Trekking to Chicago

The end of March, we headed to Chicago. 

Anthony had a Healthcare conference, and I had to go house hunting.

Amelia is starting to be a lot better in the car, so long drives aren't as miserable as they were last summer. We still wanted to break up the 15 hour drive though. We stopped in Toledo, Ohio, and went to their science Center. It was AMAZING. Our science center in Ithaca is pretty fun, but the Toledo one was crazy cool. 

The water area was huge and I am pretty sure Amelia literally (literally) thought she was in heaven.

Trader Joe's made our day

MEXICAN FOOD!! Ithaca has disgusting Mexican food, so we had to find some good eats while we were away.

On the way home, it was not quite as pleasant. We had to stop and give in to the demands of an almost 2 year old. Ice cream and Rice Krispies.

||Easter||

Playing Catch Up::

Easter was so much fun this year. Amelia had a blast finding the eggs, and kept asking us to hide them again. The Easter Bunny left some treats, a movie, and an Easter outfit.

|| And After the candy was taken away ||

That's the problem with 9:00 church.. Candy for Breakfast

We had a bunch of people from Anthony's program over for dinner. We made our first honey baked ham.. I was so nervous, but it turned out to be a lot easier than I thought. 

We had such a fun group of people. We had a Jewish student, a Buddhist, and a Muslim. It might sound like the beginning of a bad joke, but it was so much fun. We had one of Anthony's best friends, Murat, who is Muslim and completely did not understand the point of the Easter Bunny who hides eggs. And now after trying to explain it, I do not understand it at all either.

||Anthony covering it with cloves||

It was a good Easter, and I am glad we had so many friends to share it with.

Cornell Graduation

We are still alive...

We are just getting adjusted to life without school.

All of our friends are heading back to Cornell right now, and for the first time in our lives we are not in school. It is a strange concept and I have to admit that I am feeling a little stagnant. Our whole marriage has revolved around school and now we are in the grown up world. It's a bummer. I told Anthony he should apply to Med school again so we can be in school forever. (... and debt forever too, but I feel like we will be anyways..)

 Truth be told, I think it was a huge blessing that we decided on Cornell instead of medical school. 

Grad school is hard. And I wasn't even in school. Being the wife of a grad student is HARD.

I don't know if I could really survive anymore school. I like having Anthony home and a regular schedule.

On a happier note, Anthony's graduation on May 25 was a really happy day. We made it.

The ceremony was really nice and Andy Bernard from the office gave the commencement speech was awesome. Go on YouTube and watch it. 

I complained about Ithaca a lot, pretty much every day, at least in my head. 

People... I MISS IT. I miss it so much. Cornell is such a beautiful campus and I am sad that I didn't go there EVERY DAY. Ithaca will always hold a very special place in my heart as well as all the wonderful people we met. It is such a unique place and I will miss it forever.

Murat and Andrew

Daly

Julie Carmalt and Will White

Tiffany and Murat

The Flight From H.. You Know Where

Remember how excited I was that we now live Chicago and the flight to Utah is only 3 hours.. It's amazing right? Well, it's only  amazing when it actually takes 3 hours. 

On June 18, my mom dropped us off at the Salt Lake Airport. Our flight didn't leave until 4, so we went and got some lunch at Cafe Rio, I bought a book (Dad Is Fat by Jim Gaffigan... HILARIOUS), and we sat in line to board. We had been sitting there for about 30 minutes when I looked up at the screen and it said our plane was delayed an hour. This was frustrating. Especially because toddlers come with a good behavior expiration. We had planned naps, snacks, and entertainment perfectly. We have this down... (this is her 14th flight in 2 years.)

So we sat some more and eventually got on the plane. The pilot came on the intercom and explained there was a giant storm happening in Chicago and the midwest, and all flights that aren't already in flight are grounded. 

We sat some more.

TWO HOURS GO BY.... SITTING ON THE PLANE. yes we are still on the runway, waiting for Chicago to tell us if we are free for take off... 

Every 30 minutes the captain would come on the intercom and tell us "Chicago, said 'not yet'. We will hear an update in 30 minutes." After 2 hours, the captain decided to drive back to the terminal and let us off to eat and get comfortable. 

When we got off, they said they would hear an update in an hour and we would probably leave then. This gave us hope, especially because they told us that we had to be on the plane with in 15 minutes of the announcement or they would leave us. We were NOT missing this plane. 

It was now dinner time, so we got Wendy's and ate dinner. Amelia ran around the terminal 65926 times, and we hoped this would wear her out. 

Well we had to wait longer than expected and got HOURLY updates... "Maybe the next hour will be better news..."

THREE HOURS LATER. we had eaten all of our snacks and played with our toys... CUE mom's anxiety. It's about to go down in toddlerland.

we got on the plane at 9:00. Yeah.. 5 hours after our first flight. 

Because of the storm, we had to go around it, so the flight actually took 4.5 hours instead of 3. 

For the flight... Amelia did GREAT. No complaints. She didn't fall asleep until we were landing. OF COURSE. We got into Chicago at 3:30am. We were supposed to get there at 8:30 pm (THE DAY BEFORE) (too many caps for one post?).... Ugh. 

Well, it took an other hour for our luggage to get to the baggae claim, because so many other flights were delayed. the airport was packed. Amelia was so tired, but not ornery at all... we really lucked out with her behavior. 

We got home at 5:00 am. Oh and toddlers don't sleep in, no matter what time they go to sleep. It was just a great day...

Pre-Flight... oH the bliss of the unknown

Trying to keep her happy during our 2 hour Tarmac tour

Hour 3 of flight... 

As we are landing... 

Sitting on my suitcase as I roller her around the airport

My face says it all...

Shall we try again this Christmas? I think we might pass this year.

Trip to Utah:: Bear Lake Reunion

Anthony graduated on May 25, but I haven't gotten the pictures off my multiple cameras... so we are going to skip straight to our Utah trip.

After Anthony graduated on the 25th, we (us and Anthony's parents) drove all of our stuff to Chicago that night. It was an adventure to say the least. Our Penske truck kept over heating, Amelia claimed she had to potty every 30 minutes, and we drove through the night.
We took 3 days to move in and get all situated, and then flew to Utah. Amelia did awesome on the flight. I am so excited the flight home is only 3 hours. Amazing!

We had Anthony's family reunion at Bear Lake and it was so fun! We rented a cabin and just relaxed on the beach with canoes, paddle boards, and wave runners.