As promised in my most recent entry, here’s the update on the Chicago trip I took with Jack. I’m really glad that we had the opportunity to do this, because Jack and I haven’t had much “fun time” alone since Derek’s birth, and he’s now old enough to start appreciating trips like this. He might not remember it (OK, so he won’t remember), but he’s capable of appreciating experiences, and I genuinely had a blast with him as we took excursions around the city. The trip was also a much-desired chance for me to catch up with some dear friends in Chicago, many of whom I haven’t seen in three, four, or even six years!

Jack and I left the cottage on Friday morning and drove for about eight hours, but only because we took a long lunch stop and also a gas/snack/potty stop. The driving was really pleasant — I managed to pretty much miss rush hour traffic going into the city, and I really enjoyed talking with Jack along the way. He was very excited to stay with “Auntie Brinda and dog Toby.”

We got to Brinda’s condo just in time for an early dinner. Jack took to Brinda right away.

So happy!

We went to a kid-friendly neighborhood restaurant, and Jack ate pretty independently while Brinda and I enjoyed some cocktails with our dinner. It’s amazing how relaxing dining out with just one kid feels when you’re used to dining out with two! Sure, we still had to interfere with statements like, “No, don’t throw all the crayons on the floor” and “The fork is for eating, not for eye-stabbing,” but it was really nice to be able to eat my own meal in relative peace, and to catch up with Brinda. Afterward, Jack settled in for bedtime without a hitch, which gave me and Brinda the chance to chat some more (and polish off a whole bottle of white wine … oops!).

Saturday morning, Brinda had some volunteer work and stuff to do around the house, so Jack and I went to a coffee shop to get breakfast, then played a little at the nice playground nearby.

Jack stopped to pick this dandelion on Brinda’s block

We came back to the condo in time to meet my friend Meghan and her almost five-month-old baby, Charlie. We spent the morning and early afternoon at the Lincoln Park Zoo.

Jack and I in front of the zoo; Jack makes a funny face at the kangaroo area

This was the first time I went to a zoo with Jack without a stroller, and you know what, he did pretty well, despite all the walking we did. Heck, I was tired by the time we were done! Jack’s favorite parts of the zoo trip were probably the giraffes … and the pizza for lunch, LOL. I last saw Meghan when I was a bridesmaid in her June 2006 wedding, and now there we were, eating lunch at the zoo with our kids. Crazy! 

After the zoo, we drove back to Brinda’s. After a brief rest, Jack and I headed out on our own to go to Ghirardelli’s near Michigan Avenue. Jack’s had ice cream, of course, but he’s never had a huge sundae like they have at Ghirardelli’s, and plus I wanted him to ride the L. He was thrilled even to be waiting on the L platform, and he nearly toppled over with excitement on the actual train itself.

When you’re three, even public transportation is exciting!

A cute story about the L: Every time the doors closed, Jack would imitate the recorded message and say, “Doors closing” in a deep voice, and whenever we left the train, he would wave bye to all the fellow passengers. Once time, the driver of one of the trains waved to Jack, and Jack had the reaction I would have if I ran into, say, Brad Pitt or something.

Jack was beside himself at the “ice cream house,” where I ordered a Domingo (hot fudge sundae with bananas, chopped almonds, whipped cream and a cherry on top) for us to share.

Of course, I gave Jack the maraschino cherry; check out how Jack posed for the pic at Ghirardelli’s!

Afterward, we strolled Michigan Avenue for a while before heading back to Brinda’s.

Saturday night, I had arranged for a babysitter to come to Brinda’s, so that I could go out to dinner with six of my friends. (One of my friends referred her sister-in-law’s regular sitter to me.) I was a little apprehensive about how Jack would take to a new sitter in a strange environment, but he greeted Karolina (the sitter) at the door with a hug, then proceeded to show her all his trains. I asked him, “Are you sad that Mommy’s going out?” And he replied, “No, Mommy, I be happy when you’re gone. I’m going to play trains with Rolina.” Um, OK then! Karolina reported that they played for a while after we left, then Jack cleaned up his trains and stated that he would like to go to bed. They went to the potty, she read him two books, and Jack went to sleep. What?! Maybe I should get a sitter every night! But, anyway, that put me at ease for my evening out. We went to Cafe BaBaReeba in Lincoln Park and enjoyed delicious tapas and sangria while catching up.

Here I am with Kerri-Simone and Amanda, and then a group pic of everyone who was there

I really do miss my Chicago friends! It’s so nice to have good friends with whom you have a long history — these girls knew me before I was married, before I was a mom, and it’s wonderful not to have to explain myself or to provide context. Despite the fact that many years have passed since our college (or early career) days, it still feels like just yesterday when we were all in the same place.

Sunday was a big day for me and Jack. In the morning, we took a train and a bus to meet Kerri-Simone and her daughter, Remi, at Navy Pier. We rode the Ferris wheel, the carousel (well, Jack and I did; Remi’s still too little to ride that one) and then Kerri-Simone treated us to the Children’s Museum and some lunch.

Jack’s happiness at being on the bus; Jack across from the Navy Pier entrance; Jack posing with the giant Kraft mac and cheese noodle; Jack with the Chicago skyline behind him. Notice his grin! Such a little model.

Jack and I on the Ferris wheel; Kerri-Simone and beautiful Remi; on the carousel

Here are some pictures from the Children’s Museum, which was SO cool.

It was an awesome morning/early afternoon. Kerri-Simone and I met on my first day of work. She had been there for a few weeks (and had come in with prior experience), so she was at once my go-to work buddy/mentor and also a fellow new employee. We quickly became good friends, and she’s definitely one of the best things to come out of my consulting career. We used to go out to coffee and lunch (and sometimes happy hour) and dish about our relationship issues, and dream about our future families. I think our younger selves would have been thrilled to see that we would one day have a playdate together.

After Navy Pier, Kerri-Simone drove us to the Field Museum. Jack’s very into dinosaurs, and he had been waiting all weekend to go to the “big museum.” The Field Museum, of course, is home to the famous Sue, the most complete T. Rex skeleton found to date. She’s right in the entry of the museum. As soon as Jack saw her, he shouted, “DINOSAUR! Look, Mommy, T. Rex!” and started roaring. He also tried to scale the railing around Sue to try to get in closer.

That’s Jack, climbing on the railing; outside the Field Museum

We bought our tickets, then took a closer look at Sue. We then headed upstairs to see the dinosaur hall, and we walked through a new exhibit about evolution and mass extinctions on Earth. You know, I’m ashamed to say that Jack took more of an interest in the museum than I did. He wanted to stop and watch most of the videos, and he wanted me to explain a lot of what was written on the cards. He also asked a lot of follow-up questions that I actually had difficulty answering. (If only Jack would ask about celebrity trivia! Then I could help!) I’m going to have to start Googling on my phone for answers. After the exhibit, we visited the “Sue Store,” where I told Jack he could pick out one item. He picked a stuffed brachiosaurus. He was going to go for the T. Rex, but then he saw the brachiosaurus and declared that he wanted the “happy dinosaur” as a “bedtime friend,” so we got that one. Of course he wanted the big version that’s about half his size, but a promise is a promise. We then went to the special 3-D “Waking T. Rex” movie. Jack wore his glasses the whole film (it was about 25 minutes). He got a little scared at the scene in which the T. Rex was eating the “rhino dinosaur” (aka triceratops), but it was really gory and bloody. Afterward, we walked around the museum some more, then got some ice cream and headed home. Jack was a trooper — it was a long walk from the museum to the L station (made worse by the fact that, a quarter of the way there, Jack declared he had to poop, so we had to head all the way back to the museum!), but we made it back to Brinda’s, and then out for a Thai restaurant for a farewell dinner with Brinda and Karen. Jack had some of my glass noodles with vegetables and squid, and he was very entertained by the awesome book that Karen got him.

We left early Monday morning, before Brinda had to go to work, and enjoyed a pleasant drive back up to the cottage. As I type, Jack is sleeping with his baby bear in one arm, and Brachio (that’s short for brachiosaurus) in the other arm. The dinosaur’s long neck is curved around Jack’s face. It’s so cute. I’m not sure when my first baby turned into such a fun little guy, but sometime while I was busy being pregnant and caring for a newborn, Jack’s become a big boy. This trip was good for us — instead of spending 90% of my time telling him what he couldn’t do, we spent the bulk of the time doing fun things together. It was great. Johnny and I are going to try to each take one kid for an “alone weekend” (or day) each year.

Thanks for reading!

Hello from Michigan! There’s so much to write about that I almost decided to bury my head in the sand. Since my last entry, we’ve:

• Successfully driven from California to Michigan with the boys
• Spent a lovely week at the cottage, overlapping with Chris, Victoria and Maddy at the tail end of their vacation here
• Celebrated both boys’ birthdays
• And, I’ve taken Jack on our special mother-son four-day weekend to Chicago.

Whew! I decided it would be a shame not to document all this, even if it’s a lot to cover. So that this doesn’t become a monstrously long post that no one reads, I’m going to cover the road trip and our first few days at the cottage in this entry, and save the Chicago trip (which was this past weekend) for another entry. Most of you have probably seen the pictures on Facebook already, anyway!

