a day in Naperville .... and more

on Monday we left for Naperville. Deanna (Dan's mom) came to take care of the seven kids and I let her know that I was weaning the girls since I would be gone for 2 nights. (Good luck Mom! lol) Going through Madison we stopped to see Dan's brother and his family. We haven't seen them since Oct of 2005 so we had 2 years of Christmas presents and birthday presents from last year. It was so nice to see them. Jessica gave me a couple of toddler seats so the girls could be at the kitchen table and lots of fun things and more presents to take home. We got to Naperville by midnight and we were exhausted from the 6 hrs in the car but it was so nice to sleep with no babies waking us.
On Tues. Dan left for his meeting and classes while I slept in. I slept and slept and slept. I didn't get out of bed until 10:30 am. What a dream. I took a shower and then decided to take a bath too. I don't get these peaceful moments much so I wanted to enjoy the time alone. I painted my fingers and toes. I haven't painted my toes since I had the twins. Wow! They look pretty again :) I couldn't wait to show Dan my painted tootsies!
At 12 pm I ventured out of the hotel. What in the world! A snow storm! Why? Why me? I tried to drive but only made it a few blocks and chickened out. I went to the hotel desk and they ordered me a cab. I waited and waited and waited. 1 pm finally a man came running in to the lobby and yelling about who it was who ordered a cab. Like I wasn't waiting and ready for an hour already. He asked me if I REALLY wanted to go to the outlet mall and I said yes. He said some crazy things like how Chicago was in the state of distress and that nobody should be going that far. (9 miles) . The desk manager said "I bet that is what the people who work at the outlet mall think too but they probably had to do their job to please their customers." Way to go desk manager! So he said "whatever!" and told me to hurry up. While in his cab he ran a couple of red lights, complained about taking me to the outlet mall, yelled and swore at the snow and at the radio dispatcher and kept telling me that I should go to the other mall that was only 3 miles away. He was swerving so much and cutting people off. I heard at least a few people honking at us. What a ride. I would never complain about my husbands driving again. I knew that we didn't go in the direction that the hotel told me for the outlet mall so I asked him about it. He said that we could go that way too. OK... you know where you are going I thought. He kept telling me that I would be better off at the other mall and that the cabs wouldn't be at the outlet when I was done. I again said that I needed to go to the outlet mall. We drove into the "other mall" parking lot and I figured he had to pick someone up. We stopped and he told me the fee of $21.00; I said "ahem, this is not the outlet mall." He said" @$#%F I thought I talked you out of it $@%^!" I was scared to death but said "no, I just told you a block away again" He again yelled at me about how I should just go to this mall we were at and that if not it would cost me another 20 $. I said "Are you serious? I told you where I wanted to go and they told me when I ordered the cab it would only be 18.00 for a 9 mile trip." Now he charged me $21 for a 3 mile ride and was going to charge me another $20 to go where I wanted to go! This is the cabby from hell! I said "fine" and handed the $ to him and got out. I was not going to stay in this cab when he was mad. He was crazy enough when he wasn't mad.
The first thing I did when I got in the mall was call the cab company. I told them my adventure and they are sending me 1/2 refund. The other option was them sending the SAME cabby to get me and take me to the outlet mall or my hotel. No way! Imagine what he was like after he knew that I called.
So I shopped. A new winter Fubu pale yellow coat for myself, candy flower suckers for the kids, a high school musical cd for Wynter, a new Victoria Secrets bra and The Children's Place clothes for the 5 youngest kids. What a sale! Oh no! I remembered that I left Dan a note to pick me up at the outlet mall. I called the hotel desk and asked them to change my note. They did. At 5:15 I talked to Dan at the hotel he said he was on his way to pick me up. I prayed and prayed because he finally showed up at 7:15! It took him that long to get just a few miles in that weather and traffic. Poor husband. He asked if I wanted to eat now at a restaurant near the mall. I said I wanted a shower first. Bad choice Karen. After the shower and us playing a little on the hotel computer to send an email to the kids it was after 9 pm. We decided to try downtown Naperville for some food. We drove around but didn't see anything that jumped at us. We wished we looked in the phonebook or online for a good place to eat since we didn't know where to drive. Dan asked if we should just go back to the mall area and I said sure. He took a different road. It was pretty and we were sight seeing while driving. After 30 min Dan said he may need to turn around. We went a different way and another 30 min Dan asked for directions. We had just missed the street we we turned around the first time. Once we got near the mall every restaurant was closed. Other than fast food or Denny's. We ate Denny's. Our food came around 11 pm and we were back at the hotel by 12. We slept again! This time I woke up at 9 am. I was meeting Janet at the sb store. It was so nice to meet one of my favorite 2peas scrapper :) She is so nice and her girlie was the cutest lil kiddo. Not to mention that she was the best behaved kid I have ever seen in a sb store. I am hoping that Janets creative juices escaped on me. I picked up some good stuff for Cheyenne while I was there too. When she had to leave she gave me directions to the outlet mall. One more try at it with me in the drivers seat this time. It was fun to browse and I stopped at The Children's Place one more time to find more sales. 99 cents! So if you see all four of my youngest girls in the same skirt every day but different pattern you will know they were a 99 cent find. I picked Dan up the hotel and we headed back to our home sweet home. Driving through Madison we detoured to eat at Pedro's, our favorite Mexican restaurant. This was our treat :) Add some fried ice cream and I was in heaven. We got home at midnight to an alarm going off as we entered. SpyTech trip wire sensors really work. Josey wanted to know exactly when we arrived. Kids, I missed them all!
Thursday I caught up on laundry and did a class for an elderly assisted living home. What a group of gals. Fun! Friday - today - the kids let me sleep until 10 am. They better stop spoiling me like this. I think they just don't want me to ever leave again just to be able to sleep in.

What am I doing now? After writing this I am throwing in another load of laundry, moping a floor or two, searching the net for houses and scrapping. I may even throw in some family time with a movie night. I love my family. I love my life. I really love my life.