December 2003
Deerfield IL, USA
From 10 to 27 December we visited Amy's parents, Ramon and Mary, in Deerfield for Christmas. For the first time we brought Arthur's parents Ben and Ineke and brother Patrick. We visited Chicago, went up Sears tower and saw a Bulls game.
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1/18 On 10 December we flew from Amsterdam to London to Chicago. We had about 5 hours delay and our luggage got lost in London so for the first 2 days we didn't have our bags, which kinda sucked.
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2/18 The weather was nice. It was cold but we didn't have too much snow during the visit, just a little bit. Here are Ben and Ineke on their first day in the USA in front of Amy's parents' house.
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3/18 We set up the Christmas tree in the living room with Mary's Hallmark Christmas ornaments, which was a lot of fun.
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4/18 We all visited the Chicago Botanic Garden, which isn't far from home. We walked around for a few hours and saw the exhibit of Christmas trees from around the world.
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5/18 Chicago Botanic Garden.
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6/18 Here are Mary, Ben and Ineke on a nice long walk around the neighborhood.
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7/18 One day we went to downtown Chicago with Ben, Ineke and Patrick. We took the train from Lake Forest to Union Station and walked to Sears Tower. We weren't sure if we should go up at first, because it was very cloudy.
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8/18 We decided to take our chances and had a very nice view over the city.
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9/18 After Sears Tower we walked over Michigan Avenue towards Navy Pier. From Michigan Avenue we caught a free trolley to Navy Pier and back. Here we all are at the end of Navy Pier with the John Hancock building in the background.
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10/18 On our walk back to Union Station we came across this Christmas market where we had some hot apple cider.
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11/18 One night we went to the United Center to see a game between the Chicago Bulls and the Indiana Pacers.
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12/18 It was an amazing show with lots of fireworks, dancers and acrobatic acts, games, light shows -- very impressive. Everybody had a great time. And the Bulls won 86 to 75.
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13/18 We also did a lot of shopping. Here we are at Gurnee Mills.
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14/18 We saw a lot of movies on our visit, including Haunted Mansion, Timeline and Brother Bear.
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15/18 Ben, Ineke and Patrick flew back on 19 December. Here is Amy in the living room on Christmas morning, eagerly waiting to open open the presents.
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16/18 Arthur with a very nice sweater he got as a present from Santa.
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17/18 This is Tinkerbell (aka Tink), a new member of the family.
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18/18 One afternoon in the parking lot of Sam's we saw this wonderful sunset.
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