Road Trip to the Windy City!

As I mentioned in the last post, in mid-September we hit the open road for our first major trip with Noah. We decided to travel at night with the hope he would sleep the entire ride... luckily it worked! The little man snoozed for four of the five hours it took us to get to Chicago (we made awesome time). Yippee!

We spent our first few days with our friends Becky and Elisa. We had such a wonderful time - mid-70s and sun... an alfresco lunch... the Lincoln Park Zoo... and ice cream! (It was very different than previous Chicago days filled with Neiman's, the spa and mid-afternoon cocktails, but still it was still wonderful :) ) Here are a few pics of the kiddos at the zoo:

Noah and the piggies

Takin' in some urban people watching

Noah and Elisa... too bad neither of them would look at the camera!

After a few days in the city, we hopped back in the car and headed to Naperville to visit Noah's Aunt Barb and Uncle Sean. Noah enjoyed playing in the park across from their house and LOVED getting to hang out with his doggie cousin, Luca. Unfortunately for Neil and I, Noah wasn't really in the mood to sleep that night. Being in a pack-n-play in a room with us = not good sleeping from our little NPF! Lesson learned for future travel. Anyway, Noah didn't seem to mind. He made up for the fact that he was up from 1 - 5 by sleeping in until 10am!

Here is a shot of him snoozing in the guest bed:

A close-up pic of the snoozer:

Once he finally woke up, Noah had fun playing with cousin Luca and Uncle Sean. So cute!

After a busy morning of playing and chowing down on pancakes, we headed back into the city for a ND game watch party. Although the game didn't have the outcome we hoped for, the party did give us a chance to catch up with a few old friends.

"Uncles" David and Tim

"Auntie" Ali

The next morning, fueled with plenty of Starbucks, we headed back home. It took a little over six hours, but hey, we did stop for lunch. Noah did great in the car... with the exception of a few wails he let out when we tried to listen to the Browns game. Guess that doesn't make him much different than every other football fan in Cleveland :)

All smiles at the rest stop!

Thanks again to our wonderful hosts! Can't wait for our next trip back to the Windy City!!!