Beach Bums

As summer rolls on and our break comes to a close, Josh and I continue to cross activities off of our summer break to do list.

The weather has been perfect lately, so we used it as an excuse to go to the beach! Chicago has some pretty awesome beaches along lake Michigan, so visiting them is a must!

Josh and I hopped on the train in our running clothes with our swim suits in tow. We had big plans than included running along the lake, eating lunch at one of the bistros along the beach, and then sunning and running a few more miles.

That's not how our day went.

We got down town and immediately met my dad for lunch. He has a love of all ethnic foods and was presenting us with menus for different Indian restaurants, Mediterranean restaurants, and various polish diners. Silly Bruce, we can't eat ethnic right before a vigorous run! Our bodies our finely-tuned running machines! So we ate huge sub sandwiches.

We then headed towards the lake (walking slowly) and decided to sit on the beach to let our lunch digest. After all, our bodies are finely-tuned running machines and it would be irresponsible to run so full of food! We ended up ditching the run completely and just enjoyed soaking up the sunshine.

After we left the beach, we headed towards Millennium park to check out the bean and listen to a band that was playing near by. It was a blast! We think of the bean as "our place" because we ended up there on our romantically tense first date (awwwwww so tender!) so we always enjoy visiting it together. We then hopped on the train and had a relaxing ride home.

Summer break has been the best and I hate that it has to end. Thank goodness for weekends!

Road Trip!

Josh and I have been wanting to go on a road trip since early in our relationship, and this break finally gave us the opportunity to go! Picking the location was half the battle. Potential destinations ranged from the Wisconsin Dells to Washington D.C., but we finally landed on Sandusky, Ohio, the home of Cedar Point. If you aren't familiar with Cedar Point, just know that is houses some of the worlds biggest and baddest roller coasters!

We started our six hour excursion at 4 in the morning, and yes we were pretty exhausted, but we wanted to get to the park as soon as it opened at 10am. Only problem? There is a time difference we completely forgot about! So we ended up getting there at 11, which worked out just fine.

We experienced a lot of excitement on the road, including an encounter with a cop, seeing a car flip over, seeing a car on fire, and seeing a truck tire pop. Needless to say, Josh was driving with his hands on ten and two the entire time.

The day we went happened to be the first day of the season. We expected it to be packed but we were pleasantly surprised to find that it wasn't. We purchased fast passes that allowed us to cut to the front of every line and made for a max wait time of about 20 minutes. This allowed us to ride fourteen (14!!!) rides in 7 hours at the park. We kept track of each ride on our map so we could remember them all. It was unbelievable! Our heads got a little jumbled from being jerked and flipped around so much, but we popped excedrin and powered through the pain!

I think it's fair to say that Josh's favorite part of the day was getting to admire the fanny pack I wore shamelessly (he was horrified and embarrassed by it). Ladies know what a pain it is to hold a purse on a roller coaster and how scary it is to leave your purse unattended in one of those bins, and a fanny pack eliminates all of those stressors! And after our keys fell out of Josh's pocket on the second ride and we nearly lost them, he was pro fanny pack.

The ride home was fairy uneventful, but it's six hours I will never forget! I had the best time singing at the top of my lungs along side Josh and exchanging stories that helped us get to know each other even better. It was a successful trip and another event we can check off our summer to-do list!

Summer in the City

Summer in Chicago has officially begun(at least it has for me and Josh) and we celebrated by taking a much needed trip down town. The city is only 45 minutes away but we NEVER go. This changes now!

My favorite way to explore the city is on bikes. You can get from Northerly island to Wrigleyville without the annoyance of parking multiple times and without the pain and inefficiency of walking, and you get unbeatable views! Josh knows how much I love biking in the city so he accomplished the irritating feat of getting my bike rack on the car, the bikes on the rack, and driving through city traffic, all so we could have a special day in the city. And we definitely did!

The weather was spectacular. It was in the mid 70's with a breeze from the lake. absolutely perfect! We biked from Wrigleyville to navy pier where we stopped and watched small boats racing in some competition while we ate a dollar cone from McDonald's. We then headed back north and hit Lincoln park zoo (its free!) on our way. We spent a lot of time admiring the views of the city and seriously wished we had a friend with us who could have taken all the pictures we wanted, but instead we just had a stranger take one. It turned out great so I'm super psyched they were willing to help us out!

Another adventure we had on our summer to do list was go to the drive in movie. Yes, they still exist! There is one about 25 minutes from my house and it has such a fun, old feel to it. We threw a blanket in the back of my moms SUV, some pillows to sit on, and then popped the trunk and hopped in. It was such a fun thing to do. It's only 9 dollars per person and you get to see two movies, bring your own food, and enjoy the summer weather! We will definitely be doing this again soon!

We started summer off with a bang and there is a lot more fun to be had. Can't wait!

PS- in the collage picture, we're showing off our boat shoes by posing them with a potato we found on the street (who leaves a potato on the side walk? Obviously we had to take a picture).

Hey la, hey la, my boyfriend's back!

Josh is back from Houston! We were apart for 6 days and I was going crazy! It was ridiculous. but what can I say, I'm crazy about him!

I know he was sad to leave his family, so when I met him at baggage claim I brought a little taste of Texas with me! While I was with his family in Houston, his dad made us the most delicious chocolate peanut butter shakes. It was like drinking a Reese's! I thought if I could replicate the recipe, it would make the transition back to Chicago a little easier. It was a bit heavy on the peanut butter flavor (is there really such a thing as too much peanut butter?) but hey, practice makes perfect and I'm excited to practice making those shakes!

So far his time back here has been all about food. A while back Josh challenged my domestic skills. I haven't cooked for him at all while we've been dating, but we've made several meals as a team (he'd argue that he's done all the work). Today that changed! I made creamy chicken taquitos from ourbestbites.com and they were deeeelicious. I was glad to prove that I can indeed cook (I'm just lazy) and I was so excited to spoil my man. He deserves it!