Milwaukee to Chicago!

Alright! Milwaukee! 

Like I said, we got there on Sunday but took the day off to relax by Lake Michigan. (I know, rough life.) :)

On Monday we went to "the beach" which actually was pretty cool. It made me feel like I was back home because you look at the water and you can't see the other side. It was pretty cool. So we walked around for a bit but it was kind of hard to find the right people to talk to. We didn't want to go up to people who were laying out cause that's just kinda weird, so we just walked around trying to get a feel for the area. We stopped to use the restroom and when I came out, Marc had struck up a conversation with this guy who looked to be about 20/21. He was in school for Biology but still knew there was a God, but wasn't quite sure what exactly He was. It was cool that he recognized there had to be something, that's much closer than most scientists get. The conversation didn't last a super long time cause the guy was eating & his friend came over and kinda butted in so we left shortly after, but Marc was able to share the gospel with him.

So we kept walking down the beach when we saw this guy sitting out on the rocks, gazing into the yonder & Marc knew that he was next! He looked like he was kind of having an emotional day, so I stayed on the bench while Marc had "guy talk" with him and they talked for at least 45 minutes, maybe even an hour. 

As suspected, his girlfriend had just broken up with him so he was doing reflecting. They shared back and forth on what their beliefs were (he was a sikh) and how to know truth. From what I gathered, it was a very blessed conversation. By the time they were done talking, we were freezing! So we headed to the Bucks to catch up on life. We met a couple of the employees who were really nice! They gave us a heads up on things to do in the city & where to sleep. Weirdly enough, you can't just park anywhere in the city overnight, you have to have a parking permit. Dumb. Not that it matters much to us because we sleep in the Walmart parking lots, but still, that is ridiculous. I guess it's true, they will charge you for anything they can nowadays!

So that was Monday. On Tuesday we went to get our van looked at. For quite some time now, we always smelled coolant when we were driving because of the coolant leak we had. Well now, we noticed that it was  starting to leak on the running board inside of the vehicle. So lame. So we took it in to get checked out. We were there for about 3 hours altogether. What happened was that the heater core was leaking and the cost to fix it would be about $600 to fix, maybe more, depending on how long it takes. Our other option would be to bypass the heater which would just be the cost of labor and only take about an hour. Sooo we decided to just bypass the heater. Three hours, $188, and no heater later, we left and headed back to the park next to the beach. As we walked to the art museum, this guy was coming toward us and before Marc could even get a few words out to give him a tract he was refusing, but it was really weird. He acted like we were trying to give him the plague or something, it was actually kinda funny. 

the art museum!

a super sweet house that faced onto Lake Michigan

skipping stones at the lake

the Milwaukee skyline

Well the art museum wasn't free so we walked back & sat in the park & had a study together. When we were done, we went to the car to get something and noticed that it was leaking. Still. Blah. So we headed back to the shop to see what they could do. Fortunately, there was nothing wrong. The leaking was just fluid  that was still in the lines. As soon as it was flushed out, we would be good to go. Phew, crisis averted. 

On the way back to the beach we stopped at Whole Foods to get some milk for breakfast since we were out. As we walked out, there was two guys standing there hanging out so Marc struck up a conversation. It was sad cause the one guy started by saying that for fun he just drinks all day, every day but later when Marc asked if he is a believer he said yes! He believes that he is going to heaven and he believes in God. This is probably one of the biggest issues we run into on this trip. A lot of people don't know what it means to be a Christian-so many people think that just because they believe in God or go to church that that means they are a Christian, but it doesn't. Believing in God is a decision to live for Him, to do the things that honor Him. Getting drunk is not honoring to the Lord, swearing  every other word is not honoring to the Lord, and living with your bf/gf isn't either! Following God doesn't mean that we will be perfect, but we should at least be striving and when we are not it is apparent. Jesus himself said that you will know a tree by it's fruit. So the things that we do and the way that we act say more about our relationship with God then our words do. Talk is cheap. Live for God or stop saying you are a Christian, because you give a bad name to those of us who are. 

That was what we came across with these 2 guys. They, like so many others, don't know what God expects of them because they don't read their Bibles. We shared a little bit longer and were able to give them a Bible so hopefully they'll read. The one we actually gave the Bible to seemed really interested to read it-he asked twice what books he should read and where to start so that was cool. Pray for him.

