september 10th-12th

Thursday was a fairly relaxing day since I didn't have my internship. I enjoyed taking my time when I woke up in the morning, but I also made sure that I had a productive day. In the morning I cleaned and reorganized a lot of stuff in our apartment, I went for a walk, and ran a few errands. Around 2pm I ventured out to find Moody and meet up with Elizabeth. I had a blast hanging out with her - she showed me her dorm and I met her roommate. Then we went for a nice, long walk to Borders for tea/coffee. It was great catching up with her and we now have plans to go to an Owl City concert together in two weeks! :)

 

(just a few photos to break up the writing -- this is one of my favorite buildings in Chicago)

Friday was my non-productive day. I did a little homework but otherwise I just took advantage of having the apartment to myself and watched a movie, played my guitar, etc... all in all just enjoyed being by myself since that doesn't happen very often. The evening was also pretty relaxed with a very successful trip to Target (you all must know how happy it makes me that I can get to a Target easily here!) and a round of TV SceneIt.

  

Saturday - Renae and I started today with a trip to the farmers market that's on our block every Saturday. Before we left I sat at our table eating breakfast and people watching (from that seat you have a perfect view of the NE corner of the intersection) and couldn't believe how many people were walking around with flowers so it shouldn't have surprised me that when we turned the corner from our building we were faced with a sea of petals. The flowers were gorgeous! We had to buy some for our room :) I also bought a bag of the most DELICIOUS apples I have ever tasted for just $5. Renae bought some fresh vegetables as well as a purple pepper.

In the afternoon Renae and I headed down to the loop for a couple of hours. Elizabeth had told me that there was a game of "Where's Waldo in the Windy City?" this afternoon so we went, determined to find him. There were boundaries set which made up an area of about 20 blocks where Waldo, Wanda, Wizard Whitebeard, Woof, and Odlaw would be hiding. We had two hours to find them and it was quite an adventure! For all of you skeptics, it was a lot more fun that you would think - wandering around the city searching for a man in a red and white shirt/hat - and then the excitement when you finally find one of them!

 

A little acknowledgment that we were at least in the right area :)

We found Wanda first with a lucky left turn

 

You could also search for Whitebeard's 12 Scrolls around the city - we found this one, but we also passed one while it was being drawn before we knew what the scrolls looked like. We were really hoping they were actual paper scrolls... 

But then there was a sighting in Millennium Park. Can you find him?

 Waldo was on the move and we ended up following him in a circle around the park

 

Thankfully some kids stopped him and asked him what he was doing, otherwise I'm not sure we would have caught him. 

And be sure to enjoy this photo to it's full extent... not only am I in a picture with Waldo himself, please notice the man behind me and the bride and groom behind Waldo. It was amazing how many different bridal parties there were around the loop today!

september 5th - 9th

Sorry it's been a while... After we moved out of the hotel and in to our apartment on Saturday, we were without internet for a bit. I'll attempt to sum up the last couple of days for ya:

Saturday - like I said, we moved in to our apartment... My parents arrived around 12:30 and I think left around 3-ish. Nothing too exciting happened in the afternoon except worked on unpacking and getting everything settled. But I did discover that I strongly dislike grocery shopping for myself. Trying to figure out what I would eat for a week at a time is almost impossible since I don't really know how to cook anything :)
Saturday night I went on an adventure with one of my roommates, Jeanne, out to Navy Pier... if you want to know about it, feel free to ask but otherwise I won't bore you with the details right now

Sunday I went to church at the down-town branch of Willow Creek. Willow Creek Chicago meets in this amazingly gorgeous theater and so far I really like it. I went with two other people and we decided to sit in the balcony which I think is on the 5th floor. Worship was amazing - I love worshiping with such a diverse group of people! The sermon was good as well - definitely got me thinking - but it was a little different for me because it was a video feed from one of the other branches in the Chicago area. I think I'll still go again next week because they are starting a series (where I think the speaker is actually in the room haha) about being aware of how you spend your time and not letting yourself get too busy.
After church we did a little exploring while looking for the Jazz festival - and even though we never found it, we did find the Buckingham fountain:

This dad and his little boy were absolutely adorable! :) They were running around, playing games, and here the dad is trying to teach the boy how to do push-ups.

In the afternoon a few of us went to the beach which is just a few blocks east of our apartment building. It was gorgeous - a wonderful day to walk with your feet in the water... or to build a sand castle:

  

 

(more pics on facebook)

On Monday my roommate, Renae, and I went on an adventure to go thrift-store shopping with the hopes of finding some things to decorate our apartment, but... we forgot it was Labor Day and all of the stores were closed. We ended up relaxing for the most of the day at the apartment and then met up with one of Renae's friends from high school who has lived in Chicago for three years now. We went out for frozen yogurt at 

and then walked all over the city and ended up hanging out at his dorm for a while. But I just want to say... if any of you come to visit, we are definitely going out for some frozen yogurt! :)

Tuesday was pretty basic - I had more orientation meetings for the most of the day - just an introduction to the classes I will be taking.

And finally, today. Also pretty basic. This morning we had an intro to our practicum groups that we will be meeting with all semester. I took an unintentional nap while trying to get a head start on my homework :\ but it was needed. It's taking me a while to get used to the sounds of Division Street (major tourist bar-hopping street if you didn't know) right outside our window which we have to leave open in order to not suffocate from the heat. Now I'm going to once again attempt to get started on homework until leaving for a Bible study a guy in the program is hosting tonight at 7pm.

Thanks for reading! I hope you are all doing well and that you know how much I miss all of you!

Oh, and to just give you an idea of how much walking I've done this weekend here's a map of  some of the different places I walk between:

There are many other places I've gone and paths I've walked over and over again, so this is just a glimpse :) I really enjoy being able to walk everywhere or taking public transportation, but I know after a while I'll probably miss driving my car.