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| Front room of Oppenheimer gallery--with my bestie Jen and her husband Mike! |
For my birthday this August, the Doctor asked me if he could take me to a nice resort spa in Sedona, AZ. Sedona is known for its art and beauty and is a vacation destination.
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| Me with Joel Oppenheimer |
I thought about it, and although it did sound lovely, I felt a trip to Chicago would fit the bill--better then a massage, facial, and pedicure! You see, I had discovered an artist I was interested in. John James Audubon--painter of the Birds of America.
Ryan and I were in the throws of building his third surgery location in Lake Havasu City. I had racked my mind and the internet searching for inspiration and ideas about how to decorate his office. I knew the color would be soft blue, something calming. I was inspired by my good friend, Sara Peterson, who is Del Parsons daughter. She lives here by me. Del parson is a well known artist for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Because of Sara, I wanted to make this office location unique--an art gallery of sorts.
Because of her gallery and frame shop here locally, I discovered John James Audubon. I thought it would be super cool to display his works throughout the office. So when patients came to see Ryan, they also filled their hearts with images of beautiful art.
The Oppenheimer art Gallery in Chicago is known for its collection of Audubon work, and it has the exclusive rights to make high quality reproductions of his works from the Field Museum. I wanted/needed to spend a day there!!
An added bonus-- our best friends live 4 hours outside of Chicago in Indiana. We could see them too!!
I looked at airlines tickets--pretty pricey to take 5 people. I texted Paul--our pilot on Mondays for violin/piano lessons--"Paul--do you feel like flying us to Chicago over the weekend of my birthday?!" Fortunately, he LOVES flying--esp. to new places. He cleared his scheduled.
I have to say, flying privately is the only way to go. The Las Vegas airport is truly a headache. It takes us 4 hours to get from our front door to the gate. So I mapped out the trip-we could fly our own plane -to Chicago in 6-7 hours. DONE!! Taking our own plane. We have a nice, pressurized plane. It's a blessing for our family, living in a remote, small town.
After flying all Friday afternoon and into the night, we arrived in Chicago late!! But we were up and ready to go into the gallery by 11AM. Poor Gracie was overcome by the heat and humidity. I call her our polar bear. She does not do well in the heat. She loves cold climates. But she was a good sport. But you can see she is not feeling well after the long walk from our hotel to the gallery.
After a personal tour of the gallery by Joel himself, we got fascinated by his collection of Gould's Hummingbirds. Ryan and I started looking through many volumes of them.
After about 3 hours of that the kids were starving!
Luckily Subway was around the corner.
Jen and Mike took them so Ryan and I could finish up. .
Ryan did decide to buy some of Gould's Hummingbirds for his Kingman office. We also spent some time looking at Audubon. But there were 431 plates of those and it was too overwhelming. We decided to spend time on Oppenheimer's website and narrow it down. We probably need 16 for his Lake Havasu office.
We finished after about 5 hours. We got there at 11 and the gallery closed at 4 pm on Saturdays. The kids were so patient, and so bored. But they were good about waiting, so were the Ramseys. (It was almost my birthday after all)
Ryan booked us in a 5 star hotel with a view of the Chicago river. He loves to spoil us now that he is 100% debt free. (Thank you Dave Ramsey)
We're in front of the bean here! But you can't tell.
Saw this fountain. Forgot the name! Isn't Jace tall?!! So fun!
We got tired from walking. It was so hot and humid. We rode these cool street bikes to dinner on Navy pier. Chicago style pizza of course.
It was a pretty long bike ride-so the walk would have been excruciating for us non-pedestrian types!
Dinner was lovely and Paul-joined us. My brother in law/pilot.
He said no thanks to the gallery!
Navy Pier. Tickets to ride the famous Ferris wheel were sold out!! We were surprised and disappointed.
Navy Pier- lovely in the evening. Beautiful and cooler.
After dinner, Jen left because her youngest daughter Felicity had started throwing up at home--so sad, and we had tickets for the Architectural/ firework show- boat ride down the Chicago river.
Froggy joined our family on Navy Peir-and had a bubble bath with this cute girl when we got back to the hotel that night.
Late night movie after the firework show. We were still on AZ time! So we had a little energy left.
Next day was the sabbath. We honored it and went to church. We went on public transportation and the smell of urine was really strong. Gracie was not thrilled!! So funny! She was hoping we'd use an Uber--but it was $80! We maybe should have--becuase the train was delayed and we were 15 minutes late.
The famous Jace squat. He sits like this when waiting a long time. And, the train was 15 minutes late. His job was to carry the umbrella.
We made it!!
After church, we went to see the famous Sears tower.
Ryans great grandfather and grandfather worked for Sears for years and they were very successful as high up managers for the company.
View from the top!
Jace is still in his squat holding the umbrella!
My handsome Dr. He loves to spend time with his family! And we love that he loves us!
The view was really gorgeous.
Monday we headed home. So a short trip. Left home on Friday. I have to say flying in our own plane with our own pilot is the only way to travel. I'm completely spoiled.
When we stop at small airports to fuel, they always have complementary snacks to enjoy! So fun and personable. There's a whole family out there for the General Aviation world!!
And we're going again in February! We have loose ends to tie up with the art gallery. Turns out we can't make selections over the internet!!
Look at this James Audubon piece--it finally arrived in November from the Oppenheimer gallery. This is what I went to buy for my birthday! Its his Trumpeter Swan! I love it because the face on this swan depicts mine and Jaces beautiful and beloved goose Ducky!
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