As we continued walking back to the van, this guy stopped us and asked us for money. This is another popular one: "Spare some change for a homeless vet?" The first thing Marc said to him was, "are you drunk man?" My bold husband lol. He was able to talk with him and share with him for a couple minutes but he was pretty incoherent so we gave him a tract & what little food we had in our bag then headed out back to the beach.

We found a spot to chill (a bench in front of the walkway) and Marc played his guitar, saying hi to people as they walked by. Our first conversation was super blessed. These 2 guys were walking by just after Marc finished a song so he started talking to them. I think their names were John and Jihan (?) but I can't remember. (If you're reading this, sorry if I butchered that!) But they had both been to church many times. One was mentored by a Christian man for a while so that was a really good base. I couldn't quite tell what their background/beliefs were, it seemed like they believed in God but I don't know how serious they were about following him. I kinda got the impression that they were trying to get back into following Jesus, or at least knew that they should. Either way, the conversation was a good one! 

The next guy that came along was named Jay. He's from DC but was out visiting, maybe moving. As Marc started to share with him, he told us that he was a believer. Sweeeet. I think part of the reason that God has intended for this trip (but who really knows) is to encourage others, which is what Jay said. He felt like, from us talking to him, that he needed to step it up. He was also talking about how he's at the point in his life where he knew he had to be more serious with God, which is awesome!

That was pretty much the end of Tuesday. Wednesday morning we had a chill morning-the type we look forward to when we get home. We sat at Starbucks and read our Bibles. Marc read the newspaper and I blogged. It was nice. Something about being up in the morning is so fresh.

Around 11 or 12 we headed out on our way to Chicago with a pit stop at the Jelly Belly warehouse! Where they give free tours! And free candy! :)

a sweet portrait made out of Jelly Belly's!

sample counter where you can sample all of the flavors!

So that was awesome. Then it was on to Chicago! Man oh man, let me tell you. We learned early how expensive Chicago is! We had to pay almost $5 in tolls on the way into the city before we had even stopped anywhere! Now, $5 may not sound like a lot to you, but I think in terms of burritos-that's 4, maybe 5 burritos, which I don't buy anyways, but still. When you almost never spend money, $5 is a lot to spend and have nothing to show for it. Moving on. We were actually headed to a suburb called Blue Island because that's where the church was. Initially we were going to go to a different one, but I don't think they had a Wednesday night service so we headed to Blue Island instead. What should have been an hour and a half to maybe a 2 hour drive actually took us about 3 and a half hours because of all of the traffic. Traffic like I haven't seen since home! Eventually we got there around 6:15 so we headed out and got some free pizza hut (because Jesus loves us) and then made it back to church. They were showing a video on the persecuted church in China which was really cool just to see the passion these people have.

Afterwards we met a few people including the pastor (Steve Miller -awesome) & his wife (Jan) & daughter (Rheanna). Super nice. It's totally crazy because they have a daughter who lives in Eureka, which is the world's smallest town ever, where I grew up in Montana! Isn't that crazy! But anywho, we also met these two officers who had stopped by on patrol. They were asking us if we needed any recommendations of things to do and after talking for a little while they offered to get us food. Sweeeeet. Talk about awesome!

So they left & came back and had gotten us White Castle burgers & fries AND pizza from a local spot called Beggar's Pizza. Talk about delicious. That pizza was so good! 

Then we spent the next hour and a half just standing around asking them all kinds of questions, anything you ever wanted to know from a cop but knew they wouldn't answer you honestly if you asked-those are the questions we got to ask. It was AWESOME. So eventually they left and we settled in for the night. We got to sleep in the back parking lot of the church so that was nice. :)

Thursday morning we headed out to the train station to catch a train into Chicago! We were told that's the way to go because there is a ton of traffic and you have to pay to park everywhere, so this was the easy option. Turns out to take the train is not as cheap as we'd have hoped. To get from Blue Island to downton Chicago (15 miles) cost $4.75....for a one way ticket and $9.50 for a round trip! Man oh man that is CRAZY! So we got a 10 ride ticket to share and that cost us $42.75. Still dumb, but it is what it is. And we were off to Chicago!!! 

