How the Craigs do Thanksgiving....

It’s always a little different…but I like it. After Matt did the Turkey Bowl at church, we (and several thousand other people) took advantage of free day at the zoo. We braved the crowds and the rain to see Samundra (I think thats his name), the baby elephant, and he/she is so cute! Then we came home and made a yummy feast for the 2 of us and went to Bendreas to play games and enjoy more dessert. We are thankful for the many blessings in our lives including family and great friends.

weekend with TraJ and Brileen

We rented a cute cabin up at Government Camp and had a relaxing weekend with friends. Some of us needed our coffee before others of us were even awake so we opted to ground the beans outside. We went on a hike, played games, made smores by the camp fire, enjoyed the hot tub and got into the Word. We are so blessed to have such great friends.

Pampered Chef Party

Good food, kitchen gadgets and friends…need I say more.

The Land of Lincoln

A few pictures from our trip back East. Once we rendezvoused in Chicago (Sounds very exotic doesn’t it?) we got to be tourists for 24 hours. Our friend Laura hooked us up with a sweet apartment right on Michigan avenue. Check out the view from our window. We did a whirlwind tour of Chicago including: Millennium Park, The Bean, Soldier Field, Buckingham Fountain (closed for construction), stuffed pizza at Giordano’s and delicious popcorn from Garrett’s (fantastic).
We spent the rest of the week in Rockford where I failed to take a single picture. We had a great time though. We went geocaching with my nieces and nephews and had a picnic and played football in the park.

Also got to introduce some friends to geocaching (puffy vest required). First time 'caching in a cornfield. It was a great time!

Matt's cross country journey to Illinois....

So I dropped Matt off at the train station in Portland at 4pm on Saturday for his journey and headed over to Monica's and went to dinner with her. She took me to the airport the next morning. I arrived in Chicago around 2pm. Karrie and Kate picked me up and we hung for awhile. Then I met up with a Alissa, a friend from high school for dinner. The next day I took the train into Chicago and met up with my friend Laura and we met up with Matt at Union Station at 5pm on Monday evening. I'll let him add commentary about his journey but it was amazing to think about all that I did while he was in a train traveling across the country. Here's what his view was like...