chicago -first half

Okay, here we go... I'll try to keep it short. There really are so many fun stories and things I want to remember thrown in all these details though... I'm trying to write enough to always jar my memory, but not so much that it's like the stereotypical boring vacation slide shows...

Thursday
If you recall, Kasey and I left a day before the other girls... we made an extra stop at the heaven that is IKEA. This was Kasey's maiden voyage through the store and as it's been awhile since I accompanied an IKEA virgin there, it was quite entertaining for me! She honestly walked through that place like she was shell shocked... in slow motion with her eyes wide and mouth hanging open not knowing which way to look first. We only spent two hours walking through, which has got to be a record for any Ikea browsing trip, but I'll excuse it with Kasey's back and leg issues of the moment and say that we're already planning a trip back. Oh yes, we'll be back!
When we were tired of Ikea shopping {shhh, pretend I didn't say that}
We then ventured to our hotel, and had the "Super" 8 Experience. I won't say any more about that.

but this was how we watched tv all morning...






Friday
We headed into the city to find our condo. Which was gorgeous and absolutely perfect for us (and insanely cheap for how spoiled we felt!). Well, it would have been absolutely perfect if it had more than one bathroom. 7 girls with one bathroom for a weekend made us all a little nervous, but we survived! But the house... great big comfy couch, great big dining room table, great decor we were all jealous of... it made us all feel perfectly cool and comfy for our whole stay in Chicago! Kasey and I arrived just as the MI girls got there (we couldn't have timed it better) and all walked around the apartment in awe and excitement to spend the weekend! After getting settled and snacking for a bit, we all took off to pick Kim up from the airport. The other girls split off to find us a place to lunch while Kasey and I maneuvered through O'Hare to find our new friend. Let me just say here that I expected such a major airport to be much more organized and easy to navigate by car and it most definitely was not!
Boy were we glad to get out of there! And glad to have Kim with us!! We met up with the girls for lunch at Al's where Kim got to meet everyone and eventually we headed back to the condo with full bellies.








To fend off a naptime (and keep LeeAnn awake, who had worked all night Thursday and been up for like 36 hours at this point) some of the girls headed out to find a scrapbook store they had been looking forward to visiting. Maria was super excited to "try out our bus passes!!" so they took off. Kasey and I played a couple games of Nertz and then headed out ourselves to check out the neighborhood. Our condo was basically right in the Lincoln Square neighborhood, which now looking back I wish we had spent more time exploring. There were some fun shops and tons of great places to eat. I'm thinking next time I visit Chicago I might just grab that rental again and simply spend a few days right there, not even having to go into the city.
So where did Kase and I end up? We shopped at Walgreens (I had a horrible headache and needed drugs, and we also picked up more playing cards and Kasey scored on a cheap puffy vest and scarf and gloves!) and Payless Shoes. Yeah, livin' it up in Chicago... whoo! We cozied up in a great coffeeshop and waited for the other girls to come back our way and meet up for dinner. By the time they got back, everyone was freezing and exhausted from walking, so we hit the nearest, warmest (and cheapest) place to eat... McDonald's.
We hurried back to the condo and spent the night sipping rum and cokes and playing games. I think that was my favorite part of the weekend... just hanging out, getting to know each other, laughing at each other, telling stories, talking about bloggers who we all read who weren't there (oops, did I say that??), and making our own stories and jokes that we'll all chuckle over for quite awhile. We finally made LeeAnn go to bed at 1AM and the last of us followed by around 2.

Whew! That makes me tired just recounting that day... and that's the lesser of the two evils when it comes to exhaustion levels, haha! Saturday was the big one! I'll be back later with more...
*disclaimer: these pics I'm posting from Chicago will not all be mine... we lumped all our shots together to share so these are probably a mish mash from random cameras... that way we all captured a little of everything!