We got off & were surrounded by tons of huge buildings. It was AWESOME. For some reason, I love buildings, which I didn't know until I saw the awesome architecture of older style buildings. So we walked for a bit and came across this:

Look familiar? It's the fountain from Married with Children. Awesome right!? From there we headed over to the Art Institute of Chicago. Pastor Steve works there and said he could get us into the museum so we were like, um yes please! So he got us into the museum and we saw all kinds of cool stuff. We even got to see some Picasso's! It was pretty legit! Thanks Steve! From there we headed out to what is fondly known as "the bean". So sweet! 

the bean!

the reflection of the city!

:) my love laughing at the bean!

As we sat, watching the bean and eating lunch, Marc began talking to this guy who didn't really understand what he was talking about so he left him a tract and headed back to the art institute. Earlier that day Steve invited us over for dinner so when he was off work, we caught the train back to his house with him and had dinner with him, Jan, & Rheanna. It was a really awesome time of fellowship & laughs. Then they drove us back to  the van afterwards where we thought it was bedtime but 5 minutes later there came a knock on the van window. It was Dave! Our neighborhood friendly cop! lol. He invited us over to shower (SWEET because this was Day #10 without a shower) and do laundry if we needed to. So we showered & hung out and parked the van in their driveway to sleep. A very awesome day. :)

Jan (Pastor Steve's wife) drew this....with colored pencils.

FANTASTIC

Friday we had to be in town by noon because our favorite pastor in Illinois wanted to take us to lunch! So we got up early (ish) and took the 10:00 train into town. We had about an hour to kill before meeting him so we went to the Sears Tower (now known as the Willis Tower) & we were going to go to the top but it costs $17.50 to take the elevator up! Stupid right?! So that was a no-go. 

So we headed to Potbelly's, a sandwich shop downtown, where we met up with Pastor Steve & Rheanna on their lunch break. They treated us to a SUPER delicious lunch-I had a veggie sandwich, Marc had a sandwich called "A Wreck" that had like every kind of meat possible. Then we zoomed over to this cupcake shop called Sugar Bliss to get cupcakes. Oh happy day!! I love cupcakes! Especially Red Velvet with cream cheese frosting! Mmmmmmmm. Thank you Steve :) 

awesome! they painted the vent to look like a submarine

mmmmmm cupcakes!

  

my Red Velvet & Marc's muffin

After cupcakes, we made a quick stop at FYE so he could get music then we walked them back to the art institute (where Steve teaches fashion design & Rheanna models for his class). He showed us his classroom (sweetness) and even blessed us with a bunch of art stuff! The best quality of colored pencils, pastels, drawing papers, just a bunch of stuff so that was really awesome. 

Steve's classroom

Rheanna posing for their 70's sketch

so in the library at the art institute, they have all of the copies of Mademoiselle

and Vogue bound into books.

crazy

this room is filled with clothes that are so expensive, you're not allowed to wear them.

So we said goodbye then headed out towards the blues festival. By this time the food & cupcakes had set in & we were sleeeeepy! So we stopped in a park to take a nap. While Marc slept, I used my new art supplies to draw & it came out better than I thought it would, but not good enough to post lol. After about 45 minutes to an hour, we got up & walked around. The city was hosting a "Blues Fest" so we headed towards all the people! One of the first guys that we came up to was a guy sitting by himself on the curb-aka target #1. Marc was talking to him for 10-15 minutes about the validity of the Bible, the "roads to God" theories, what truth is, and other stuff. From there we kept walking and saw this guy dancing in the middle of the street (which was blocked off) all by himself. Of course, I took this opportunity to take a video and then Marc tells me, "I think he's the next one I have to talk to." So the song ended and Marc went up to talk to him. A minute later I look over and he's dancing again, but Marc wasn't with me...so where was he?! So I looked a little bit in front of the guy and Marc is standing there, with his camera, recording the dude dancing. Awesome. And hilarious. I guess immediately he said that he didn't want to talk about religion but then asked Marc, "Why did you approach me?" And Marc said, "Because I saw you dancing." So that's when he asked Marc to record him. Good story huh? I thought it was hilarious.

