Week in review...

I am so glad that this week is almost over.  One more day and it's the weekend!  Unfortunately, when I woke up this morning I felt like I was fighting something.  Now, over 12 hrs later, I feel like I'm battling a fever and sore throat-great.  Apparently there are tons of folks at work who are sick with bronchitis, pneumonia, stomach flus.....and they for some reason just come to work anyways which just spreads germs.  And I'm sure to catch anything that is near me.  I popped some Vitamin C this morning in hopes to ward off anything lurking about with the intentions of attacking my immune system. 

I think my major lack of sleep is also playing a role in feeling under the weather.  Cadi had been keeping me up/waking me up in the middle of the night two nights this week.  And then last night I felt like my throat was sore so it was hard to get good rest.  I was up pretty much every other hour to get a drink and try to alleviate how dried out my head was.  

Not to mention the fact that we had to fire someone this week and he didn't take it too well.  After having him leave the building, he lurked outside for an hour which made my boss scared to leave at the end of the day.  Our VP (a bigger guy) escorted her and another lady out.  Apparently shortly after that he returned to our downtown office and I'm not sure what exactly happened, but he had to be removed by guards.  It's a shame because he was a very quiet, polite guy and was always nice to me, but was fired for basically not showing up for some work things.  We then had to fire a girl today.  She took it much better and was just a little confused.  I don't think she's the brightest bulb in the chandelier though haha.  

This week I also got my annual review and I got a major raise!  I'm glad because we've been extra busy at work so it's good to see that all the work I've been doing hasn't gone unnoticed.  

Other than that, I've made up a new meal haha.  Last night I formulated my own recipe for a Turkey Meatball Stew kind of thing.  I put it in the crock pot this morning and let it cook all day.  It really hit the spot when we got home.  It was hearty and warm-perfect thing for a very cold day and not feeling that well!  The stew included fresh cut russet potatoes, fresh chopped carrots, fresh baby portobello mushrooms and homemade ground turkey mini meatballs.  I used a large can of cream of mushroom and small can of condensed cream of broccoli soup with a bit of water for the base.  Best thing about it is that I'll be able to freeze some of it since it made a lot and be able to pop it on the stove and have a meal in about a half hour at a later time.  I love cooking and making up new recipes.  

Now it's time to hit the sack in hopes of getting a better nights sleep and waking up to not being sick!

Date Night!

Yesterday Peter and I had a date night.  We have been so busy visiting with family and friends on the weekends and Peter was out of town one weekend that it's been a while since it's been just us together.  We initially planned on being out of town again this weekend in Hollidaysburg but on Friday it was pretty nasty out with snow and ice so we decided to postpone our trip until March.  

We spent the morning and early afternoon lounging around and vegging out watching "Rush Hour" and some other things on TV.  We left the house around 3:30 for a 4:00 movie at the dollar theater.  For $1.98 we saw "PS I love you".  It was a cute movie and the scenery in Ireland was amazing!  Some of the movie was kind of unrealistic, but overall we both really enjoyed it.  I thought that I would cry during the movie but I actually didn't.  There were sad parts, but nothing that actually made me cry.  I do think he was sweet for doing the letters, etc. and thinking of how she would deal with life after he died.  

After the movie, we went to Olive Garden for dinner where we stuffed ourselves with salad, breadsticks and pasta.  I had Chicken Scampi (without the onions) and Peter had Tuscan Garlic Chicken.  They were actually pretty similar.  I have had the scampi before and knew I liked it.  The only differences were that mine was with angel hair pasta and Peter's had curled fettucini and that Peter's had chicken breasts while mine was chicken tenderloins.  Plus Peter's had spinach in it.  But basically, very similar.  Both yummy though!  I ended up bringing half of mine home with almost an entire bowl of their salad and extra breadsticks.  I also got a piece of the Black Tie Mousse Cake to go.  Our waiter was very cool and so we decided to give him a nice tip.  In the end we spent under $20 (including the $10 tip) because we had a $25 gift card.  

We stopped at the mall on our way home to return a skirt I had bought and to pick up my ring from Valentine's Day.  I had to send it out to be sized and with the holiday, it took an extra long time.  I was pumped to finally get it!  It's so pretty :)  I also found a cute black polo shirt at JCP for $2.97 haha.  It's not a regular polo so I like the puff sleeves and big buttons.  

We got home around 10PM and continued our veg out process from the morning.  We changed into PJs and watched some more tv and just had a great day together! :)

Wheaton College

Today we slept in and bummed around the hotel for a bit.  We even took a dip in the hot tub and tried the pool but it was too cold!  We went in the hot tub first also so that didn't help with how cold the pool felt.  Oh well!  We had breakfast at the hotel again which is really great because they have all kinds of muffins, cereal, bagels, fruit, breakfast sandwiches, waffles and juices so we don't have to worry about grabbing breakfast out somewhere.  We took showers after our hot tub dip and then eventually rolled out to Andrew's apartment. 

 We went to the cafeteria on campus for lunch and met his friend Jackie who seemed really nice.  She probably thought we were nutcases though because Peter and I just talk and ramble and make fun of each other all the time haha.  Then we stopped and played pool and pingpong in the student center.  The student center they have on campus is completely awesome!  They have tons of rooms with chairs and couches and fire places.  Plus a room with games and a big screen TV in it.  I liked that there were several rooms with doors etc on them for reading and stuff.  Geneva had one big room so it got noisy pretty easily.  Andrew also gave us a tour of the campus which is a really nice campus!  See for yourself...

