Greetings from Chicago!

Long time NO BLOG!  I have kinda missed blogging!  Anyway, I do have a good excuse.  Me and the Husband went to CHICAGO!

Derek and I had a super fabulous time of course!  While we were there for business, we managed to have some fun!  I do have to preface my post with saying that while I absolutely LOVE my new phone, I'm not quite used to taking pictures on a cell phone yet.  Therefore, the pictures are not as great as our first trip (hmph)  But I think I managed to capture our time well enough!

We were upgraded to a corner room on the 33rd floor which meant awesome views all the way around our room!

Monday- After getting to Chicago, of course the first thing we do is go get pizza!

We had to get Lou Malnati's pizza (A) because we had it last time and the pizza is so frakin' delicious!  And (B) It is our favorite pizza in Chicago!

After eating, we did the next important thing in Chicago...shop!  Derek, as always, lucked out BIG TIME and managed to score some major deals.  I on the other hand not so much.  But shopping is always fun in the bigger cities!

The first event I had that night was at The Roof at the Wit.  Since the event was at a bar, Derek tagged along with me.

Source

I guess this is the newest " swanky spot" for nightlife.  The drinks were very expensive (as expected) and very limited BUT it was a great time and great views of the city all night long!


Tuesday- This was my super busy day!  I had a meeting at 7:30am and decided to walk to the board meeting.  I stepped out and literally felt like I could take on the world since I was conquering this huge city!  On the walk home at noon, I was ready for a car or cab.  Either one because my hair did not agree with the moisture in that city!  LOL! (I did take some pictures to prove I was up and at-em' this early in a suit...but after staying out late the night before, these pics will not make it to le blog, haha!)

Later that day we checked out another pizza place: Gino's East

 As you can tell (or may not be able to tell) from the pic, there is writing literally EVERYWHERE in this restaurant.  Its pretty sweet.  The pizza ended up being almost exactly like Lou Malnati's.  Little differences and A LOT more expensive!

Later that night I had our program's alumni dinner, which Derek met up with us afterwards for the open bar (oh ya!)

Miss Monica and I

The dinner was the Union League, which means it was super expensive and unfortunately not that great!  We made it out to "Howl @ the Moon" (which is a dueling piano bar) much later that night.  Great to hang out with everybody from our program!


Wednesday- This was finally a day to ourselves, whew!  Derek and I went and got some lunch (surprise, another eating event :  )  )  We tried XOCO, which was suggested by our friend Nick.  I was super excited for this restaurant because being HUGE Top Chef fans, the owner of this restaurant is Rick Bayless who won the first season of Top Chef Masters.

I had no idea what type of food it was.  After going and not knowing what the hell I was ordering,  it ended up being an up-scale contemporary Mexican street-food-style cafe.  If you know what I mean?!?!

After the Mexican food, we went to Sprinkles, a cup-cakery (which I wanted to go to last time, but we just didn't make it!).  I WAS SO EXCITED!

Never mind the huge gloves I had on.  I was so cold!  Anyway, I was so excited!

I didn't know which one to get...they all look SO GOOD!

 We ended up getting their red velvet and chocolate marshmallow cupcakes.  YUMMY!  Oh and we couldn't walk out the door with some special dog cupcakes for our little Brutus!

We then had dinner with our friends Emily and Nick at an adorable little italian restaurant in Wicker Park.  Other then that...that was our trip.  Whew, I'm exhausted now =  )  Stay tuned for a weekend recap and updates on our house!