Cristiana seems to love little spaces that she can crawl into and just hang out. She use to crawl into Rusty's corner between the two couches but lately her favorite hangout is on the bottom shelf of the bookshelves that are attached to our living room TV armoire. She likes to bring in her toys with her and plays in her little nuke for a few min. I think we need to get this little one a play house!
A few days ago, I introduced Cristiana to her first PB & J sandwich. She's had Jam and bread before but I was holding off on the peanut butter (allergy precaution) but decided to go ahead with it and it was a huge hit. She loved it so much that she licked the plate for a few minutes after she was done.
Yummy!
On our last day before our flight, we headed out to the Navy Pier, which seems to be a VERY popular place for the tourists, since it was very crowded with people and travel buses. There's so much to do there, rides, movies, vendors, boats, and even an indoor circus, but unfortunately our trip was a short one since we had a plane to catch. We did spend a little bit of time in the park in front of the pier because they had a really cool "splash" fountain. I knew Cristiana would not jump in, but we tried anyways (there's a small video of us at the fountain below). After our short trip, we headed to the airport and unfortunately left the beautiful weather in Chicago to the wet and stormy weather in Orlando. We actually had a pretty good flight back. Cristiana slept about 1/2 of the flight (yippee!) which was great since our flight was full and we were a bit tight on space. Though Cristiana's sleep schedule made it a bit stressful during our time in Chicago I would have to say that overall we had a great and successful first trip with Cristiana.
After another good long nap which of course allowed mommy to have another good long bath, Cristiana and I headed out to Lincoln Park Zoo on our 4th day in Chicago. We actually made a pit stop at the Tribune Tower to pay daddy a little visit before our venture to the zoo, which he very much appreciated. We had a longer bus ride to the zoo which Cristiana was not too happy about. Our other outings have been train rides and then short bus rides but this was all bus. The Lincoln Park Zoo was lovely, and since it was an absolutely beautiful day (for the 3rd day in a row) it made it even nicer. The vegetation and outdoor animal exhibits are great. It's so cool to have something so "natural" in the city, but then again, Chicago is truly a beautiful city. Our trip back to the hotel was a bit more rough since the bus was pretty full and Cristiana was tired, and as we all know she will NOT fall asleep unless she's in her bed, no matter how tired she is. SO, needless to say I had to get off a couple of stops prior to ours in order to maintain both our sanity's. A nice LONG walk back along Michigan Ave. (the main downtown road) to our hotel.
After resting up a bit and having dinner, we headed out to visit the famous Buckingham Fountain, but as I like to call it, the "Married with Children" fountain. It was quite nice and periodically there's a fountain show with music, water pressure changes, and lights. We were lucky enough to see one while we were there.
Since we were out during the time they do the turn down service we were able to receive one (we always opted not to have one since we were usually in the room during that time). The turn-down service included fixing the room and turning down the bed of course, but they also placed a fish tank screen saver on the TV, romantic jazz music on the radio, "trump" waters on each night stand along with a motivational message, and placed our slippers on either side of the bed. The turn-down service made our last night at the hotel even nicer.
On our 3rd day the gals headed back to Museum Campus on the same bus and subway to play at the Shedd Aquarium. The Museum Campus area is absolutely beautiful with so many areas to just lay out a blanket and enjoy a picnic. The field museum, the aquarium, the planetarium, and Solider Field are all located in this area. We had a great time looking at all the fish and animals but were a bit disappointed to not be able to see the big guys (whales, dolphins, penguins, sea lions and otters) because their exhibits were all under construction (they were redoing that whole area). We did get to see some sharks as well as a huge anaconda. After some fun in the aquarium we headed across the street to the children's garden, it's a small but very cool playground. Unfortunately it's aimed for older kids that can climb but Cristiana had fun just walking around and enjoying the beautiful weather we were blessed with.
