Twenty-Seven and Holding!

This past Friday marked Kyle's first time in a few years that he wasn't out of town for his birthday, and I was thrilled to be able to make a big hoopla out of the occasion. (In the Sheppard family, birthdays are a huge deal and I have strived to convert Kyle to this way of celebrating since we've been married).

I "travelzooed" and found a 4 star hotel in the heart of Chicago and a fabulous sitter to stay with Cade overnight and another fabulous sitter to relieve her for the afternoon and evening on Saturday. Friday morning Kyle was presented with a few gifts and an invitation to spend the night in the city with "the girls" (Savvy and me).

After a drive in rush hour (who would have thought going to the city on Friday afternoon would take so long?) we arrived at our destination, The Ambassador East Hotel. There we dined at the world famous Pump Room-- also a four star experience. We were given the choice of Evian and some other kind of water we couldn't pronounce to start our evening with. Kyle blankly looked up and said, "Ummm, I'm fine with tap water."

We were really interested in ordering an appetizer... but nothing on the menu looked all too appetizing (we aren't four star restaurant regulars but maybe sometime in the future stuffed pumpkin gnocchi will sound good)... so we just hit the main course:

<< I ordered the buffalo short ribs. Yum!

Kyle ordered Amish Chicken and an $8 side of mashed potatoes--worrrth it!>>

Dessert:

Kyle's birthday dish of apple fritters>>>My dish of double chocolate delight. This was a "shot" of hot chocolate with a piece of dark chocolate cake and passion fruit ice cream.

After lounging in the restaurant listening to a live jazz musician and watching an old sugar daddy at the bar pick up on young ladies, we headed back to the hotel. 2 1/2 seconds later Michelle fell asleep and Kyle watched 3 or 4 channels at once with full power over the remote-- a supreme birthday treat for any man. Savannah was amazing and slept some 6 or 7 hours straight. It was the best sleep I've had in months.

After an extremely lazy morning (no pitter pat of Cade's feet down the stairs at 6 am!) we headed to the city where we walked to the Hancock observatory:

We then attempted public transportation and spent 40 minutes on a bus to take us to the museum of Science and industry where we saw the famous display, "Body Worlds" a collection of human cadavers disected with great skill and artistic talent. It was AMAZING!

We came outside to find the wind howling and snow falling. We waited for about 10 minutes for a bus and finally gave in and got a taxi to take us back to the hotel to pick up the car. Cool picture of the ride home: