We love visitors!

We were able to have three sets of visitors this past month...

Grandpa Walker and Granny Kate spent a long weekend with us in May

Then Grandma Bunting came out to watch the kids and help with projects.

(I used an old photo, because apparently we were too busy to take any with her here)

 Then Paul's great friend Matt, his wife Kathryn and their three girls came to visit us last week...

We toured Chicago

including the architecture tour (I love the picture of everyone looking up)

we hung out on Navy Pier

And also visited Millennium Park, Grant Park, The Museum of Science and Industry, The Field Museum, and Sears Tower.  We introduced them to deep dish pizza, Potbelly sandwiches, and Culver's butter burgers and custard.

We didn't think that was enough, so we headed out to Nauvoo and Carthage as well!

the kids got along so well

(poor Matthew was totally outnumbered)

The kids and the dads at Carthage.

It was also very awesome for Paul and Matt to hang out together.

Their lifelong friendship will extend to our kids and that was pretty amazing!

Showing our guests a good time!

Uncle Ryan came to Chicago for a conference

 a couple of weeks ago.

He's seen the big city, so we took him with us to 

see the rural side of Illinois.

There was a huge corn maze and other games at this farm,

but the highlight was the pig races!

Paul and Ryan are so excited to be here!

The little pigs were cute--they ran for Oreos 

and had names like Jennifer Hamiston, Christina Hogiluera and Just-in-time Bieber

The kids loved it

 Up close for a better look at the "athletes"

They were pretty fast!  Halle was trying to keep up.  

She might have done better had she been offered an Oreo at the end too!

Girls' Weekend

Brittany came to visit me in Chicago since the boys would be skiing in Utah

We had a lot of fun shopping for maternity clothes

and picking out things for her baby girl coming in July!

 We stayed up late and talked

 We even bought the same shoes

 And finally, I had someone to go see Jane Eyre with me!
It's not playing in many theaters, but there was one relatively close that we decided to go to (for a 4:30 show)  We were the youngest movie-goers by about 40 years!  It was really funny, but we are so glad we went to see this movie!
It was fantastic--the scenery was gorgeous and the actors were outstanding!  Brit and I both loved it and highly recommend it to any fellow Bronte fans out there

(Mr. Rochester is quite handsome--he looked familiar and when I looked him up, imdb said that he played Wickham in the most recent Pride and Prejudice)


Thanks Brittany for coming out to keep me entertained and doing the fun stuff that I rarely treat myself too!  

Christmas Company

"Would it be so bad to ask the grandparents to stay at a hotel?"

(Christmas Vacation)

Just kidding!

We love when Grandma and Grandpa come to visit.

Thanks for coming to play, watch the kids, do some house projects,

hang out, tend to the sick, and keep the post-holiday blues away!

We love you!

We Love Visitors!

Kelsey and Rylee came to visit last week...

We got to celebrate Kelsey's Birthday!

And we took the little girls to American Girl Place.

We also went to the Aquarium, did some shopping,
some eating, and some playing

(Kelsey documented the visit much better than I did!)

We loved having them and showing them our fun city-

Afton loved being the big sister. 

Halle showed Rylee what it's like to have siblings.

Matthew just tried to ignore all the girls. 

And Nora wanted Kelsey to adopt her.

I enjoyed having another adult around
(as well as a good excuse to play!)

Thanks for coming!

Guess who's coming today?

Uncle Chad, Aunt Jordan and cousin Garrett!

Chad with Nora and Garrett 

Jordan and Nora

There's a lot of excitement at our house right now!

We love having people come visit--

and we especially love having cute Garrett come to stay

We are so glad they're making the trek out here!

We haven't seen them since summer, so it'll be a fun fun weekend!

Aunt Heather is coming!

Yeah--Aunt Heather gets to visit for the weekend! The kids (and I) are very excited. Heather usually comes in to watch the kids or do some work training, but this time she's coming for fun (well, and a half-marathon with me). She has not seen enough of Chicago for all the times she has been here. What to do...the architecture tour, Art Institute, Navy Pier, Michigan Avenue, Botanical Gardens, Sears Tower, Shedd Aquarium, Adler Planetarium--the one that's supposed to get the $3 million dollar "projector" you've been hearing about, any one of the 3 zoos... (no baseball anymore so that's out)..there's so much to do here and just not enough time!