Awesome Girls Weekend

This weekend I headed back to Indiana for a 10 year (eek!) college reunion with some of my sorority sisters.  15 out of about 35 in our pledge class made the trip to Bloomington.  As the title states, it was AWESOME!  It was so great to see all of my girl's from back in the day and even more amazing that I have made such a wonderful, group of lifelong friends. 

I flew into Indy on Thursday night, I got in at like midnight due to a delay and my poor friend, Woody, was gracious enough to pick me up at the airport, despite being 24 weeks pregnant and having a 3 year old who was going to wake up at 6AM.  First off, I walked off the plane and told Woody that the airport looked completely different, she told me that's because it wasn't even the same airport, they built a completely new airport!  We arrived at her beautiful new house and hit the sack, I personally couldn't sleep, I think the time change plus the excitement of seeing all of my friends, some of whom I have not seen in 10 years was too much for me!  So Friday morning came very early

Friday morning our friend/sister, Crista, hosted all of us for brunch, those who were local brought their kiddos, it was a wonderful brunch.  Crista seriously missed her calling because she is an amazing cook and is  the Martha Stewart of the group! 

Us ADPi ladies and some of the kiddos of the group!

I also got to meet the super fabulous Julie.  She is a friend of Crista's and found my blog through Crista's blog and we got in touch with each other after I had a clubfoot meltdown and Julie posted a super supportive comment.  We've been reading each others blogs for 2 years and are Facebook friends and we FINALLY got to meet this weekend.  Julie came with her two beautiful babies, Owen and Eleanor.  It was so awesome to finally meet her!  We definitely did not get enough time together so we will have to be seeing each other again soon!  Perhaps she and Crista should make a trip to California for a girl's weekend in Napa!  Hint, hint!

Me, Ella, Julie, and Owen

After brunch we all headed down to Bloomington, the spot where it all happened, Indiana University.  We stayed in the Student Union where there is a hotel.  Six of us got a suite and the rest were down the hall.  There was one guy stuck between our rooms, poor guy!   It was a great time!  We headed to dinner at Yogi's, an old favorite, and then hit Kirkwood, the main drag for some bar hopping.  The first stop was the Upstairs Pub for some AMFs (translation Adios Mother#*$&@%), it's a pretty blue drink that is quite potent.

Derkash (we use last names a lot in the house, I was Ski, short for my maiden name Wilensky, and even though the majority of us are all married now, we still used our nicknames from college) with her AMF.  See it's pretty blue!

Ralsto "Red Dawg", Andrea and Derkasch enjoying their tasty concoctions!

Then we went across the street to Nick's, quite possibly the BEST college bar in America.  I spent many weekend nights and many dollars on beer at Nick's. 

Nick's is known for a game called Sink the Bismarck, I am proud to say that I am a master pourer!

Ready to get this game going!

Mad Dawg going in for a refill!

Derkasch, Autumn and I

After the bars we ordered Pizza Express cheesesticks and breadsticks, I dream about these breadsticks.  Rumor has it they are expanding nationally under the Hot Box (yes, classy) name so I might have to look into being a franchisee because I have never had better pizza, cheesesticks, and breadsticks.  And that is not the beer talking!   We kicked Saturday morning off with a hearty breakfast at The Village Deli, it has been featured on Food Network and in their magazine for have one of the best breakfasts in America.  I had the most delicious, ginormous, banana pancake!  I somehow never made it there for breakfast in college but they have delicious lunches as well and feel like I missed out on their breakfasts!

Getting ready to chow down!

 After breakfast we walked into a couple of shops on Kirkwood and stocked up on IU gear.  I scored an awesome IU shirt with an owl in it!  Then we headed over the sorority house for a house tour and some reminiscing!

My senior year composite picture, look how young I look!

The cold dorm, where I used to sleep.  My standards have certainly gone up in the past 10 years!

Jonna, Andrea, Crista (top) and Derkasch (bottom) checking out their old bunks

Amy and I in the Cold Dorm

My old room, I shared this with 2 other girls!  We didn't have the pretty blue paint 10 years ago, it was all beige.

Our dining room, the yellow striped paper is a step up, it used to be what every one who has ever seen it can agree, a tacky floral print

The entrance of our house

We took our first pledge class photo in this very spot some 13 years ago, who knew all of these years later we would be gathering again in Indiana to see our lifelong friends!

Front of our house, it was the biggest and newest when I was there, some of the other chapters on campus have now built new houses and the are ginormous!  But I am proud to say after many years of struggling, ADPi is now the biggest house on campus with some 160+ members!

