Chicago!

Me and Rey in front of the bean sculpture at Millennium Park.

We have been having a blast after being delayed in Houston for 5 hours! Yes, we suffered through a horrible delay because of the weather. If you all remember, Wednesday's weather was terrible. We drove through the rain to the airport and couldn't find a place to park. We finally parked over in the International flights terminal and we ran to our flight. Thank goodness we had our boarding passes so all we had to do was check our bags. As it turned out, we were delayed for 5 hours anyway.

Once in Chicago the evening event was over so we just grabbed something to eat and then went back to our beautiful hotel room. The Drake is such a beautiful hotel! If you go to Chicago you should definitely stay there.

Thursday I was in the conference all day and Rey walked around all over town, literally. He ended up in the ESPN Zone but he got back in time for our evening event at a club, La Passage. Very cool place. The entrance is in an alley between Prada and Barney's. We had a really great time with the open bar and dancing. It was sponsored by Univision.

Friday I was in the conference again until 2 p.m. Rey went back to the ESPN Zone until I was done. We checked into our much cheaper hotel, the Travelodge. Not a great hotel, but a really good location.

Friday afternoon we visited the Buckingham Fountain, but it isn’t turned on until May. It was still very nice. It’s right on the edge of Lake Michigan, which is beautiful by the way. Did you know that it is the only Great Lake that is totally bordered by the United States? It isn’t bordered by Canada, like the other lakes.

From there we walked over to Millennium Park. What a cool place!! There are two really interesting sculptures there. One looks like a big silver bean. We walked all down Michigan Avenue and looked at all the shops on our way to see the Picasso sculpture. Across the street is another great sculpture, Joan Miro’s Chicago sculpture. And around the corner is Jean Dubuffet’s “M0nument with Standing Beast.” Chicago has an impressive collection of sculptures.

Then we went to Little Italy at ate at Frank Sinatra’s favorite restaurant, the original Rosebud. The Little Italy area is adorable. The houses around there are very nice. After walking around for a while and taking a picture with the Joe DiMaggio statue we had some coffee at the Starbucks. I knocked out really early because I was so tired.

This morning we got started again and we went to a ton of places. We visited Soldier Field, home of the Chicago Bears. From there we went to the National Museum of Mexican Art. Very inspiring. Then American Girl for a gift for my daughter, Navy Pier, the Disney store, and the John Hancock tower. At the Navy Pier we ate at the Billy goat Tavern and Grill. It’s the place that the Saturday Night Live skit, “Cheeseberger, cheesberger, chips, no fries,” is based on. After that the funniest thing happened.

Rey wanted to go to the neighborhood where he lived as a baby. The way his parents have told him the story, the neighborhood was very ghetto with a lot of gang activity. What we found was far from that. Turns out that they lived in what is now called the East Village. It’s a really funky party of town, very eclectic and very much like our Montrose.

Rey remembered that a guy that he met Thursday told him that there were some good bars on Division St. Rey checked his GPS on his extra phone and found out that we were right around the corner from where he used to live. We asked a couple passing by and they confirmed that we were right near Division and close to the bars Rey had heard about. We walked right around the corner and found a street lined with cute small bars and restaurants.

We ended up at Phyllis’ Musical Inn listening to a pretty good band. Coincidentally they turned on the Rockets Utah game of the playoffs and Rey enjoyed watching that. We finished the night with pizza at Pizza Metro and then back to the hotel room so Rey could finish watching the game.

Tomorrow we’re off back home and to the kids. I miss them!

Chicago, the 80s and a Little History Lesson

I am totally procrastinating. I have a To Do list written out, a packing list, and a grocery shopping list. I only have a couple of things on my To Do list checked off. The good thing is that a lot of items on my packing list are clean. I only had to wash my jeans and my shirts. Other than that I am the world's worst packer and I won't really get it done until Tuesday night. I know myself. I also have to pack 3 days worth of clothes for the kids because they're going to my sister's house. Why do I love to procrastinate? I don't really call it that. I say I have so much to do. Right now I'm washing a load of clothes and the kids are in the tub. Before they took baths we went to our meeting, I had a bible study with my student, we went to a congregation going away party and they painted crafts.

I've been thinking about music a lot lately. I guess it's because I've been listening to Spanish Pop/Rock more over the last year, I started listening to the Dixie Chicks, and then I also started listening to very new artists, like Lori McKenna. It got me to thinking about my music history and I came to the realization that I got stuck in the 80s and I never got out. I have listened to 80s music my entire adult life. I occasionally listened to some other groups, like Mana in the early 90s. I also listened to some grunge in the early 90s. Basically I listened to the Singles soundtrack and liked it. Other than that I have not listened to anything new until now. It's kind of cool to finally come out of my 80s cocoon.

One last note and then I will bid you adieu. I wish I could say more about this, and I probably will in a later post, but I don't have the time right now. Check out this super interesting history about my husband Rey’s (and now kids') ancestors. I want to make a scrapbook with all this information for the kids to use in school projects and reports. Won’t this make an awesome history project!!??

I told Rey that next time we go to San Antonio I want to visit Jose Francisco’s historical house at the Witte Museum http://www.wittemuseum.org/exhibits/longtermexhibits.html, the family cemetery, and of course the Alamo. I want to take pictures of all of these things for them to have available for reference and to use in projects.

Jose Francisco Ruiz was the only original Texan who signed the Texas Declaration of Independence

Francisco Antonio Ruiz was mayor during the Alamo and placed on house arrest.

http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/articles/RR/fru11.html - Jose Francisco

http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/articles/RR/fru31.html - Francisco Antonio.

Chi-Town Here I Come

I'm starting to get excited now as the days are drawing very near. Rey and I are going to Chicago! I'm going to an advertising conference and Rey gets to come with me this time, which will be really nice. He didn't get to come last time and the time before that we took the children with us, which made for a very challenging trip. So we're both excited that we'll be going to together and without children this time. We have a great list of things for Rey to see while I'm in the conference and then together that weekend. Yay!

Gwen Zepeda Reading at the MFAH

Local author Gwen Zepeda will be reading on Thursday, April 19th at the Museum of Fine Arts Houston at 6:30 p.m. I unfortunately will not be able to be there, but I invite you all to make it out to hear her if you're in Houston. I LOVE LOVE LOVE the title of her event, "Mexican Women Were My Mister Miyagi." Isn't that the most awesome title? I think every person who grew up in the 80s understands that title.

Gwen's reading is yet another great event of the Houston Sor Juana Festival. There's also a play at Talento Bilingue Houston, El Entrecejo, or The Brow, a play about Frida Kahlo. I'm going to that on the 21st. http://www.tbhcenter.com/story.php?sid=117

And there's an on-going exhibit at the MFAH through the month of June. I still need to go see this one! http://www.mfah.org/main.asp?target=exhibition&par1=1&par2=1&par3=350

For a full schedule of the remaining activities check out nuestrapalabra.org.

This Entry is About Shoes

First of all it's like this. Foley's is no longer Foley's. It's Macy's. Therefore the old Foley's traditions no longer exist. That means no more mega shoe sale twice a year. Read all about it here. http://blogs.chron.com/shopgirl/.

Second, I am an equal opportunity shoe buyer. I will buy a cute pair of shoes at Payless, if it speaks to me, the same way I will buy a pair of Franco Sartos.

I was in Payless yesterday. I found a great pair of faux snakeskin black and beige sandals with a cork wedge heel. I wish I had a picture of them to post so you could see how truly adorable they are. But here's an example of how cute some Payless shoes are now. http://www.payless.com