Hello Everyone! We are in Iowa now. Life just got alot more hectic! It was crowded at my mom's but at least everyone was in the same place...here, m-i-l lives in one place, s-i-l at another, f-i-l in another, and b-i-l clear across town from all of them! It's crazy keeping track of where I have been and where I haven't!

Before we left Illinois, we went to the Shedd Aquarium with my mom. This is how that went:

We got up at 7 and got all the kids ready. (mom, 14 year old niece Ash, 9 year old nephew R, and me and my 2 boys) We were all running behind and made it to the train station just in time. Lots of stress involved in those 2 hours! We got to train station in Chicago and we were doing potty breaks before we started the long bus connecting trip across city and I saw a Donut place and decided to buy some for the kids. R was in bathroom so I asked my mom what he liked. She told me to get him a chocolate one with sprinkles. So that's what I got for all three of the boys and my neice got a long john. Well, I guess that was the wrong thing to do. R threw the hugest fit I have ever experienced from children half his age! He thought I was being unfair cause I let his sister get whatever she wanted. So, he was still being awnry when we went to leave station and my mom had had enough! So she told him to knock it off and he decided he wasn't taking another step toward outside till he got what he wanted. Bad move. My mom grabbed him by the arms and dragged his butt out of the station. Dragged him down the street almost a full city block. She was so pissed at him! So, we were at the corner and mom was tired of dragging him so she told him to get up and he said no. A few more very disrespecting answers from him later, my mom smacked him across the face. I guess there was a cop standing near cause he came up and proceeded to tell my mom that she couldn't do that to him. BIG MISTAKE!!! My mom told the cop "I most definitely can!" The cop told her he wasn't allowed to let her do that. She went back on the fact that she could. They went back and forth on that for a few rounds and finally the cop told her "Ma'am, I don't want to have to arrest you and cost you way more than has already been done." My mom said "Good, then walk away and let me deal with this" He said he couldn't interfere with the way she was raising him. Which set her off cause that's what he was doing. She told him if he had a problem with her smacking him, he should find a way to get the kid to get up and walk with us. The cop didn't have an answer for that. After a few minutes of bickering, the cop must have decided he didn't want to drag an angry off mom to jail cause he left the matter be. We were all very angry about the whole thing. R didn't even have a mark where my mom hit him and the cop didn't even look. He just threw a fit. Mom smacked him, yes, but she didn't hit him that hard and anyone who hasn't been in that situation before wouldn't know if they would have done it different.
So, anyway, we finally got him to get up and behave just to turn around and get directions to a bus stop that didn't exist! That was frustrating. It took us 2 hours to get across the city which should have only taken 30 minutes. We were almost too tired to look around when we got there! We spent about 3 hours at the museum and all the kids loved it. It is a very awesome place! T's only wish for the whole trip was that he get to see some turtles. So we made sure to see the giant sea turtle they had. He just loved that! A wanted to see the dragon. So we made sure we went to see the Kimodo Dragon. He thought that was cool, even though he was disappointed that it didn't have wings!
All went well until we left. We found the right bus stop and got on the right bus. By now the whole group was exhausted and just wanted to go back and get on train. So it really sucked when the lady that was standing 3 seats up from us on the bus fainted. We felt very bad for her. From the looks of things she was just dehydrated but they still stopped the bus and made everyone get off so they could call an ambulance. It was crazy. We were put on another bus and, according to the map we were looking at, got off at the right stop. The map was wrong. Plus, when we went to get off, the bus driver didn't realize everyone wasn't off yet and shut the door when half of us were still on bus. That was scary! We managed to get his attention before he went too far. At this point, we were about 10 city blocks from the train station and decided that we had had enough of city transportation today. So we walked. I haven't felt so happy to be sitting on a train in my life!
We agreed it was worth all the trouble in the long run but it was still very nice to finally get back to the house and put our feet up! We all slept very well that night!