Weekend at Home MIMM #8

Happy June!! I am loving that it is warming up outside and sunny after the long cold winter. However I am NOT loving how the maintenance in my apartment can’t figure out how to turn my heat off…but that’s another story.

                I’m on my way back to Philadelphia as I am writing this. I spent my weekend in Chicago for my sister’s high school graduation. It was a packed 48 hours, but a lot of fun!

                Saturday morning I was able to enjoy my last Zumba class at Lifetime Fitness as it was the last day of my membership there. While I have found a couple Zumba classes at the gym I joined in the Philadelphia area, the instructors are definitely not the same, but I respect that each instructor has their own style and that is great!

I was too busy enjoying the class to take pictures but did take this quick picture.

A new to me song that my instructor brought in flags from all over the world for us to dance with as the sound was about waving your flag. Something I really enjoyed about her class is the props and interacting with everyone. For a while she had a belly dance song and would bring a few belly dance skirts for people to wear. I actually own a belly dance skirt and would bring my own. It was lots of fun!

                After getting my workout in, my friend picked me up for lunch. We went to a place called The Protein Bar. Even though it was a bit of a drive from my house, I knew my friend would love it. We both got Quinoa bowls. I got the spinach, chicken and pesto one. It was delicious!

                Following lunch, we drove to the Jarvis beach in Chicago where I got to meet up with a couple other friends. One of my friends who now lives in Oregon happened to be visiting and it was great to catch up with her as well as another one of my high school friends. It was such a beautiful day for the beach to get some sun. However, the water was pretty cold. I went in waist deep and then quickly went back to my towel to enjoy the sun and warm up again. Lake Michigan tends to warm up mid July or so.

                Saturday evening, I enjoyed a wonderful steak dinner at home. We also had some delicious side dishes including roasted brussel sprouts with bacon and zucchini salad and rice. With the beautiful weather, we enjoyed our meal sitting on the patio.

                Later that evening, I met up with my friends whom I saw at the beach earlier, at a bar in Evanston. I don’t drink any sort of alcoholic drinks. I really just don’t like them, so I just drank water and chatted for a couple hours.

                I think I finally got to bed at midnight and normally I go to bed around 10pm, so it was late for me, but it was so nice to socialize as I don’t know anyone in my new town and I was filling them in on my new life.

                Sunday morning I woke up at 7am and made some breakfast and caught up on Big Bang Theory. I don’t have cable or a TV in my new apartment so I have been feeling a bit deprived from TV. Before moving, my favorite Sunday morning activity was cutting the coupons that come in the Sunday paper. Now that I’m not living at home, my parents are stopping the newspaper subscription soon! However, they saved the last few coupons inserts and I was able to look through them and cut coupons for some things they might need or I might need. Watching TV, eating breakfast and cutting coupons was a great relaxing Sunday morning for me!

                Before I knew it, I had to get ready to go for my sister’s graduation. She had to be there a bit earlier than us, so my dad quickly dropped her off, then came home to change and we headed out. We got there and squeezed in with all the people in the bleachers and waited for the graduation to start. 

                It was weird going in and remembering everything from my graduation day 6 years ago. I could remember exactly where I sat and how hot it was wearing those gowns and everything. At that point it hit me that my sister was really heading off to college in the Fall and there are no more high school graduations to attend. One of the greatest feelings at the graduation though was to be able to stand up in the bleachers along with all the other alumni towards the beginning of the ceremony and be a proud WildKit!

                The graduation didn’t last too long; an hour and a half and only half an hour that was spent calling out the over 700 names in the class. Once the graduates started to walk out, people couldn’t wait to get back outside. Even though it was over 80 degrees today, it was so hot in the gym, so it was nice once we got a little bit of a breeze and waited outside to find my sister.

                Once we all found each other, we had a little photo session. Technology and cameras have advanced so much over the last 6 years and so at the time of my graduation, my dad did not have his Digital SLR camera yet so I have fewer pictures, but I must say I love the photo sessions with him just snapping picture after picture, as a few are bound to turn out good. Two years ago, my sister and I had fun with a photo shoot after my college graduation, so I felt we needed to do some of the same poses and get some nice sister poses. 

               We also had one of her best friends tag along with us for lunch so she joined in some pictures as well.

                My dad made the decision to go to the Happ Inn for lunch after no one could really agree on a place and he had a gift card to use anyway. The place was delicious! We were all pretty hungry so we ordered chips and guacamole and some pulled pork sliders for an appetizer. For my entrée, I actually also ordered the pulled pork dish. After filling up on chips and delicious guacamole, I removed the bun from my pulled pork and just ate the meat and saved most of my fries for later. I loved the paintings/pictures on the walls in the restaurant, especially the bathroom sign ("Men to the left, women always right"), which my sister’s friend was going to Instagram but I beat her to it LOL.

                After lunch I was stuffed. We then took some more photos outside by the flowers that the restaurant had. 

the rare family photo

              Then I had a couple hours at home which I spent uploading photos, packing my suitcase and then packing up more things in my room. My parents are really eager to take over my room or rearrange the house, so I had to leave some post it notes around on stuff to keep and stuff to give away, etc. I don’t know the next time I will be coming home as I am starting my new job in 2 weeks and obviously won’t have time off for a while with a new job. My dad and sister may drive out to visit me in August for a couple days and drive some of my stuff to me or maybe soon I will start getting a package a day at my doorstep. Eventually I will have all my stuff, but I have everything that is necessary for now.

                It was certainly a marvelous weekend, so I’m linking up with Katie for MIMM. Thanks Katie for hosting.
The weekend seemed like it went by in a flash but I had a great time. Now back to Philadelphia to enjoy my last 2 weeks of freedom. On the agenda for today is a trip to the grocery store as I tried to clean out most of my fridge before leaving for the weekend.

                Wooo that was a long post for the jam packed weekend! Thank you if you made it all the way to the end. Hope everyone has a fabulous Monday!