekend) some of my friends from Nashville came for a visit. Marlena, Devin, Kristin, and Ben all drove up from Tennessee to spend the Labor Day weekend with us. It was so fun to have my girlfriends here to be goofy with again and just spend some girly time together. We went to the French Market, downtown Chicago, the Flea Market, IKEA, Sweet Tomatoes, and just hung out at our house. I think everyone had a good time just seeing each other again.

Now we are at this weekend. Last night we had our first GG of the Fall, so it was nice to be back together again with our Friday night friends. Then today Ben and I went on the Chicago Luxury Home Tour. It's like the Parade of Homes, except the homes in this tour range from $1 million to $6.5 million! We toured a $5.4 million house today that was quite useless. Seriously, who needs all those odd-shaped rooms.. ?? Anyone with that many kids usually can't afford that big of a house, right?

Tomorrow is the opening game for da Bears! Go Bears!! Since U of M is not doing well, I'm going full fledge into the Bears this year. Not that I have really ever followed UofM...but I am from Michigan, so everyone assumes that I do...so I just play along.

That's it! Good night!