Chicago

Dave and I have been wanting to go to the temple for a long time now. Since it's 2.5 hours away, it has been hard to get there, but we got there!! It was so good to be in the temple again :) Those of you who live close - go often!! We took it so much for granted, and now it's going to get even harder to go, so make time to GO!!

Since it's a little bit long of a trip to just go up and back, we decided to have a mini baby-moon and spent the night in Chicago. We ate at Smoque's BBQ for dinner Friday night after the temple. We didn't know this before we went, but it has been on Diners, Drive-ins and Dives. Pretty cool!! It was super yummy and we really enjoyed it. 

That night we stayed at the nicest hotel either of us have ever booked - a Hilton Garden Inn. It was super nice, and we enjoyed it, but we'll probably stick with cheaper places from now on - they have free breakfasts :)

The next day we drove into downtown Chicago. I have never seen building so huge. I felt so tiny!. We went to Millennium Park. There is some cool stuff there. Like this Reflecting Pond:

You can walk on water there! :)

And Cloud Gate (aka. "the bean"). It's basically a big reflect-y thing where people go and make fools of themselves. haha. Can you see us in all of these pics?

Hi! 

Dave is so strong!

My baby belly and a smile.  I felt extremely awkward and didn't know what to do. :)

 Underneath the bean.

Okay, funny story. When we were at the temple there was this nice young couple waiting by the fountain. We hurried and got out of the car so they could take our picture for us. We found out that they were waiting to ask us the same question!! When we went to take theirs, their camera was dead, so I offered to take a picture on our camera and email it to them. 

The next day, we were at the bean, and look who we ran into!!

It was such a random coincidence. Out of ALL the people and places in Chicago, we happened to run into them twice. It was pretty cool! Maybe it was meant to be and we'll be best friends someday :)

Major props if you can find us in this picture!!  

Selfies... gotta love them! 

We had to take a picture with all of the skyscrapers in the background. We didn't even get the tallest ones in there! I have never seen so many TALL building packed into a space so tightly. It amazed me. 

And here's the ocean... I mean... Lake Michigan. I keep calling it the ocean because I've never seen a lake where you couldn't see the other side. It was pretty :) and very cool! 

More of the skyline & the bean

What's a trip to Chicago without the deep dish pizza? We stopped into Giordano's to try it out. 

it was SOOOO good.

Those pieces look tiny, right? They weren't... we both got through 2 pieces and thought we were going to die. We waddled back to our car after this carrying the rest of the pizza so we could eat it later - much later - for a midnight snack. 

The cool sign at Giordano's. I have no problem with this commandment :)

Another pic of the pretty Ocean-Lake. 

Before heading home, we drove up the coast a bit to Wrigley field. Dave was really excited to see it!!  

We had a fun time in Chicago! It was so nice to be able to attend the temple again, and to spend some time out of the house! We will definitely be going again, as there are a lot of other things to do in the Windy City!