Chicago... by car, train, and boat

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Starting our day at the train stop in South Bend.
The boys were really excited. So excited that they
woke up at 6:30am! :)

Here is our water taxi!

Sonya, me, and our boys on top
of the water taxi.

The little boys. :)

Waiting for the water taxi to take us to Navy Pier.

The big boys playing in the forts at the Children's Museum.

Our fearless pirates.

Sean helping our future engineers
build something.

A view of Chicago from the water taxi.

Cullen helping Colton with some bolts.

Finn bounced around in the water room so much.
He played with everything!

Cullen building a dam.

Grayson was serious about his work
and put on some safety goggles.

Fireman Finn!
Our group of boys loved this exhibit!!
They slid down a fireman's pole, put out fires,
put on costumes, crawled through a smoke filled room,
drove a firetruck, and answered emergency calls at the station.

Getting ready to leave Navy Pier after a
fun day at the Children's Museum.

This Dyson hand dryer was in the bathroom
at the restaurant. I've never seen anything like it...

We put together some foam, to make
them into flying objects to see how long they would fly.
Sean gave them a ride up.
Here one of our projects is going up, and one is flying down.

We are excited that our friends, the Chaneys, live so close to us again (Chicago). We wanted to go see them before school started, so we headed out to the Windy City early Thursday morning. I found a commuter train that ran from South Bend to Chicago, so we took that. It was about a 2 1/2 hour ride (with all the stops), but the boys LOVED it. It was a great experience for them. The Chaneys live very close to the Museum Campus in Chicago and they met us at the train stop.

From there we walked over to the Shedd Aquarium where we took a water taxi over to Navy Pier. The boys really enjoyed riding on the huge boat, so did we... amazing views of the city. Once on Navy Pier we ate lunch in the food court we had to have some Chicago hot dogs. :) Then we went into the Children's Museum. We spent about 3 or 4 hours there.

We then got back onto the water taxi (where Colton and Finn napped) and then walked back to the Chaneys townhouse for a little bit before dinner. The boys older boys ran around being wild, enjoyed some childish toilet humor, etc. Then we walked to Lou Malnati's for some authentic Chicago-style deep dish pizza. It was so good!

After a wild dinner where little (slap-happy) boys outnumbered the adults, we walked back to our train stop for trip home. The boys were so good on the train, especially considering what a crazy day we had. It was a long day. We left our house at 8am and got home after 11pm. It was a lot of fun and we can't wait to go back to the Shedd Aquarium next time!