They even have this mini museum in the bottom of one of the buildings.  I thought this display was pretty cool:

They also had a whole exhibit of Jesus's death and resurrection.  

The "heaven" room:

I tried taking a nice picture of Peter and Andrew while we were there, but with these two, it just didn't happen haha.

I'm excited to go back in the springtime when we can walk around more without being freezing!  It wasn't too cold on Sunday-in the 40's so it was at least bearable.  But Saturday was coooooold!  

After our tour, we went to the grocery store so Andrew could stock up on some food and we could get stuff to make dinner.  I made Chicken Tortellini for us and some of Andrew's friends.  We served it with garlic toast and salad and it was yummy!  We watched the finale of "American Gladiators" at Andrew's apartment which was fun.  We had a good time hanging out and meeting Andrew's friends.  There was poker night going on later so we hung out for a while and Peter and I grabbed some Starbucks around 9PM so we wouldn't be so tired (it didn't work haha) and we played poker for a bit later on.  I didn't play because I didn't really know how to totally so I was on Peter's team haha.  

When we got back to the hotel room, the room was filled with such a great fragrance from the flowers!  More of the lilies opened and it made the bouquet even more beautiful and we really enjoyed taking in the smell!

Shedd Aquarium

While visiting Andrew in Chicago, we took a trip to Shedd Aquarium in downtown Chicago-the largest aquarium in the world!  It was soooo much fun!  It was so huge that even after spending the whole afternoon there, we didn't see everything.  

Instead of driving, we took the train.  This was my first time on a train so I documented it with a picture!  I loved the train ride.  It was so convenient for $5 unlimited rides all weekend, it was a better option than driving and dealing with traffic, directions, parking, etc.  It was also a smooth and relatively quiet (even though the train was packed) ride.  

Then we took a short bus trip from the train station to the aquarium.  This was also my first time on a public bus.  I've ridden school buses and charter tour buses, but never a city bus....so again I documented it with a picture! haha

Andrew was with us too!

We got off at the Museum Campus Bus stop which is near the aquarium, planetarium, etc. and had a short but beautiful walk to the aquarium.  Don't ask what Peter's doing because we don't know hahaha.  

This is the pathway up to the aquarium.  With all the snow it was very pretty!

On our left the entire walkway was a view of the Navy Pier with a lighthouse far out in the water.  It was very picturesque.  

Getting closer to Shedd Aquarium...

We could also see some of the Chicago skyline and part of Lake Michigan.  It was pretty cool because it was frozen close to land but we could see where it turned to water too.

This is another view of the Navy Pier:

Even though it was pretty cold out, it was very enjoyable with all the views to take in.  This park looked so inviting and I would love to go back in the springtime-which we plan to do next year before Andrew graduates!

Proof that the 3 of us were together on this adventure:

The next shots are all from inside the Aquarium.  No flash photography was allowed (even though we saw some rude people doing it anways) so I used the iPhone for many of the pictures since our digital camera didn't pick up the pictures good enough with no flash.  It was so pretty and had so many different reef tanks and fish tanks.  When you first walk in, there's a huge tank with a hammerhead shark and a giant turtle and Shedd staff actually go into the tank and answer your questions while they feed some of the fish.   

Before we explored more of the aquarium, we grabbed some lunch in the cafeteria there since it was lunch time and Peter was hungry! :)  This is us on the steps down to the cafeteria.  

Some tanks had one species of an aquatic creature, while others had several species mixed together.  

Jellyfish!

This is one of my favorites:

These were cool dragonfish.  I don't know if that was the "exact" name but something close to it.  

Seahorses:  

Another favorite:

Even though we paid for the cheaper admission that didn't include all exhibits (we figured it wasn't worth it because we wouldn't have time for it all anyways) we got to see the penguins and whales and dolphins.  The whales were hard to see because the water was really cloudy and they were on the other side of the tank.  We did however watch the penguins for like 15 minutes which was really fun.  We kind of "snuck in" but no one said anything haha.  Our plan was to plead innocence and act like we didn't know better.  

All in all it was a very fun Saturday afternoon at the aquarium.  We went ate dinner at the cafeteria at Wheaton and Peter and Andrew played pingpong for a while.   We must be getting old though because we headed back to the hotel around 9PM to crash.  

Chicago!

When we arrived at our hotel in Chicago, I found these beautiful flowers waiting on the desk for me!  Peter told me I'd be getting part of my Valentine's present when we got there, but I didn't expect flowers!  He didn't want to give them to me Thursday because we were leaving Friday afternoon and I wouldn't have been able to enjoy them.  So instead he arranged for them to be waiting for me in Chicago!  It was so sweet and they smelled incredible!  These pictures don't do them justice...

Obviously you can tell that we had been up early on Friday because I went to work until 12:30.  Then we went right to the airport for our afternoon flight.  After landing in Chicago, we got a cab ride to Enterprise for our rental car.  It was cheaper 5 miles down the road even after adding in cab fare.  After getting our rental we drove in rush hour construction ridden traffic to the hotel haha.  We were hungry and exhausted but ready to have a good time!