After our fun outing Cristiana enjoyed sitting at the window like usual and I was able to get a good glimpse of the sun setting over the city. It was beautiful (the picture does it no justice) and then Cristiana enjoyed a bath in the deep soaking tub.
After a good long morning nap for Cristiana and a nice long relaxing bath for mommy, the girls headed out to play at the Field Museum of Natural History while daddy worked hard at the Tribune (picture on bottom right). We caught the subway and a bus, which Cristiana seemed to really enjoy doing, and spent a few hours just walking around and looking at all the exhibits. My main reason to visit the Field Museum was to see the actual skeleton of SUE the largest and most complete T-Rex that has been discovered. During my 1st internship at Animal Kingdom one of our locations as Education Presenters was at the SUE replica that is located in front of the Dinosaur ride. So afte
r educating guests about this Dino for a whole semester, I figured I would have to pay the real thing a visit during my trip to Chicago. But the highlight of our museum visit was the kids area. The Crown Family Playlab is located on the ground level of the museum and it is just a super cool area for kids to play and explore freely. Cristiana really enjoyed being able to roam around freely (after being on mommy's back the entire time) and also touch everything without being reprimanded. There's a small interactive exhibit on how the people in a village make corn and Cristiana enjoyed climbing in and out of the windows rather than the normal entrances of course and grabbing the soft "corn" and putting them on the floor; but she later came back and picked up her mess (that's my girl!) We spent a lot of time in their music room where they have instruments from various countries; Cristiana really liked the bells, "xylophone", and the hand drum. They also have a small forest exhibit filled with small jackets that the kids can wear that resemble animals (Cristiana wasn't impressed with them, but I was). Though daddy was not able to join us, I did take pictures of the beautiful Bear's Stadium (Soldier Field) for him, which was right across the street from the museum.
Cristiana and I had a great time, and though mommy lost her transit card on our way back, we were still able to get back to the hotel (Thanks to a very nice man who gave mommy his card with enough money to catch the bus back to the train station to buy a new card).
Cristiana really enjoyed spending her time at the hotel making a mess as always and reading her books while sitting either on the sofa with no cushions (they were under the crib mattress to help short mommy) in her car seat, or next to the window (pictures found on day 3). As mentioned previously, Cristiana's nights were starting to get worse and we definitely started to feel it on night #2, I guess she was starting to miss home.
This past week, Jaime had to travel up to Chicago for business, so Cristiana and I decided to make it a small vacation for us since she's never traveled before (Our last trip was 2 summers ago while I was pregnant). I was excited about going since I had never been to Chicago before but nervous about the trip and plane ride with Cristiana. Our flight left during Cristiana's morning nap but needless to say she did not sleep, WHAT A SURPRISE HUH? Jaime and I were hoping to catch some shut eye but ended up entertaining Cristiana the entire flight. Her first flight went pretty well, she did get a bit fussy at times since she decided not to take her morning nap, but overall behaved very well (we were also lucky to get a whole row for us 3 on the plane which allowed Cristiana more wiggle room). Cristiana did finally pass out on the taxi ride to the hotel and did not wake up until we were in the room. We had the pleasure of staying at the Trump Tower in Chicago and all I can say is WOW! Our last luxury stay was during our honeymoon at the Sheraton in Moorea (French Polynesia/Tahiti) but this was completely different. All the doormen and bellhops knew who we were and everyone was just so polite and accommodating. The hotel is absolutely beautiful and modern. The room was huge and had everything you needed or desired (Ceiling to floor windows, 42 inch flat screen (which Jaime fell in love with), super comfy king size bed, kitchen with stainless steal appliances, flatware, and cookware by Cuisinart, huge bathroom with shower and deep soaking tub (which I deeply enjoyed), vanity with TV in mirror, robes, slippers, and tons of other enjoyable and nonessential things such as the $25 water bottle available for purchase (see photos). We did just a bit of sightseeing on our first day (it was a bit cold (in the 50s) on Sunday when we arrived) and ate very yummy pizza. When we got back to our room Cristiana had another gift from the hotel waiting for her (she had already been given their Trump Kids bag w/goodies that included the pink cow you see in the pics), they brought her a VERY yummy chocolate chip cookie (her name spelled correctly on the plate (most people spell it with an H) in chocolate) and some milk. This hotel went out of the way to make everything perfect for all of us, including little Cristiana. Anything we needed (including a bigger crib for our toss and turn monkey) was delivered right away to us. What attention to detail and what great service!
