Austin's 10th Birthday

Austin celebrated his 10th birthday with a bowling party last Sunday. His best friends, Grant, Travis, Matthew, Nathan F., Nathan S. and of course Casey and best friend Kari, were there to enjoy the celebration! We had a great afternoon and I just love this age!


Best Buds since birth - Austin & Grant
The ferocious Girls Team!

Travis & Austin - we always have a laugh at these two together!
Signing the bowling pin...

Chicago Part 1

We went to Chicago for Easter weekend and had such a great time. We picked up Nicole from Eau Claire on the way and arrived there on Thursday evening. On Friday, we visited the John Hancock building and observed the city from 94 floors high. The elevator took us there in 45 seconds - it's one of the fastest in the nation. We ended up going back that night to see the city lights and the kids really loved this part of the trip.

Looking down from the top

Day & Night Pics of the same scenes

The Navy Pier

Oprah lives somewhere on this magnificent street facing Lake Michigan

We literally ate our way through Chicago and I can't button my jeans this week! We had lunch at Gino's East, which is a landmark restaurant known for their deep dish pizza. I'm not a huge pizza fan, but this was honestly the best pizza I've ever had!!



For dinner, we went to Ed Debevics which is a hoot. The waiters dance on the counter and are always cracking jokes with the customers. It was crazy and fun!

At Navy Pier - I would love to visit this place in the summer - it's so full of things to do and you can just hang out on the pier and watch the lake (which really is like an ocean it's so huge).

Water Tower; it survived the fires of 1871 and is just beautiful lit up at night. The kids learned a lot of history about the city and how they rebuilt it after the fires destroyed it.

Of course, we went to an aquarium. The Shedd Aquarium is one of the best in the country and Casey had a ball checking out everything. We ordered tickets online, but if you didn't, the line was over 2 hours long to get in!

View of the city from the aquarium

The Feld Museum

The Buckingham Fountain - this fountain is one of the largest in the nation and this picture doesn't do it justice. At night, it's lit and also has music. We could see it at night from the Hancock Building.

Chicago Part 2

We visited Grant Park and Millennium Park, which are next to each other. I kept telling the kids we had to go see the "silver bean", which is actually named Cloudgate and is a 110 ton sculpture. They thought I was crazy, but boy did they have fun!!!! It's amazing what happens when you get a bunch of people looking into a mirror (basically). We took some fun pics!

This is the Pavilion where they hold concerts and I just loved the curves and lines. Imagine sitting there on an evening facing the skyline and seeing the stars - I want to go back this summer!

The Bean! I love the reflections of the skyline and buildings...

I took this one standing under it and looking up into the center.

This the Crown Fountain and there are two of them facing each other. The LED pictures are in glass block and are pics of 1,000 Chicagoans. It was a cold day, but in the summer, this is a very popular place to be!

(Casey and Austin walking through the water)

Every few minutes, the fountains "spout"!

My fave photo of the trip - I snapped this as we were leaving and I just love it.

Spring Break '09

For spring break this year, we went to Orlando and Tampa and enjoyed time at Sea World and on the beach. It was a very relaxing trip (well, relaxing in the Ryan "way" - busy, but fun!). Nicole couldn't make it on this trip as she had mid-terms and that wouldn't be good, so we missed her!

This is looking out of the plane window at sunset - there was a jet in the distance.

We were in The Villages for a day, and we love to tootle around in the golf cart. The trees and landscaping there are so pretty.

Um, yeah. Can you believe he flies planes for a living?

Nana, Cary and Austin went golfing for the afternoon - they had such a great time and Austin was happy to be golfing after a long winter.

We then went to Sea World - I really love going here because it's not a crazy pace; you can see the park easily in a day and it's a very pretty park. And, the Ryan family loves animals!

Casey and I fed $5 fish (yep) to stingrays - it was so weird because you put the fish between your fingers and the rays suck it out like a vacuum.

The dolphin tank..

A leafy seahorse - very pretty and eerie at the same time.
While everyone else was riding the crazy roller coaster, Austin spent some time with this little guy - he was so cute!

OK, sounds corny, but I got a little teary eyed at this one. I should've been a whale trainer.

Beth and Andrew met us for the afternoon - they were also visiting Orlando parks.

This is the kind of floor Casey would like in her bedroom! It's an aquarium below and above you! Very cool.

We ate dinner in at Sharks Underwater Grill - it was a great way to end the day. (Sorry for the blurriness)
This was a great hotel room that Cary found for us in Orlando. The kids had their own bunk beds (to the right) with their own TV.
We also visited Aquatica, Seaworld's waterpark. I'm not much of a waterpark fan, but I loved this one! The pool had a huge sandy beach with a million lounge chairs, so it was easy to have your own space. It was laid out real well with a lot of ranges of slides and lazy rivers.

The wave pool

A very scary slide that felt like you were dropping straight down to the ground. It twisted around at the top and then dropped you. The kids and Cary loved it! I went once and it took the little lifeguard guy to keep convincing me to go!

The was a great tube slide that took you right through one of the dolphin tanks. You can see the slide behind the dolphins.

We went to Jennie's for a day to celebrate Chelsea's 13th birthday. Mom, Ed and Grandma Dot drove down for the day also and we had a great time together.

Fresh pedis!

We then headed to the beach for a few days - the Pippins met us on Sunday afternoon.

Casey and Austin spent hours riding the waves in their tubes. The pool was right behind us and it was so nice for them to go back and forth between the pool and the ocean.

I just love this pic. Case and Aus all tuckered out.

We think Case got a little delirious from all the sun - we found her like this packing things up to head home! A shower cap over head decorated with several headbands.