Avery and Ralsto in front of our house

After our house tour we headed up to Oliver Winery which is just north of Bloomington for a picnic and wine tasting.  Crista arranged for us to have Dagwood's sandwiches (another Bloomington favorite, yes we pretty much ate our way through the weekend).  It was pretty hot and humid so my picture taking skills dropped off significantly. :)

Oliver Winery

Down by the pond at the Oliver Winery, in college we used to take our books to the winery and spread out on a blanket on the lawn and "study" for finals!

After the winery we hit up Jiffy Treat, the best ice cream place ever, they even used to deliver to campus.  So when it was snowing and we had a hankering for Jiffy Treat, they would bring it to us!  Does life get better than that!?!  Their cyclones (like a blizzard) with cinnamon toast crunch are my favorite!  Then we hit up the school bookstore and I stocked up on some IU gear since it's hard to come by in California.  I got Riley a super cute sweatsuit outfit, an IU hat, and stuffed IU bear.  When I gave it to her Sunday, she grabbed the bear, hugged it and said "Oooo I love it!"  So adorable!  Saturday night we went to the Irish Lion, another old classic for dinner and then followed it up with Kilroy's.  Then it was time to head home on Sunday! 

Campus and Bloomington has changed a bunch, unfortunately Kirkwood used to be filled with local eateries and is now very corporate.  Where Jiffy Treat used to be there is now a Panda Express.  It's kind of sad actually, one of the most appealing things about IU and Bloomington was it's individuality and independent charm.  When Starbuck's first opened my senior year (yes, there was no Starbuck's in Bloomington until I was a senior, that's how old I am), there were protests because it was the beginning of corporate business in the adorable college town.  Now there is a Starbuck's in the Student Union which to me is wrong on every level!  They are also building new buildings on campus like crazy but I will say that IU is doing an amazing job of making them blend in architecturally with the rest of the older buildings. 

I would be remiss to say that we were reminded daily of the tragedy of missing IU student Lauren Spierer while we were on campus.  She went missed about a week and a half ago and there are very little leads in the case.  We didn't see much of the search efforts as they were concentrated in the woods around campus but we saw the posters all over campus and town and we all hope that there is a very positive outcome in the search for her.  It's a reminder of how much Bloomington has changed and what a scary world it can be out there.

All in all it was a great weekend, I have made such amazing lifelong friends and only hope that one day when Riley is in college, if she chooses that she can have the same experience!  I truly hope it is not another 10 years before I get to see all of my fabulous IU/ADPi ladies again!

Diamond Sisters

Yesterday we drove down to San Jose to see my first daughter, ok really my Diamond Sister, she's my daughter from my sorority! Jen was in town with her husband from Boston so we met up with them and some friends for brunch. It was great to catch up with Jen and meet her friend Hillary who just moved to the area, we're Facebook friends so it was nice to finally meet her! Riley is getting SO much better at meals at restaurants, although when she decides that she is done with her meal, the adults pretty much have to be done too. But all in all she did great and she took to Jen and Hillary's husbands pretty well. She gave everyone multiple kisses when we left but both of the husbands got a few extras! That girl is going to be trouble!!!

Me and my girls!

Since we were on the peninsula we decided to hit up the Stanford Mall but the weather was pretty yucky so we just headed home.

If...

If there are any questions as to whether Marc is really Riley's dad, this should pretty much cover it! (He used to think it was funny to ask for a paternity test, I think this is better than any blood test could ever be!)

Riley is so her daddy's daughter!!!

Photo courtesy of Ralsto, thanks for the laugh Red Dawg!

Sisters and Their Girls

I think I may not have mentioned that Ralsto and I are sorority sisters, we were in the same pledge class in ADPi at IU, so it was awesome spending time with her again and it's so fun that we both have girls! I miss my college girls a ton and loved the girl time with Ralsto, especially the wine and the Glee marathon once the girls were asleep. But Friday came it was time to go, I was so sad to say goodbye to such an awesome friend and her sweet little girl (and Daisy too because Daisy and I became great friends!)

A couple of more photo ops with the girls before heading to the airport (with a stop at DD for some coffee of course!).