Cristiana slept ok for her first night away from home, but little did we know that her sleeping pattern and habits were on their way down a spiraling staircase. On to day 2!
The Crespo family celebrated International Migratory Bird Day @ Animal Kingdom. We had a great time hanging out with daddy (Jaime hasn't been to Animal Kingdom since before Cristiana was born) and because daddy came(we had more hands), we were able to capture some fun videos of Cristiana. Cristiana enjoyed the safari (since she was actually awake for it) but I think her favorite attraction was the petting zoo with the goats. She loved hugging the goats and got a little too close for comfort to their droppings. But she definitely has no fear of anything. She also LOVED the characters, especially Rafiki who was able to spend time with her since he had no one waiting for him. She was all over him (watch the video) for about 10 min and kept running away but returning back to play with him, she was so funny! And though she was pooped as could be, she did not fall asleep on the way home, what a surprise!
Make sure to pause the music at the bottom of the blog before playing the 3 videos below.
On Friday Cristiana and I headed over to Amelia and Monica's house for a little bit of catching up and play time. It never seizes to amaze me every time I see these girls hang out, how much they've grown up and how different their interactions have become. The girls were so cute playing pee-a-boo together and just being silly. Cristiana decided to push one of the chairs around and Amelia decided to help her out and they both helped each other take out the diapers from the changing table cabinet. We had a great time and Amelia must really wear Cristiana out because this is the second time in the past few months that Cristiana has 
actually fallen asleep on the way home. Last time she fell asleep, we were with both Amelia and Ava @ the splash park. I think we need to hang out with Amelia more often! :)
On Wednesday Cristiana and I met up with some of the moms for lunch and playground fun. All of Cristiana's mommy and me friends are now on different nap schedules so it's difficult to meet up with them, but we were lucky enough that this play date worked with our nap schedule. The little ones had fun running around and playing on the playground equipment. Cristiana actually went on the bridge ALL ALONE! This little girl sometimes is fearless and it scares me half 
to death. The summer has definitely arrived here in Orlando because the little ones were all red and sweaty by the end but it doesn't seem to bother them one bit
It's starting to get warm, so I decided to break out Cristiana's splash mat for a little bit of early summer fun. Well, the water coming out of the hose was still a bit cold and Cristiana did the same thing she's done in the splash parks, she touches the water but gasps and runs a way when she gets splashed in the face or anywhere on her torso. Hopefully as the water warms up she'll actually get in the mat 
a
nd
enjoy it. 
Yesterday, the Crespo family finally made it out to the Orange County History Center to visit the Jim Henson exhibit they've had open since February (this was the last weekend). It was really interesting to see some of his original drawings and story boards for various movies, shows, and even commercials (I had no idea he had created Muppet commercials). Did you know that Oscar the Grouch was drawn in purple but when he first came out he was actually orange instead of green? And did you know that Cookie Monster used to be named Wheel Stealer and had a mouth full of teeth, kind of scary looking and completely not kid friendly) Unfortunately they did not allow pictures of any kind in the Jim Henson exhibit so I was unable to share anything with you guys. They did have an area for the kids to play with puppets, make their own, and really neat touch and feel stuff (walls and HUGE crinkle cookies), needless to say we spent a lot of time there. Crsitana even made an older boyfriend. There was a boy who kept bringing the puppets over for Cristiana to play with and he would give her puppet hugs.
We visited the other floors but spent most of our time chasing Cristiana around since she was running all over the place. She's a quick one!
