Hendricks Family: May 2009

Memorial Day Weekend & Galena

Stan and I enjoyed a nice little getaway to Galena, IL. Stan finished his last final of a very long semester on Tuesday, I dropped off Sean with my parents Wednesday morning (thank you!), and we drove to Galena after work Wednesday night. We stayed at a nice inn called Le Fevre Inn & Resort. We slept in until 8am both mornings and took bike rides - and just enjoyed some relaxing time together celebrating our 8 years of marriage and this 2 weeks in between Spring semester and Summer Term :)

View from the 'road'

Outdoor firepit & gazebo

Our room

Downtown Galena

Cannova's Pizzeria

We met my parents on Saturday afternoon to pick up Sean, after a going to a wonderful wedding for my co-worker, Lenore (unfortunately, and rather unusually, I didn't take any pictures...) We spent the rest of the weekend at Stan's parents. Sean enjoyed throwing rocks in the pond, playing with golf balls in the basement, eating corn on the cob, spending lots of time with Grandma & Grandpa, as well as...

running through the sprinklers, first thing in the morning, while still wearing his pajamas...

Birthday @ the Morton Arboretum

For my birthday, Stan packed up the Jeep and we went to the Morton Arboretum for a nice bike ride, time in the Children's Garden and a picnic by the animal houses. We love going out there, and it was such a treat on my birthday since Stan has had a Saturday morning class all semester, we've hardly been able to spend family time together like this. We had a great morning at the arboretum, went to a friend's son's first birthday party in the afternoon, and finished off the day with a free dessert trio at Houlihan's. Perfect.

Scooping tadpoles

I love watching moments like these!

What joy :)

"Look, Daddy - another one!"

Sean holding a tadpole - my 100% boy.

Deer joining us at our picnic...
Sure is refreshing to get out of the city for a little while-

We're Moving to Hollywood!

It looks like we are moving to Hollywood Ave in Brookfield, IL! This house is about a 10 minute drive from our condo - and it is a short walk to the Metra Line (that goes within a block of Stan's downtown office), a big park, the elementary school and the Brookfield Zoo.

It has 3-bedrooms upstairs - and the main floor has a living room, dining room, kitchen and den - and an unfinished basement. We are VERY excited about having our first garage and a small, fenced-in yard. I'm already dreaming of coming home and pulling into my garage, letting Sean run around in the backyard while I carry in the groceries. And I'll only have to walk up 5 steps to get into my house. What a dream! It looks like June 25th is the magic day where we will close on our condo sale and buy this house and move....

3527 Hollywood Ave, Brookfield, IL 60513

Living Room

Dining Room

Kitchen

Bedroom

Second floor landing with laundry shoot - I'm excited about not having to carry my baskets of laundry up & down 3.5 flights of stairs - but we'll have to see what else travels down this shoot via my 2-year old son...

Mother's Day Weekend

Time at the Indianapolis Children's Museum - according to my Mom, he spent a lot of time in this train table and did a very good job at sharing the trains - I'm so proud! He also spent some time at the water table - and at lunch later that day, the family at the next table pointed to Sean and said "Hey kids, it's Mr. Splasher!" I guess he had a good time in the water too...

Helping Papa with the grass and all the helicopters on the driveway

Mother's Day brunch at Chris' house - went for a ride in the golf cart - Sean kept saying "faster! faster!" (luckily not while the golfers were swinging...)

Looks like the start to a promising America's Funniest Home Videos clip...

I love these snuggles!

And I love these hugs!

Our item to photograph ourselves... not too bad...

Happy Mother's Day!

Why are all these guys sitting down... isn't it Mother's Day?

Sean's attempt to adorn Chris' backyard with a lawn sphere

Clothes - going, going, gone!

"Aren't I cute? and wet?!"

A little Carmel High School Ambassadors reunion at Sarah's wedding in Cincinnati

What a happy couple and beautiful setting!

Our Happenings

May got off to a busy start - Stan is finishing up the semester - it cannot end too soon for either of us - one final down, two to go - after he wraps up his finals, we are heading to the Le Fevre Inn in Galena for a little R&R - hopefully followed by a low-key Memorial Day weekend.

This past weekend we were in Cincinnati for a friend's wedding and stayed with Brook & Jeremy. Sean stayed in Indy with my parents and had a wonderful time. I will post some photos from Sean's Indy adventures, Sarah's wedding and Mother's Day.

We have no news on the home search- everything still seems to be on track for our condo closing at the end of June - but we do not have any leads on homes right now. We are working on getting our finances in order and starting to explore the possibility of a short-term rental while we are waiting for the right home.

Pregnancy is going well - I'm still having a lot of body pain & missing my RA drugs, but I'm managing - and quite appreciate to all of the help from Stan, our parents, our neighbors & friends. May 28th is the big day when we hope to find out if we are having a boy or a girl - and to hear the ultrasound tech tell us that our baby is "unremarkable" - meaning everything looks exactly the way it should be! Then we can start thinking about names...