(I'm also loving how I look holding two girls! Hopefully one day Riley will have a little sister!) Then it was off to the airport, the guy at the airport was SO nice. He got me aisle seats, didn't charge me to check my bag and gave me Priority Access so I that I could board right after First Class. Riley was great on the flight from Buffalo to Chicago, she even fell asleep. I let her walk off the plane and since we were in the last row we were the last ones off. The pilot saw her and asked me if I wanted to take her picture in the cockpit. How cool is that!?! I really didn't think they did that anymore with all of the security but he let me put her up there so she wouldn't get scared and she sat up there with the co-pilot and the pilot put his headset on her. Seriously cool! It was a little American Eagle jet so everything was a bit more accessible but still so nice of him!

And it went downhill from here! Riley was SO tired, she threw many temper tantrums in the terminal at O'Hare, and when I counted to three before putting her into time out (yes, airports can have time out too!) she looked up at me and counted right back at me, proud of her for counting and it was seriously cute but do I not have any authority!?! Then she got upset when we left the stroller to put under the plane, even though she had no interest in sitting in it but it was "mine," (seriously hate the mine phase) then she wouldn't let me sit in the seat. I flew with her as a lap child and that is the LAST time I will do that. She said "no touch," "mine," "no sit, my chair" as everyone boarded. When I had to sit down so that we could take off she threw a massive fit, screaming bloody murder for over an hour before a flight attendant came and took her from me after asking if I was flying alone. She took her to the back and showed her all of the gadgets (we were in the second to last row) to give me a break from her difficultness, everyone was for the most part really nice about it but I broke down bawling because I was that mother who could not control their toddler on an airplane for 4 hours. I was so upset and she was so rotten on the flight that they brought be a complimentary bottle of wine! It was that bad. She stayed with Bonnie, the flight attendant, for about 45 minutes, Bonnie even brought her to first class and got her a cookie and some milk. Which made Riley feel really cool! When Riley was finally wanting me back she was good for an hour or so and then she started her screaming again, because I had to sit down and not let her sit in the seat by herself. Bonnie took her back and had her help her collect the trash so Riley walked up and down the aisles with her feeling like hot stuff. Thank goodness we landed early! I love you tailwinds! It was seriously awful! I left the plane with a killer migraine.

Despite our flight back it was an awesome trip! I'm so glad I got to spend a few days with an awesome friend. Many of our friends were extremely supportive during Riley's clubfoot treatment and our pregnancy scare but Ralsto was probably one of the most supportive and I am so glad I got to spend a few days with such a special friend and her beautiful daughter! Ralsto is a natural mommy and a wonderful friend! Audrey and I are both two lucky gals! Thanks for a great trip Ralsto!

When In Buffalo, Have Wings!

Well Riley really was not feeling well! Wednesday night she slept over 15 hours (how's that for brace wear!), woke up, drank a big cup of milk and then went back to bed for another 2 hours. It happened to be cold and rainy so Ralsto and I scrapped our plans to go wine tasting (boo! but I guess that's what motherhood is about) and opted to stay in instead. She was kind enough to run out and get us DD Coffee (did I mention how much she rocks!) and then she went out to get me some Buffalo Wings while I babysat two sleeping babies, not a bad gig! I guess the famous place, Anchor Bar is under new ownership/management and is not as good as it used to be, so the locals are split on two places, Elmos and another place that I can't remember the name of. Adam (her husband) likes Elmos better and well we're obsessed with Elmo around here so we went with them. They were delish!!! I got the Honey Mustard flavor because that's Adam's favorite and I knew I wouldn't eat them all so I wanted to get something he would polish off.

Riley woke up feeling much better and wanting to hold Audrey. She seriously loved holding Audrey. She was so adorable with her, when Audrey was in her swing she took a blanket and covered her and in the car she held her hand and touched her arm while we drove. She even turned on Audrey's mobile (they have the same one) for her. It was really sweet! I can't wait to see her as a big sister someday!

Oh and Audrey sits really well in the Bumbo, I had Sesame Street on in the background for Riley and I was blocking her view. Silly me for blocking Sesame Street!

Yes, they have matching outfits, Ralsto and I are fully aware that they will hate us for this one day but we didn't care because they were stinkin' adorable!

I guess I forgot to mention that Ralsto's husband is an offensive line coach (I think I got his position right, if not, let me know Red Dawg) for the University of Buffalo so he's knee deep in football season and didn't get home until super late on Tuesday and Wednesday. Tuesday Ralsto and I waited up for him but Wednesday after two bottles of wine we both passed out before he got home but Thursday he was able to get home earlier so Riley met him Thursday, he's a pretty tall guy, so Riley was like "whoa!" when she saw him for the first time but she took to him right away! We recruited Adam to take a picture of Ralsto and I with our girls.