Moving on, we walked through the park area and there was these 2 guys sitting there. As we stood there deciding where to go, Marc said he felt like he needed to talk to the 2 guys, so he did. Well, they were from Brazil and spoke terrible English so after a few different angles, Marc gave up but tried to give them a tract. The tracts that we use look like million dollar bills, so the guy asked, "For me? This is a gift?" but then he wouldn't take it. It was kind of a bizarre day.

Leaving the Blue's Fest, we walked out onto the main strip but stopped to watch a huge line of people play chess on these boards that were set up. As I sat there on teh planter watching Marc watching them play, a guy sat next to me & we started talking. His son had just started a game so we were there for a while. We talked about traveling and family and I told him about the trip & asked him about his beliefs. He is a Catholic but is really involved in his church. I didn't really get too invasive like Marc does, I don't think I'm that bold yet haha but we had a really great conversation & talked about the importance of living for God and serving Him. 

the first guy Marc talked to

the 2 Brazilian guys who didn't speak English

the chess tables

a better view

the boats near Navy Pier

Navy Pier (obviously)

tiiiiight

Marc's Chicago dog

we were crossing a bridge when we noticed a gigantic crack in the floor.

creeepy.

winding down Saturday night in Chicago :)

Dave brought us some more free pizza and Marc

practiced worship. 

After a game and a half we left & started walking back towards the station. By this time it was probably close to 5 or 6 and we were exhausted from a long day of walking, so we caught the train back to Blue Island and as we got off, Marc found another guy to talk to. I know, surprising right? Then we started walking back to the house where we were staying (with Dave & Kathy), when a truck pulled up next to us going really slow. Man, I hate when people do that! But we turned around and it was Kathy picking us up. Yeah! 

Saturday morning came and we woke up, ate breakfast, and read then headed out to the church to help the maintenance team but when we got there, nobody was there :( so we went to the train station. As we were driving there, I looked up the schedule-the next train was coming at 11:18. It was 11:17 when we pulled into the parking lot! Before we could even get anything together to make our mad dash, the train pulled out. Darn. So we got out & looked at the schedule-the next train was coming at 1:18. Totally lame sauce. 

While we waited, Marc played his guitar & we wrote postcards to kill time. Finally the train got there so we got into the city (about a 45-55 minute train ride) so we got off and walked FOREVER! to Navy Pier, just north of the downtown area. As we walked we met this family who was vacationing from Indiana (I think) and we walked and talked with them. They asked the usualy questions-are we wealthy? How many times have I wanted to kill Marc? How long will we be gone? Etc, etc, so it was cool we got to share with them the awesome works God has done with us and show them love.

After what seemed like forever, we arrived at Navy Pier. We walked around it for a while & Marc got a Chicago dog, something he had been looking forward to! As we walked on, we got to the end of the pier and sat between two parties of people. On our left were two guys, one was 16, the other 19 who were brothers there with their family. Marc struck up a really good conversation with them. They were Catholic ("I think" they said) and only went because their family did. They didn't really know to much but Marc was able to give them the gospel and why we need Jesus. It was a really cool conversation. We talked with them a lot about different things also, just life in general as well as Jesus. After about 15 minutes, they bounced out cause their family was leaving. We were both really surprised that the parents didn't say anything to us, but glad we were able to talk. The sister and her boyfriend were in close enough proximity to hear and the sister even joined the conversation from time to time so that was cool.

We walked back down the pier and came to a park where there was a fountain and a bunch of people playing in it. We sat on a bench and it wasn't too long before this guy sat next to us. He was probably about 17-19 and he looked really angry. Marc kept trying to talk to him but he didn't seem like he wanted to talk, he gave very short answers and just seemed really uneasy the whole time. Marc told me that he didn't like the uneasiness of the guy so I said let's go, but Marc wasn't done. He started talking to him about Jesus & gave him the gospel but he said he already believed in God and knew he was going to heaven so Marc tried to drive home the importance of relationship and being in right standing with God. After just a few minutes, his friends got up to leave and off he went. By this time it was getting late so we made our way back to the train station. As we did we stopped to talk to this guy about the train & ask him a couple of questions. We got to share with him what we were doing and, as a believer, he was super encouraged! It was a really great conversation, and then it was off to the train!

