Entries Tagged as 'birthday'

Happy Belated Birthday, Quinn

May 16th, 2013 · No Comments

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I finally caught up with Quinn in mid-May to celebrate his birthday, which is in early April. We missed the celebration because we were in Japan. We got Quinn some Lego sets while we were there. We didn’t know that these lines are also available in the U.S. Lucky enough, Quinn did not have either of the sets!

I was poking around and realized that I have a post for Quinn’s birthday every year! I can’t believe what a grown up boy he is already! 6 years old!

- Quinn’s 5th Birthday (After party at the Village Tap)
- Quinn’s 4th Birthday (After party at the Village Tap)
- Quinn’s 3rd Birthday (Lincoln Park Zoo)
- Quinn’s 2nd Birthday (Village Tap)
- Quinn’s 1st Birthday (We missed the big party, but celebrated on a quiet night of babysitting!)

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Funny enough, the reason I was at Chad and Jen’s to give Quinn his gifts was for a barbecue to celebrate Chad’s birthday! So, happy birthday to him too!

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Easter and Birthdays

April 3rd, 2013 · 1 Comment

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Dad getting ready to carve the turkey.

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Dad and Jess with the cake they made.

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Surprise inside!!

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A few of the birthday gifts that Stephanie got from me and Dallas.

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I think Amanda liked the Vosges chocolate bars!

Dallas was out of town,* but I drove up to my brother’s house without him on Easter. My parents went too and we had a all had a nice turkey dinner. For dessert we had a cake that my dad and Jessica made. The big surprise was that the not only was the cake decorated very colorfully, but inside the cake the dough was layered with different colors.

Amanda and Stephanie’s birthdays are not until this weekend, but that is when we leave for Japan, so I gave them their birthday gifts early. Fun fact via my brother: Stephanie was born on Easter Sunday 17 years ago, but it won’t fall on April 7 again until 2075, when she turns 79!

Nice seeing everyone! Hadn’t seen most since Christmas time!

* Dallas has been/is travelling on average, every other weekend for work or pleasure for about six months, I think.

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Rory’s First Birthday

February 18th, 2013 · 1 Comment

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Aunty Glenna, Kenji, Amanda and Tyler

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Caroline with Rory and her friend Kim. Kim’s daughter’s birthday is only two weeks from Rory’s.

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Tyler

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Rory feeling skeptical about what’s about to happen.

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Maybe it’s ok.

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No, it is definitely NOT ok.

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Eddy was very willing to fill in! He’s one year older than Rory.

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Kenji blowing bubbles at me.

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Dallas & Quinn, Best Buddies

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Time for presents. Caroline and Rory had lots of help from the other kids at the party.

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Packers football! Who could that be from?

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Eddy wants to help!

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Chad, Ed, Dallas, Quinn, Jen

I can’t believe Rory can be a year old already, but this past weekend we celebrated his first birthday! Danny’s friend owns a cute little restaurant in Forest Park called Amelia’s and closed it down for the afternoon for the party. I was sort of dreading going to Forest Park, but it only took us about 20 minutes to get there from our house! The party was a fun mix of family and a bunch of our friends. Rory was not into the cake at all, but he seemed to like the opening of presents. Well, I think he liked the paper the best.

After the party we went to Danny and Caroline’s house in Oak Park to hang out some more. Somebody had to drink all the leftover beer and it might as well be us. And Ed! Rory missed his nap because of the party and somehow stayed awake and happy long into the night. And he did eat a bit of cake once the pressure was off and he was seated comfortably in his high chair at home.

Happy birthday, Rory!

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Dallas’s Birthday

December 9th, 2012 · No Comments

For Dallas’s birthday we got together with twenty, yes TWENTY – it was the biggest reservation they could make, friends for dinner at Zed 451. The Roundarch holiday party was at Zed 451 last year and we enjoyed it so much we decided to go back. For about $48 each person you get unlimited food. You can go up to the salad bar as much as you want, whenever you want and there are guys who come around with meat and you just tell them how much you want. The salad bar was so good, I could have just eaten that. Tons of great meats and cheeses there too! As for the meat at our table… I can’t even tell you what all we had. Several steaks, salmon, venison, duck, pork belly, sausage. Whoa. So. Much. Meat.!!


Danny, Dallas, Marty, Mike, Todd


Me and the most interesting man in the world.


Not the best photo of me, but it was somewhere around 3 a.m.!

Both before and after dinner we met up with even more friends and hit up a whole series of bars that I’d never been to: Streeter’s Tavern, Jake Melnick’s, Clark Street Ale House, Celtic Crossings, The Lodge. I think we got home at somewhere around 4:00 a.m.!!! Long night, fun night. Great friends!

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Jessica’s Birthday Brunch

December 9th, 2012 · 1 Comment


Mimosa Bottle Service


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Skillet No Skillet

This weekend I celebrated both Jess’s birthday and Dallas’s birthday. They both had night outings on Saturday, but Dallas’s trumped Jess’s so I was glad when Jess decided to also have a ladies brunch with manicures and pedicures to follow!

Jess, Sara, Ginny, Emily and I got together at Frog n Snail. I’d never been there before, but if you watched Top Chef in the olden days you’ll remember Dale Levitski . Frog and Snail is his place. When the waiter came to take our drink order we weren’t sure if we were doing coffee or drinks or what… When he suggested the Mimosa Bottle Service, we were all like “YES, PLEASE!!” Coffee… who were we even trying to kid?

The way the mimosa bottle service works is like this: There are four different “bubbles” you can order (cava, champagne, prosecco, etc). Then they bring a carafe of orange juice (OJ pronounced as a word phonetically, if you’re our cool waiter) as well as peach, blueberry and pumpkin mixers. Then you get to custom make your own mimosas, mixing together whatever you’d like. So fun!

For brunch Sara ordered the homemade pop tarts. I had one bite of the apple one and it tasted just like apple pie. So good. The pastry was really nice and flaky and light. A couple people had the Croque Madam sandwich, which was two-year aged white cheddar, rosemary ham, shallot, apple and a sunny egg. The waiter said it was the chef’s specailty and everyone seemed to really enjoy it. I got the dish called Skillet No Skillet. I don’t see it on the menu on the site, but it was roasted vegetables, fried green tomatoes, some lamb and fennel sausage and a poached egg. This was so good and flavorful. And not super heavy.

We loved Frog and Snail for brunch. We had so much fun visiting and making our mimosas and eating delicious food. Our party sat in the back near the kitchen and we did have a few Chef Dale sitings, which added to the excitement.

After brunch, Sara, Jess and I went to Get Nail’d. They were able to get us all in and their rates are pretty cheap, $32 for mani and pedi, I think it was. … but they were so slow! My girl was so talkative. I knew her entire life history by the time we were through.

Fun way to spend a birthday afternoon. Happy birthday, Jess!!

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