Giving Thanks

So after a week and a half of work at the new job (by the way, I'm working at a Community Development Entity -we're helping people through building business and bringing development to low-income areas - it's very cool), I was allowed to take a day off of work to take a 5:30am flight to Southern California for Thanksgiving.

Yes, the weather was nice (65°F!). Yes, I enjoyed my In-N-Out Burger on the way back from the airport. Yes, the food was excellent. And yes, Mr. Cleaver ran into a cactus. But the best part of the whole trip was this:

photo courtesy of my big brother Luke

I got to meet my little cousin. I got to learn a three-needle cast off with Jeanine. I got to go through my grandmother's quilt collection. I got felting tips from Zoe Ann. I got to hear about Alexis's wedding plans. I got to talk about living in the Midwest with Ray and got to know my sister-in-law better. I talked photography with my brother and Mr. Cleaver spoke French with my Uncle's mother. I tested the law of probably with my grandpa on the Roulette wheel in the "man room" and walked the Huntington Gardens with mother. I learnt that most of my family reads this blog (Hi Family!) and got to see the lighting of the Mission Inn with all of the population of Riverside.

In a word, my trip was wonderful. 

And I couldn't be more grateful.

Acting Touristy

As of today, I have 10 days left in Chicago, so it was excited to have the opportunity to play the tourist this week with my coworkers.  Every year we take a field trip during the summer. My first year we saw the new baby beluga at the Shedd Aquarium; last year, we went to the Taste of Chicago; this year, we decided to take the Chicago Architecture Foundation's river tour. 

We went out on the water at noon on Tuesday, and despite the apocalyptic storm the night before (as in over 800 lightening strikes a minute and its peak and there were tornado sirens!), we had beautiful weather. It was almost too sunny and a lot of my pictures were overexposed, but I did like how some of them turned out.  

And true to the docent's promise, I did learn some really neat stuff about the city and its architecture.  It was definitely worth the trip.

I'll definitely miss Chicago when we go, but I can take comfort in the fact that I have done and seen a lot of the city. From living in Hyde Park to checking out the museums, I've been a pretty good live-in tourist for the past 2.25 years.

On an entirely different note, I've received The Smile Award courtesy of Stina's Stuff. It's my first blog award so I'm super excited!

Characteristics for the Smile Award are as follows: 

1. Must display a cheerful attitude. (not necessarily at all times–we are all human)
2. Must love one another
3. Must make mistakes
4. Must learn from others
5. Must be a positive contributor to blog world
6. Must love life
7. Must love kids

These are the rules:

1. The recipient must link back to the award’s creator (http://www.thebabblingsofmere.blogspot.com/)
2.  You must post these rules if you receive the award.
3. You must chose 5 people to receive the award after receiving it yourself
4.  You must fit the characteristics of the recipient of the award, as posted by Mere.
5. You must post the characteristics of a recipient.
6. You must create a post sharing your win with others.
7.  You must thank your giver.

I'd like to give the award to the following folks:

1. Bitter Betty Blogs: mother, crafter, vintage sewing diva extraordinare, and all-around awesome lady.
2. Blue Yonder : I'm inspired by the adventures she shares with her boys and she is only encouraging my desire to raise a bunch of chickens.
3. Non-Profit Girl, a friend from college, who takes a look at Portland, OR and the non-profit world.
4. Cult of Domesticity: My blog-land domestic twin, who is expecting her first child
5. The Fabled Needle,  someone who takes action to follow her dreams and has a wicked awesome sense of style.

Zoo Day!

So to finish up our 4th of July weekend, Mr. Cleaver and I headed to Lincoln Park for the Green City Market and the Lincoln Park Zoo on the 5th (and yes I know there's still Sunday, but that was dedicated to the Men's Wimbleton Final). Having finally gotten the memory card for my shiny new Pentax K200D, I thought this would be a great opportunity to take it out for a spin.

This is the one picture I took at the Market:

But before you worry about not getting a chance to use my camera much, I took over 650 pictures at the Zoo. Don't worry I won't make you look at them all. (I edited it down to 40 on my computer in any case).

Because we were going directly from the market to the zoo, we didn't want to purchase a whole lot of stuff and couldn't really get anything perishable. We did pick up some rosemary and a half-pint of raspberries, the latter of which served to perk up that overly dry birthday cake.

