A little family time

Its been a few weeks since my last post. Last week I visited my folks back in Illinois (which Bill and I call the "Wah". Pronounce IL like its French and you'll see why). Then this week was a little crazy with the Rittenhouse Square Flower Market, a charity fundraiser for the non-profit I work for. Monday was playing catch up, Tuesday was finishing all the last-minute prep work for the market and a cocktail party for one of the foundations we ask for money from, and then the market on Wednesday and Thursday. So this week wasn't the best time to play catch up on my visit to IL.

But now I'm ready to tell you all about it!

I got in early Tuesday morning. My dad greeted me at the gate, which I love. Because he works for the airlines he still gets to do that so I'm always the only person who still gets a welcome party.
For the first two days, it was just the two of us, catching up and doing Father-Daughter things like going to the movies (finally saw the Hunger Games!), eating bad-for-us food and going to the Transportation Museum!

 The Transportation Museum was actually a lot of fun, even though it was like 95 degrees and humid as hell. It was a large campus of buildings and platforms that housed a series of automobiles, planes and about a zillion trains!!!

The automobile museum had everything from old wagons and opera carriages (which apparently were made tall enough to fit in top hats)....

... to the original motorcycles... 

... and a plethora of gorgeous cars

And did I mention the trains?

... the enormous, gargantuan trains...

 Yes, that's my dad standing next to a train engine and no, that's not a Star Wars sandcrawler full of droids. Its a train used to dig tunnels in mountains. Tunnels! In mountains! The things humans think of.... 

Most of these were too large for me to get near. They made me rather nervous if not simply scared. 

After getting scared by trains, the next few days were a breeze. My mom took me to buy flowers with her on Wednesday... 

... and then she surprised me with a pedicure! 

Then we went to dinner at one of my parents new, favorite spots in the city, Lola's. Its a jazz and R&B lounge. They've been raving about their brunches for a while so it was fun to get to go to dinner with them there. 

My mom ordered the best dirty martini any of us had ever had, but the food was pretty memorable as well. All in all, a great night. 

In fact, all in all it was a great week, despite the large amount of these... 

... which I love, but am crazy allergic too. 

We actually tried to spend a large amount of time outside to get me some fresh, cat-free air, which led to a great week full of eating out, enjoying some sun, museum visits, street fairs, and of course, a little home improvement. 

I can't wait till they come visit us in September!