Here's to long drives and best friends...

A few weekends ago we were heading to visit Tyler's parents in St. George and I decided it would be fun since we were already heading out west to leave a few days early to go visit one of my very best friends up in Spokane. I called her on a Sunday and we flew out that Tuesday. Luckily she was great about having us come up for a visit on super short notice.

Ever since I got this job with Delta I've wanted to go visit Tyanna. As I said up top, she is one of my best friends. I met Ty almost 12 years ago when we were thrown together as roommates in the magical land of St. Thomas. We bonded over eyebrow plucking and old English window stickers and the rest is history. From the second I met Ty, I loved her. She is hilarious and easy talk to and just plain amazing. So easy to love.
Anyways... back on subject, me and the kids flew out on a Tuesday morning. We got to Spokane and headed to the Powell home so the kids could run around for a little while (seven hours on a plane is a long time to sit for a one year and a three year old). She has a daughter Owen's age and a son that is Collette's age. They immediately hit it off.

Later that afternoon we headed over to Coer d'alene, ID to go for a hike (something else for me to love about Ty. She loves hiking as much as I do). This hike was amazing. Have I mentioned before how much I miss hiking?

 Picking out their walking sticks

Sennah kept putting the moves on Owen. He wasn't really having it. Owen really likes his personal space.

After the hike, we headed out to have some amazing pizza. I really need to take some photoshop courses or something. I'm sure somehow there is a way to make Kris look like he isn't the spawn of Satan but I have no idea how.

After dinner, we headed back to their house and got a good nights sleep because we were getting up the next morning to head to a little town called Leavenworth and then on to a condo on Lake Chelan to spend a couple of days.
We started our drive around 11:00 that Wednesday morning and were so pumped to get on the road. It was supposed to take us 3 hours to get to Leavenworth.

Six hours later, we arrived in Leavenworth. That's right people, six hours. You would think we'd have been pissed about the drive taking three extra hours but I loved that Ty and I were able to sit and chat for six hours straight. I can really talk to Ty for hours and hours and never run out of things to say to her. Once she and I had a work trip and we talked the whole four hour drive, stayed up talking until three in the morning, talked all through work the next day and talked the whole four hour drive home and I remember when she got out of the car feeling like there were so many other things I still wanted to talk to her about.
Back on subject... One thing that was unfortunate on the drive was that Ty's kids don't sleep in the car. You'll notice my children sleeping soundly but her poor children went the whole six hours without a wink. Her kids are troopers though so when we arrived in Leavenworth, we jumped out and did everything we could to enjoy this beautiful little town.

First thing we saw when we got there were these goats. For the kids, I think a six hour drive was totally worth it to see these guys.

Also while there were found the cutest little old school candy shop with about a million types of taffy and black licorice ice cream (one of my favorites... yum!)

After we grabbed our ice cream, we headed out to play in the grass.

 Poor thing, had no idea her ice cream had fallen off of the cone.

 The discovery.

Is there anything better for kids than rolling down a grassy hill? So cute.

After an hour or so, we decided it was probably time for us to head to the condo. Since Sennah and Dutch hadn't slept at all on the car ride, we thought it best to get the kids to bed so we could wake up and enjoy Lake Chelan the next day.

Isn't this place gorgeous? It was a bit of a bummer when we were there because there had been fires in Oregon that week and the smoke had drifted our way. Our view wasn't quite this beautiful because the mountains were covered with smoke but still such a pretty place.
In the morning we got up, had breakfast and then spent time playing with the kids at the playground and swimming at the pool.

 Oh my, aren't these kids the cutest? Running around in saggy diapers and pj's? Love them.

 The playground at the condo was awesome. Something right out of my childhood. Metal slides, metal monkey bars, real merry go rounds and then rocks to break your fall. The kids loved it.

We tried swimming in the pool but my Florida children, as I've said before, can't handle cold water so we ended up swimming in the hot tub for the next hour or so.
Remember how I said that Ty's kids didn't sleep the whole six hours in the car? Well unfortunately, poor little Dutch didn't want to sleep in the hotel room either. I think that he and Ty got maybe three hours of sleep over the course of the two days. Because of that and the fact that me and the kids were heading home the next morning, we decided  to leave Chelan that afternoon.That night we just hung out and soaked up as much of  the Powell family as we could. We were all so bummed to leave these guys the next morning. It sucks having friends live on the complete opposite side of the country.

We miss you Powell's! Now that we've seen what Spokane was all about, you need to come see us and find out what Fort Lauderdale has to offer! We miss you! 

The Windy City

Once upon a time we had some really good friends who lived in Florida. After living there for a very short nine months, they decided to leave us for Chicago. We were really sad. 

Fast forward a year. We had a free weekend and decided to go visit these fantastic people for a few days. We left on a Friday morning, got to Chicago around noon and while the men went to Starbucks to work, we ladies and children caught up with each other. The best way to start out a trip, with good conversation. 

Our friends live in the most beautiful little town just outside of Chicago. They live two blocks from Lake Michigan so later that afternoon we walked over by the Lake and went to a little park there.

They don't call it the windy city for nothing. It got crazy crazy windy while we were playing. My poor Florida children couldn't handle how chilly it made them. I'm really raising some wimpy kids when it comes to the cold. I don't know how they will ever handle Utah winters. Max on the other hand was playing in the water fountain. Soaking wet with no shirt on and it didn't even phase him. what a tough kid. Anyway, we decided to meet the men and warm ourselves up with some deep dish Chicago pizza. YUMMMM. 

Saturday we got up and headed downtown so we could check out Navy Pier.

All of the sitting in the car for 30 minutes really made us work up an appetite so before checking out anything else, we headed to get us a Chicago Dog. AMAZING. I love hot dogs, is that disgusting? It's true... I really love them. This one definitely did not disappoint. It opened my mind to so many hot dog possibilities, tomatoes, pickles, mayo, onions, blue cheese and so many other amazing things to top your dog with.  I think we may have to throw a hot dog bbq soon so that I can try and relive this. We also had ourselves a deep fried twinkie, because why not? No joke, sometimes I wonder if I like to travel just so I can eat the food in each of these places.

We took a turn on the giant Ferris Wheel overlooking Chicago.

Jeff was fantastic and stayed down below with the baby while the rest of us enjoyed the ride:

We decided to hit up the water fountains next. On your way to the water, the kids played in the park. One of my favorite pics from the trip.

We also had to stop a few places to take some pics of the city. I think I'm in love with this place. Really, I fell in love with Chicago while we were there.

I loved the fountains. How funny are these things?

My kids had so much fun.

Next stop was the Cloud Gate (the bean). I have seen this thing in pictures a ton but had no idea it was in Chicago. Isn't it such a weird tourist attraction? Just a giant silver bean? But for some reason it's really cool. I loved it. We took about a million pictures of us doing different things:

These ones though, are my favorite. Thanks to my husband for his creative thinking. Aren't they cool? Did I already say that I love this city?

By this time the kids were getting sick of walking the city streets so we decided to head back to the hotel and have dinner there. I'm pretty sure there was other food besides churros and macaroons but I couldn't tell you what it was. We love churros and macaroons... yummm.

After dinner, it was getting late and Jeff and Caitlin had to head home to put their babies to bed. We were so bummed to see them go. We really love these people.

Sunday morning we got up and walked around the Magnificent mile and spent some time in a toy store (shocker right?). Isn't it crazy how what you do on vacation changes once you have kids?

Around noon that day we had to head back to Fort Lauderdale and real life.

Thanks Jeff and Cait for hosting us and hanging out! We love you guys (have I said that before?)!