We picked a perfect day to go the zoo: the weather was gorgoreous and nearly all the animals were awake an active.

The trainers came out and played with the seals:

[wp_caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="357" caption="Della the Grey Seal"][/wp_caption]

The big cats were alert, if not on the prowl:

[wp_caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="334" caption="Tiger Tiger Burning Bright"][/wp_caption]

The chimps people watched:

[wp_caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="500" caption="Keo the Chimp"][/wp_caption]

And the polar bears swam:

and swam:

and swam:

(I took about 100 photos of the polar bears alone - I though it would make a good subject for my "In Motion" photos for the swap.)

It was also a great day for knocking stuff off our Chicago-to-do list: we hit the Green City Market and we rode the carousel at zoo and as you may or may not know, my love for carousels knows no bounds.

 

We've got about 6 or so things left on the list, which is good, because we've finally set a moving date : the week of August 18!

If you're interested in seeing more of our day at the zoo, you can check out my flickr set here.

Check One More off the List

It was my friend Kasey's birthday this weekend, and in honor of that very special event, Kasey, her boyfriend David, Mr. Cleaver, and I all went down to Navy Pier.

As some of you may know, Mr. Cleaver and I are moving back to Maine this summer and our time in Chicago is quickly dwindling.

With this in mind, we've been constructing (a mostly mental) list of things we have to do before we leave Chicago. The list includes things like see a show at Steppenwolf (done - Dead Man's Cell Phone), visit the Shedd Aquarium (not done), see a Cubs games (done, but like to do again), eat Katie Cakes at Taste of Heaven (never too many times for this), and so on.

One of the things that has been on my "Chicago-to-do List" ever since I moved to the city was to ride the Ferris Wheel that towers over Navy Pier. At 140 feet in diameter, and a seating capacity of 240, this baby is big - though not as big as the original Ferris Wheel that was built in Chicago for the World's Columbian Exposition in 1893 - which stood 264 feet and could carry 2,160 people. (Thank you Devil in the White City)

Well Saturday was finally my day to check that one off the list and was well worth it. The view are amazing:

Now it must be said that Mr. Cleaver is not a fan of heights. So here's me waving at Mr. Cleaver.

And here's Mr. Cleaver waving back:

In addition to our jaunt on Mr. Ferris' wheel, our party of four ate a great lunch at Charlie's Ale House and played a rousing gold of Micro Golf.

Now I say micro and not mini because seriously, look at the size of each of these (18) holes.

My favorite part of the game was making up random "pars" for each hole. I think five was the highest and the average was two or three. Let it be said though, that this is a speedy game, which throngs of small children on either side.

Not that you can't take time to make that perfect shot :)

Touristy Time at Home

In sticking with a long personal tradition of being attacked by dinosaur skeletons. Mr. Cleaver and I made a visit to Sue at Chicago's Field Museum on Saturday.

Sometime in the Early 90's

August, 2005

Saturday, 2007

Mr. Cleaver is more concerned really...

I have no shame, really, about being touristy in the place I live. Particularly when the library hands out free museum passes to those lucky enough to snag them (we've managed four: MCA, Art Institute, Adler and Field, in a little over a year). This might come from having lived predominately in touristy Meccas (Napa, Chicago, not to mention "Vacationland").  I also believe there is a reason people come to see these things.

Now I have no plans to go to the top of the Sears Tower, so I do have a little shame about these things, but what shame I had didn't stop me from also visiting the Billy Goat Tavern this weekend, which was totally worth it.

As Fall Winds To A Close

Since, I consider fall to be officially over after Thanksgiving, I wanted to send my favorite season off in style with some more photos of Fall at her peak from my honeymoon trip to Vermont. They know how to pull off a good fall up there.

I'll miss you.

Local Eating, Vacation Style

I've been a bit lax in posting this week (it's been one of those). But I've been wanting to post a few photos from the honeymoon back in October and as fall is quickly ending, now seemed as appropriate time as any.

Today's theme: the best of eating locally in Vermont's Northeast Kingdom.

Cider and syrup. It doesn't get any better than that.

Except for maybe the Maple Syrup Candy...