Happy Birthday Rhonda... belated!

Okay, so I'm late with the birthday wishes, but intentionally. Here's the deal. Rhonda, my sister-in-law celebrated her "29 again" birthday last Saturday by coming to Chicago with her best friend, Kim, who flew in from Florida. They stayed at the newly remodeled Renaissance Blackstone Hotel. Rhonda is a Lt with the Ripley Fire Dept and works part time for another nearby dept as well (sorry, I forget), she is mega busy with two jobs, 3 dogs and Chelsey! So, this trip for her was much needed. Anyway, I met them downtown to celebrate because really, this was the first time Rhonda and I would get to hang out as friends - and, I love the City.

We had so much fun! I had never met Kim, but she was a blast. Kim is Carla's picture twin - she was snapping pictures left and right for everything. It was awesome. So, that's why the blog post is late, I was waiting for some pictures, still don't have them, but I am posting the pictures I have regardless.

Rhonda and Kim were awesome because they were so easy-going. We first went to Taste of Lincoln Avenue. I always have fun there, we picked up my friend Debbie, who lives near and we walked over. We always run into someone we know, and we did! We saw Vedran and Canadian Steve. We hung out there for a while. On the way back, Kim saw a bicycle rickshaw - this is so wrong on so many levels, but we hopped on... this cannot be safe with the 6-way intersections on a Saturday night in Illinois. The poor "driver" was carrying a load, let me tell ya. We were laughing all the way - the WRONG WAY! He completely went down the wrong street, and admitted he was not from here, but just got his personal trainer license and was having a yoga party next week. Then we went back to the hotel and changed for the night.

We stopped by Frankie Z's to say "hey" to Casey (Larry's best friend since knee-high athletic socks), we met up with Jessica at Frontera Grill, then went to get Rhonda and Kim a late night pizza snack. There, I tried to get a drink, but had a ticket and the waiter would not accept the paper ticket with my Sam's Club ID - ridiculous. I had a discussion - I didn't win, but on purpose to make a point (Here, in IL, if you get any kind of ticket, the police officer issuing the ticket will either give you an option to pay cash for the ticket amount of the offense on the spot, surrender your license, or post bond - this is the dumbest thing I've ever heard of. I don't have bond insurance - didn't know I needed it because even in Utah, we don't do such ridiculous things - and if you surrender your license, the paper ticket should suffice as your DL).

After that, we headed to Jilly's Piano Bar where Debbie and her 'date' grabbed a table. We only hung out there for a bit, and Jessica had to leave to catch her train back to Evanston. Debbie and date left too. Rhonda and Kim wanted to go dancing. Well, I thought I'd show them a good dance club. Bad idea. We went to Crem, which was bought from some friends of ours and used to be called Sauce. It was not at all what I, nor they, thought it would be. After a bit of wandering around, we sat on some benches and a guy - who seemed to be 18 - preceded to hit on Kim. Kim has a son, mind you, that is probably his age. Rhonda and I were laughing. We were laughing so hard, I couldn't breathe! All-in-all it was a super fun time, and I am so glad I got to hang out and share those good times with Rhonda!

Love ya!