Santa Brunch - and Christmas fun!

I took Ellie and JR to the Santa Brunch at SRCC with Dad, Emily, Brian, Luke and Ms. Molly. Nana happened to be traveling and Lauren went to a breakfast at Kristien Woods' house instead for R+F.

Ellie got to wear her new dress from Nana (it is super-cute and she was very excited to show Santa). JR was happy just to wear his desert boots and a sweater. I swear that kid has a mind of his own. 

Overall it was a blast. Bummer Lauren didn't come but it is what it is. 

Zoo Lights 2015

We brought JR and Ellie to Zoo Lights tonight. I think it might be JR's first visit to the zoo (unless he was super young). They had a blast!

Highlight was the house with all the Big Cats. There were two lions and JR roared at them before we left. And he help pointing out the leopard. 

Ellie loved it and wanted to ride the carousel. We will have to do that next time. 

Great way to get in the festive spirit!

Getting back to journaling, but the topics are going to be different

I've decided to get back to journaling, but now that we have the two kids with a third on the way, I'm deciding to start chronicling some of the fun small things from their day-to-day and things we do together.

I'm going to find a way to do this from my phone but this will be a lot of fun to share with them when they get older.

Back to journaling!

Back to Japan - 2014 tour from Tokyo to Yokohama, Shonan, and Osaka

I'm back in Japan for a work project, and it's been a totally different trip from the last time. For this trip, we are doing training at four different sites around the country. What an interesting trip. Just a few of the highlights from each of the places...


Tokyo - this city just amazes me. I only had one night here, and that's never enough. We went to an awesome bar - Bar High Five - and it was killer. http://www.barhighfive.com/

We followed that up with just a solid dinner around the corner, and that was a great way to settle into what was going to be a fun week.


From Tokyo we had to go to Yokohama, and this was a much more laid back night. We were resting up for Osaka.

Two things were impressive for me during this part of the trip:
1. The client site in Shonan was as impressive of a research facility as I've ever seen
2. We got to take the bullet train from Shin-Yokohama to Shin-Osaka

Pictures of each below.

The final leg of the trip involved a few days in Osaka. Highlights included Osaka Castle, catching the last day of the cherry blossom festival along the river, walking through Dotonbori, and eating some amazing food.

The sushi place we went to for dinner was incredible - Sushi Hoshiyama. Very young chef, creative sushi, incredible experience.

Lunch for tempura was ridiculous

Emily is no longer a Dolan

Crazy to think about, but this last weekend my sister got married.

Congrats to Emily and Brian!

Some pictures through Lauren's website [below].

www.laurendolan.com

Singapore 2011

I got to spend a little time in Singapore for work this Spring. Really, I was there for 3 days... I got in late on Tuesday night after flying 20h through Tokyo, and had to leave on Friday night around midnight to head back to the US.

The weather while we were there was absolutely amazing. There is something to be said for tropical weather in March. Needless to say, my thick-blood Chicago physiology wasn't too thrilled, but it was a great way to sober up from my extended weekend in New Orleans for Brian's bachelor party.

The first thing I saw on my drive in was the huge Ferris Wheel - the Singapore Flyer. It just so happens to be the largest wheel in the world.

I did have a pretty good view from the hotel of the Marina Bay / Fullerton Bay area.

 Crazy bridge with a view of the docks.

 View of the Singapore Flyer

Pool at the Mandarin Oriental

The first day there Ashwin and I had a meeting with our client, but after the meeting was over we were able to walk around a bit and check out some more sights. We ended up walking much further than necessary, but we ended up walking past the new hotel called the Marina Bay Sands. It is a monstrosity of a building - actually three - with a mock ship at the top. At the base of the complex is a huge casino as well as some very high-end retail.

Marina Bay Sands (left) and Art Science Museum (right)

What was amazing is that between the first two days there we didn't have to leave a square mile of the city. Our hotel was on one side of the bay, client office was on another, and we had dinner with the team on the water.  We we ultimately forced to check out some other stuff after all the workshops were over and Eduardo left. Unfortunately, I wasn't feeling great (dehydrated even though I was trying to drink a lot of water) so I couldn't enjoy the chicken and rice as much at the food stalls. I have a feeling that we'll have another one going on there soon. Until then there are just some night pictures to bide the time...

 Helical pedestrial bridge

View from the hotel at night - Marina Bay Sands, Helical Bridge, and museum

 Night-view of the museum

 Night view of the Sands

 

 Night view of The Flyer

 More night shots from the hotel

 Pedestrian walkway outside Marina Bay Sands

 Can see the stands in the background where you can watch the floating platform (blue, yellow and green seats)

 We had drinks in one of the Fullerton Hotel rooftops

Skiing in Boyne Highlands

Well, it is now official. Lauren skied for the first time over a long weekend up at Boyne Highlands in Michigan after we were invited by our friends, and she did great. I'll edit this post and add pictures and video, but for now I'll just summarize it like this: we're going to have to get out West next winter. No question about it.

Well done baby.