sweet home colorado: Streamwood or BUST!

This June we took off for 2 relaxing weeks of vacation back home in Illinois! We had such a great time that our trip will be broken up into a few blog posts each full of a million fun photos!

We (meaning Abby) decided that it would be best to save money by driving instead of flying this summer. And that way we would have our own car for the trip as well. So we packed up the car and just about anything else that we thought would be helpful or convenient to have while away from home and hit the road! It was nice to have the extra space in our car to bring our fishing poles, bats and gloves, cooler, stuffed animals, blankets, etc. The boys were SO excited to take a road trip.

I surprised them each with a new book to read along the way and a TMNT Seat Pet. These were a major score on clearance after Christmas. I got them for $2 each and hid them until our trip. They are pillows that attach to the seatbelt and make car sleeping much more cozy! They were THRILLED when they opened the door and saw the surprises on their seats!

Heath even decided to take a snooze right away. And for that, we were grateful. Well worth $2 if it made my child who does not like to sleep, WANT TO SLEEP!

Brooks did some "coloring".

And even got a HULK ring pop snack!

After a few hours of quiet time we put on a movie. We stopped for gas, quick bathroom breaks on the side of the road (one of the perks of having boys), and for caffeine fixes for Mark. He is the driver, I am the nanny. He just drives and drives for all 15 hours and I tend to the children. (Who did excellent by the way! They slept great and we had no meltdowns! SCORE!) We drove straight through the night until we arrived in Streamwood around 6 a.m.

The boys got straight to playing, chasing Gryffin, and being pampered by Grandma! Mark slept most of the day away and I lounged around, enjoying the extra help with the boys.

Grandpa and Auntie Mal worked that first day, but Flobby came over to play.

We took a walk to "Grandma's Pond" (that's what Nolan calls it) to feed the ducks.

There were more geese than ducks, but we did our best to defend the ducks from their aggressive pond mates.

There were a lot of mosquitos and a lot of geese poop on the ground and our visit was cut short when it started to rain.

But the boys love this little tradition when at Grandma and Grandpa's house.

When Grandpa got home from work he brought a surprise for the boys...

Minion Twinkies! They love anything Minion right now. And they had never had a Twinkie before. So this was a fun and delicious treat!

And we had a Mexican Fiesta to celebrate our first night together!

This trip was extra nice because we didn't make it jam packed. We had plenty of time to relax and hang out and do whatever we wanted each day.

Auntie and Flobby bought Brooks these cool orange sunglasses! He loves the color orange and wants to be just like his brothers, sporting sweet shades.

We always stop by Streamwood Florist for a visit with Soo-ja and Ik!

The smell of this shop is just amazing and brings back such great memories of my time spent there.

We went to Woodfield to buy Nolan some new Nikes. His toes had literally broken through the front of his old shoes…so it was time.

We stopped to play on the play land a little while we were there.

Nolan thought he was too old for this activity, but in no time he was joining in with his brothers. Who can resist a good slide? Ha! Even when your legs are that long!

Every time we are in Chicago, we must eat at Portillos. We usually only visit once each trip, so we usually eat burgers or beef. This trip I knew Mark needed a second Portillos run and he needed to try the Chopped Salad. It's delicious! He agreed! We have now decided that 2 Portillos trips are a must each vacation.

We visited Kerri, Joe, and Oliver at their new home, on the day that they closed! We were so grateful they made time for us during the craziness of buying a house and before they left the next day for vacation!

They found a great new house with a wonderful backyard!

The boys had such a great time playing on their trampoline, swing set, and sandbox!

And I loved catching up with Kerri and getting to love on Ollie!

This girl is just the sweetest soul! We are so happy for them and the new life and memories they will create in this amazing space!

We played a lot of catch whenever we had some downtime.

And we did some tree climbing too! I miss big, beautiful trees like this!

We had Lou's for dinner one night. The boys call it "Chicago Pizza". I call it heaven!

The boys helped Grandma feed the birds.

Grandma planned fun little activities for them: like Playdough, water color painting, Jello jiggles, and more!

Reading before bed time

The weather on our trip was very mild and cool. Mark was thankful that the humidity was low, but I could have used a little more sun. But it did help us feel motivated to do a little running! Mark was a champ and worked out most days because you can actually breath when running in the midwest!

Streamwood Splash Park

Waiting for the weather to warm up!

We were the only ones brave enough to play at the Splash Park that day! The boys loved it because they had the whole pad to themselves! It was only 66 degrees, but they didn't mind!

They had a BLAST!

When they were chilled, we dried off and played some baseball...

and played on the playground some more.

We also spent some time during the week hanging out and Auntie and Flobby's house.

We had a family dinner there one night and Mark and I went over twice after the kids were in bed to watch the Bachelorette all together! It is fun to have another home to visit when we're there.

And of course, Grandma took each boy out on a date: Heath came up with the order- Brooks, Nolan, Heath.