Road Trip

So, the road trip went really well! We left the evening of July 1. We wanted to get to Las Vegas so that we could have a full day of driving on Friday (July 2) and not deal with LA traffic. Johnny had to work that day, so we left after dinnertime and rolled into Vegas a little before midnight. June was awesome and met up with us at our hotel (Embassy Suites, so that we could have the boys sleep in their own little living room, where they’d be less disturbed by us), along with Charles, Brian and Andrew, so that they could help us get our stuff up to the hotel room. Let me tell you: Spending just one night in a hotel room, when you have two small kids, entails a lot of gear! We had a cooler with us filled with drinks for the trip, so we lugged that up to the room each night to restock the ice (I also had some fresh fruit in the cooler that I cut up for us each night, to combat the unhealthy food we were eating on the road). Then there was Jack’s inflatable twin-size travel bed, plus his pillow, nightlight and stuffed bear from home. Each of us had a duffel bag (the kids shared one) … you get the idea. Here’s a picture of how much stuff we brought up to the hotel room each night:

Jack insisted on helping to push the luggage cart each morning

But, you know, it was really helpful to have all the stuff — it helped the kids settle into their sleep routines, even though we were in four different hotels on the trip. Even when we had a room (instead of a suite), and even though it was hours past their bedtimes, they fell and stayed asleep without much of a hitch.

The kids, tuckered out in one of the hotels. Instead of lugging up our own pack-n-play, I borrowed a hotel from a crib each night. If a room had an extra bed, we had Jack sleep in that instead of on his inflatable bed (one less thing for us to set up)

So, the lodging aspect of the trip went well. The driving part was pretty good, too. We split up our trip like this:

• July 1: Drive from Torrance to Vegas
• July 2: Vegas to Glenwood Springs, CO
• July 3: Glenwood Springs, CO, to Omaha, NE (this was the tedious day … it was about 12 hours of driving!)
• July 4: Omaha, NE to Chicago (only about 8 hours … felt like a breeze!), where we had dinner with Ann and Jared, then stayed at the Sheraton in Evanston
• July 5: Evanston, IL to Frankfort, MI (such a fun day — we spent the morning walking around Northwestern, reminiscing about our college days, then took the leisurely drive up to the cottage and arrived around 7 p.m.)

Our typical day on the road had us getting up around 8 a.m. (the boys slept in until then, or even later, because of how late we rolled into the hotels), eating free breakfast at the hotel, loading up the car, and being on the road by 10 a.m. or a little before. It took some time to repack the trunk and set up Jack with his entertainment for the first leg of the trip. We would then stop for lunch, gas up if needed, then drive again until late afternoon, when we stopped for a snack (or gas) and a potty break. Then we’d drive until dinner, which took place at the boys’ usual bedtimes (7 p.m.), then drive until we hit our destination. We usually switched drivers every 200 miles, and we alternated who took the first leg each day, so we ended up taking an equal number of legs. Each day was full of driving (with the exception of the last day), but it was fun — I’m always awed by how big our country is, and the scenery changes as you drive from West to East. It kind of sucked losing time as we drove through the time zones, but we’ll gain it back on the drive home.

Derek was in what Johnny called “Oregon Trail mode” on the drive: We had expected him to be the more difficult child to deal with, since he doesn’t have as many entertainment options, and is rear-facing. But, he was completely happy to nap, look out the window, eat from his Snack Trap (or more accurately, litter his car seat with snacks from the cup), gaze at Jack or just stare into space. He didn’t fuss more than a handful of times. Jack was, as predicted, easy to entertain (the portable DVD player was a godsend, as was this collapsible play tray that strapped around his waist to hold puzzle pieces, toys, coloring books and snacks. The Leapster 2 that Ann lent us would have been a godsend, but, after all that prep, I FORGOT TO BRING IT! Johnny will bring it back with him for our return trip). However, the person in the passenger seat definitely had a more difficult job than the person driving, because that person had to reach back to retrieve items that Jack dropped. We did set up some ground rules with Jack beforehand so that he understood that the driver couldn’t help him pick up toys, and that the passenger only had limited capacity to help. Jack had a couple of tantrums related to dropping things that we couldn’t reach while driving, but time-outs in the car (where we’d ignore Jack for three minutes) really helped with those, and in general he behaved really well. In addition to his toys and stuff, Jack also made up stories along the way — there was a particularly cute 20 minutes where he made up superheroes, and he and Johnny came up with what their powers might be. Here are some pictures from the trip.

The kids enjoyed bathing together at each hotel

We made the most out of our meal and snack stops!

