So here I am.. 24 hours later.. and we are IN Chicago!

The drive was pretty uneventful.. except for the fact that we learned that Sara has a bladder the size of a pea.. but otherwise, the girls mostly slept, complained about the lack of decent radio choices in rural Indiana, and sang obnoxiously loudly to "The Climb" by Miley Cirus... I am pretty sure that was sarcastic singing, btw.

In general, I was actually quite impressed with the musical tastes of this group of girls.. we all tended to make fun of the same things (think Lil' Wayne - Bedrock and Justin Bieber...).. It's so nice now that the girls are past the 12-14 year old stage! And I was pleasantly surprised to find out that they could actually sing lyrics to Michael Buble' songs and some of the girls didn't mind mentioning that they loved John Mayer as a songwriter (I made sure to comment on the fact that he is a womanizer and not someone they should see as a potential dating partner)..

Due to our stop somewhere in Indiana where the girls ordered custom subs at Subway and a freshly grilled chicken sandwich at DQ.. we ended up approaching Chicago at 5:15 pm.. OHIO TIME.. so it was only 4:15 Chicago time. We thought we were in good shape when we realized the time difference.. we had beat rush hour after all!... or so we thought..

We ran into major road construction and spent about 1.5 hours on the last 30 miles of our drive.. this is where Sara's bladder came into play again.. but the girls were well fed and well rested.. so no one whined or complained at all.. they were all good sports and enjoyed taking pictures of the city as we approached.

We finally got into downtown Chicago.. had to make the block 3 times to get close enough to the valet at the Hard Rock Hotel (only to find out that they charge $48 a day for parking.. WHAT?.. we will be self parking tomorrow a block away!).. the girls found our circling during rush hour hilarious.. I was not so amused.. but we made it nonetheless...

We got into the hotel, and the girls were psyched.. I've never been in this hotel before.. but it's pretty cool. The girls were impressed. We got two adjoining rooms on the 17th floor.. on the corner of the building overlooking Michigan Ave.. the views are super impressive. The rooms here are big and the bathrooms are great.. and we also have 2 walls of mirrors.. which, with 7 females, comes in super handy at make-up time!

All the girls spent some time getting made up.. and putting on their highest heels.. when I told them that we'd be doing lots of walking tonight... so maybe comfortable shoes would be in order. MOST of them took my advice... I'll let you guys ask your daughters which one did not... but she ended up buying a comfy pair of shoes on sale about 15 blocks later... ;)

We had dinner at a traditional Italian restaurant in the theater district.. Petterino's.

The girls ate so well! Well, all except for Mackensie, who didn't care for the menu.. but wow! The girls ate Calamari, real Caesar salad (with anchovies!), chicken parmesan, lobster ravioli.. it was great! I was super impressed.. and all of them had fabulous restaurant manners. It was a real treat to be with such well mannered young women!

Then, we took taxis to the Briar Street Theatre. It was the first taxi ride ever for 3 of the girls, so they loved that.. which was a lot of fun for me.. taxis are such a normal part of my life, to see the excitement made the experience new for me as well. We arrived and got our seats.. on the 3rd row.. which was the "wet zone"... so we all had to don ponchos.. which was a little nerve-wracking at first, but proved to not be as worrisome as we expected.

The Blue Man Group was FANTASTIC. I am sure you will hear all about it from your daughters, but they all loved it. They talked about it non-stop until they passed out. One of them even mentioned that when they get married, they wanted to have the Blue Man Group perform at their reception.

All in all, it was a really great first day. The girls are all terrific and had a good time. Now I guess I should get some sleep (after uploading photos), since tomorrow is Shopping, Spa Day and then... Beauty and the Beast!

Pictures to follow.. more updates tomorrow night!