midwestern adventures.

i'm currently in st. louis! the past few days have been very busy. here's a brief breakdown of the adventures so far...

SATURDAY

i left grand rapids around 11am and had uneventful drive to my brother's condo in the chicago suburbia. i spent the afternoon with my brother, sister-in-law, niece and my brother's friend matt at a street festival in palatine.

ivonne and olivia.

olivia, my niece, is such a great baby! she's about 6 months old, can roll over, army crawl across the floor, not quite sit up on her own and is just getting her first tooth. she likes to have staring contests. she usually wins. she gets the hiccups a lot which is rather adorable. 

we got dinner at a mexican grocery store and then eventually headed out to see a band that only does talking heads covers at a pub in naperville (without olivia, of course). it was a lot of fun to go out with my brother. i don't know that we've ever done that before.

SUNDAY

olivia and her staring contests.

olivia woke up early, so i hung out with her and kyle in the morning.

i eventually headed over to meet my friend caitlin and her boyfriend. we went to their church (willow creek...the largest church i've ever been to. it felt like a mall). afterward, we had a lazy afternoon before heading out to pick up my friend jenn from the train station near the chicago botanic gardens. caitlin works there as a horticulturist, so we got in for free and spent the rest of the day walking around the gardens.

chicago botanic gardens.

the gardens are beautiful, but it was also the heat of the day, so we were all quite tired by the end of our wanderings. i fell in love with the amazing bonsai collection they have and want to learn more. 

eventually, our stomachs started calling, so we headed to arlington heights to get dinner at this cool little pub. i ate a delicious veggie sandwich (portabello mushroom, tomato, alfalfa sprouts, onion, zucchini, greens, mozzarella, and a pesto mayo) served with a side of mac 'n cheese. yum!

eventually it was time to drop jenn off at the train station, so we said our goodbyes and went our separate ways.

carillon bells at chicago botanic garden.

MONDAY

after hanging out with olivia one last time, i hopped in my car and headed into the city to meet julia, one of the other corps members from MA, for breakfast. she lives in this cute neighborhood in the north part of the city. we ate at a swedish restaurant...which made me very happy. i had swedish pancakes with lingon berries for the first time in perhaps 3-4 years. it was really nice to see julia and talk about our lives after the program.

cornfields in illinois.

after a while, i hopped back into my car and started the trek to st. louis. my parents lent me their gps unit for the trip. i was apprehensive about taking it because i'm notoriously horrible with electronics. however, it's really easy to use, so i'm having a good time with it. i changed the voice to french, which is awesome. i made a few stops along the way, but made it to st. louis a little after 6pm.

st. louis.

dan, evelyn, kelly and i went to dewey's pizza for a delicious dinner. dan, evelyn and i split a pizza that was half wild mushroom (so many different kids of mushrooms!) and the edgar allen poe (red pepper, mushroom, tomato, garlic, goat cheese and probably more things i don't remember), and i ordered a delicious candied walnut and grape salad. the dressing was a citrus basil vinaigrette. mmmmm...

TODAY

dan, evelyn and kelly (the friends i'm visiting here) have class or work all day, so i'm spending the day relaxing, catching up on letters, and making some phone calls. kelly has the day off tomorrow. i'm very excited to see her and catch up on all the directions life has taken us this year.

next stop...lawrence, ks to visit my grandma!

ROAD TRIP STATS (including trip from MA)
cities visited: 7 - rochester, buffalo, niagara falls, ypsilanti, grand rapids, chicago (+suburbs), st. louis
miles traveled: 1,793
tanks of gas: 4