With my luck, we missed the first one and had to wait an hour for the second one, but it wasn't too bad. We walked around Chicago a little bit more then sat at the station. When we finally made it back to Blue Island, our awesome new friend Dave brought us some pizza :) then Marc practiced worship and we crashed in the parking lot. (We had been sleeping at Dave's house but we figured since we'd be there in the morning for church that we would just stay in the back.)

Soooo now we're at Sunday. Church was good-there was a guest speaker from Lima, Peru who gave a message on the 4 ways the Lord wants to speak to us. Very sweet. After church one of the ushers, Robert, invited us to lunch. He & his wife Lucy (and their two daughters) took us to Portillo's, a Chicago original!

We had a really good time with them! It was awesome to see how the Lord brought us together. On our way there they were telling us about this ministry that God has called them to where they are to go door to door and hand out Bibles but everytime they go online to buy Bibles, something comes up that prevents them from doing it. How weiiiiiiird, we had two boxes of Bibles in our van since Texas that we haven't been able to give out. :) So they blessed us with lunch & water bottles and we blessed them with Bibles! How cool to see the Lord's plan fall into place. :) After lunch, Dave invited us back over so we went to his house and hung out for the night, played games, ate dinner, watched TV, good times.

Monday! Monday was awesome! They had extra, free tickets for Six Flags so they invited us to go with them!!! How super fantastic is that?! I am always fascinated at how God gives us not only what we need, but many times things that we want, also. The rides were awesome! Scary, but awesome. So there is a ride there called "Superman" where you sit down & are strapped in and then lifted up so you are laying facing the ground & flying like Superman, so the entire time all of your weight is on the restraints with nothing below you except the ground. Well we go to get in & sit down, and they have to have us re-close our restraints twice and then made us get off because the harnesses weren't closing right. TERRIFYING right?! They did a test run then we got on & nobody died, thank God. The ride was scary enough but with the extra psychological factor, I was so afraid. SO. AFRAID. But then it was worse because Dave kept making stupid comments about us falling out. Man oh man.

So Six Flags was fantastic. Really hot but fan-freaking-tastic. Thank you Stone family for an awesome day.

Welcome to Six Flags!

don't tell them we took their picture!

apparently they hate cameras lol

this one...was awesomely scary

this is Superman, the ride where I thought I was 

going to die

Foghorn Leghorn! My homie!

who doesn't love Scooby?! 

you can't really tell but on the front left is Marc

and the front right is Kayla

Daffy! :)

Tuesday morning we got up and did laundry and then headed out to Wrigley Field!!!! We haven't really spent money on non-essential items on this trip and if we have, no more than a couple dollars here or there, but, as a baseball fan, Wrigley was a must! So we caught the train and made our way up town.

We got there shortly after 6 and bought our tickets. At first the guy told us that they didn't have two tickets together! What!? But after looking again, he found 2 that were cheap enough. When we got to our seats we found out why-there was a pole in front of us!!! But it wasn't bad enough to obstruct the game, I just had to lean a little bit. Man oh man, was I happy! I think there were a couple of bogus plays, but they were in favor of the Cubs, who won, so it was ok. We even got to hear the song they play when the Cubbies win! Very stinkin cool!

epic.

haha they gave away free hats, but Marc's didn't fit :(

this is why our seats were cheap! There was a pole in the way!

be still, my heart.

the legendary scoreboard.

the wall made extra famous when the world's dumbest 

fan upheld "the curse"

gotta love a night game

So that was it for Wrigley! All in all, a very awesome experience, which leads us to the present: Wednesday. This morning we had to get a battery for our van cause the one we have was going out :( at least we caught it before it completely died, so that's good! Then we practiced worship at the park. Marc is leading worship for the church tonight. :) What a blessing! 

As of right now, we're leaving tomorrow morning for Indiana. Keep us in your prayers, it will be sad to say bye to Chicago. The Stone family and the Millers were so incredibly awesome. It's so cool knowing that we have made such good friends in such a short amount of time all over the country. Pray for them, for blessing upon their families. :) Peace!