Oh, and a big accomplishment: Jack stayed dry across America! He’s done really well on the potty-training front, but this was the ultimate test. We didn’t stop that often, but Jack held it, and if he needed to go, he told us (there was one time that we had to stop on the side of windy, very busy highway). I was so proud! I can now definitely declare him potty-trained (during the day, anyway. He still wears a Pull-Up at night, but I don’t care about that). For a three-year-old boy, I think he did really well.

As I mentioned, the last evening of our trip, we met up with Ann and Jared in Chicago. I hadn’t ever seen their condo, so we finally did that (it’s beautiful!), and then they treated us to dinner at Leona’s. It was so wonderful to get together with them — Ann was literally in her last days of pregnancy (she just had a gorgeous daughter, Audrey, on July 12 … Jack’s birthday!). I hadn’t seen Ann in years. It was high time! Unfortunately, in all the excitement, I only got one picture … it’s a cute one of Jared and Derek.

Derek’s usually shy around new people, especially men,but he reached out his arms for Jared immediately. So cute!

The next day, we had breakfast at Clarke’s, a restaurant we frequented in our college days. It was surreal to be back there with the boys!

Afterward, we took a sentimental stroll around campus, taking pictures in front of the Delta Zeta house, the arch, the Rock, and the dorm where we met.

It was so special to see Jack bounding along paths that Johnny and I used to walk every day. College felt like it was just yesterday — shows just how fast time flies.

Happy Birthday, Jack and Derek!

We got to the cottage Monday evening and had three full days of overlap with Chris and Victoria, who had been there for almost two weeks already. They left Friday morning, so we had most of the week together (along with my in-laws). We made the most of that time. On Tuesday afternoon, we had a joint birthday party for Derek, Jack and my father-in-law, whose birthdays are July 5, July 12 and July 6, respectively. We had lunch, cupcakes and also did the “fate-grabbing” thing — it’s a fun Chinese tradition where, on a baby’s first birthday, you set out a bunch of items in front of him, each symbolizing a career. Whichever one he grabs is what he’ll be. Some of you may recall that Jack grabbed money. Let’s see what Derek did!

Getting ready to decide his destiny …

… and he grabs the SPATULA! I have a celebrity chef on my hands!

It was so cute. I’m kind of sad that that’s the last time I’ll get to experience that tradition. That is, until June has kids. Ha.

Derek and Jack enjoyed the cupcakes. And, look at our family now!

I can’t believe Johnny and I are parents to a one-year-old and a three-year-old. They are amazing boys. Sometimes I’m sad that I missed out on a daughter, but then I feel blessed that I have two such wonderful kids, and I think that maybe God or whoever decides these things made Jack and Derek extra-great to make up for the no-girl thing.  I mean, they have their moments, and they definitely keep me on my toes, but the kids have brought us a lot of joy, and Johnny and I are enjoying parenthood — it’s a team effort! We are also extremely fortunate to have such supportive families. I don’t know what I’d do without my mom so close by, and without my in-laws’ yearly extended visits! Not everyone is lucky enough to have her mom come help out each day.

Anyway, Jack and Derek have grown so much. Just look at this:

Newborn Jack on the left, newborn Derek on the right

Ah, and today they’re both so big. Sniff, sniff. But, as nostalgic as I am sometimes for those baby days, I am definitely glad not to look like this anymore!

Other Fun Times at the Cottage

Aside from the birthday celebrations last week, we also went to the beach, ate a nice dinner out at the country club and just enjoyed quality time together.

Jack in his beach gear; Derek (aka Water Baby — he LOVES the water!) and Jack at the beach

Dave, who’s very beloved by Jack, patiently let Jack lead him around the beach; a family pic

My in-laws gave the kids adorable batik print clothes from the Bahamas, and we tried (unsuccessfully) to get the cousins to all look at the camera at the same time.

Just a couple of cute pictures:

Last Thursday night, a family friend babysat while we six adults had a lovely dinner at the club.

On Friday, I took Jack to Chicago (but will update about that in the next post). Johnny, my in-laws and Derek stayed at the cottage. Johnny left Sunday to fly back to LA (I miss him! But he’ll be back in two weeks to spend a few days here and drive back with us), and I returned yesterday. Today, Jack had his first tot tennis lessons, I went for a refreshing run along the lake, and we all went to the beach again.

Yes, Jack is picking his nose in that second picture

The original intent had been to take Jack out in the kayak, but it was too choppy today. However, we did get some cute pictures of him in a lifejacket.

OK, that’s it for now. I’ll try to update about Chicago tomorrow. And, I promise to make it around to my subs soon!