Gretchen and I left on Thursday afternoon. I took a 1/2 day off work, and picked her up from daycare. Our plan was to reach Chicago by 3:30 their time, and miss the rush hour traffic. If you've ever traveled by yourself with a potty training toddler, you know that you have to stop more than you'd like! I also learned that MapQuest has better directions than my GPS! My GPS put me in rush hour traffic and along all of the toll roads- I had to pay a $3.00 toll at one point! Gretchen didn't like going through the tolls because she thought we'd get ice cream!
We arrived at the hotel, after a detour in China town and sitting in bumper to bumper traffic for an hour. Gretchen was excited to see daddy, and we headed up to the hotel room to relax for a bit. He had a banquet that evening, so Gretchen and I ventured out on the town! Thankfully, we were staying in a suburb of Chicago, so we didn't have a lot of traffic to deal with. We found the mall and discovered that it had a Rainforest Cafe, so I insisted that we eat there, thinking it would be a fun experience for Gretchen.
Tilt your head sideways, so you can see this sassy pose my daughter is doing! Oh, and the m2m hair bow I made her before we left on our trip! This is the entrance to the dining area at Rainforest Cafe.
We were seated near the dolphins, which Gretchen was fascinated with.
Sadly, we were also seated next to this gorilla, that spoke every 25 minutes. Gretchen heard the noise, so I took her out of her chair to see the talking gorilla, thinking that she would find it comical.... but, she screamed her chilling scream and instantly clung to me. I could have let go of her and she would have still been hanging on for dear life. Thankfully, our waiter understood my child's terror and allowed us to switch tables, seeing as to how Gretchen refused to sit back in her chair and our food was there.
After switching seats, from the terrifying gorilla, she enjoyed a huge bowl of mac-n-cheese. I had fried shrimp (one of my favorite seafood dishes), which sadly, wasn't very good and there wasn't a lot of shrimp. I should've remembered that the oil spill in the gulf would affect this.
And, as promised, Gretchen did get her ice cream, since the toll workers wouldn't give her any! And, she even shared with mommy!
After switching seats, from the terrifying gorilla, she enjoyed a huge bowl of mac-n-cheese. I had fried shrimp (one of my favorite seafood dishes), which sadly, wasn't very good and there wasn't a lot of shrimp. I should've remembered that the oil spill in the gulf would affect this.
And, as promised, Gretchen did get her ice cream, since the toll workers wouldn't give her any! And, she even shared with mommy!After dinner, we did some shopping. Which, wasn't easy when I didn't bring in the stroller. At one point, Gretchen literally dashed out of a store and down the hall! At least it gave me an excuse to not buy anything! We did, however, end up with 2 new shirts and a pair of sunglasses for moi' and 2 shirts and a pair of shorts from gymboree for her!
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