We're here!

We've officially been in Chicago a week now and boy what a difference a week makes! We spent last Saturday and Sunday nights on an air bed in an otherwise completely empty apartment. The movers delivered our furniture on Monday and by Wednesday we were completely unpacked...it was an exhausting week. Jason went to work at U of C and Argonne on Thursday and Friday while I ran errands around the neighborhood. Now that we've had a little time to sit back and take it all in, we've decided that we love it here! Our apartment and neighborhood are perfect for us!

Here's Jason's favorite part of the apartment; just between you and me, it's an office, but he insists that it be referred to as his "command center":


He's already been busy setting up his computers to do all kinds of fancy things. He also loves the command center because it has lots of room for his many books:


While he spends most of his time in his command center, tinkering with his computers, I enjoy the living room:


It has a nice view of the park across the street (Oz Park):


And my new sofa (thanks again mom and dad!) is a very comfortable reading location. Sadly, the sofa almost didn't make it here. Our movers told us it wouldn't fit up the stairs and left it in our lobby. We didn't quite understand why they couldn't get it up the stairs...all of our measurements said it should fit. In the end, we think they were just tired and didn't want to mess with it. I'm not saying that getting a 93" sofa up this stairwell was easy:


...it just required being a little geometrically imaginative. Jason and I were able to get the job done and are now trying to figure out how we can get out of paying the movers for the part of the job they didn't complete. I'll keep you posted on that one!

We also have a small dining room and kitchen:



I'm learning that when it comes to big city living, space is often a hard to find commodity...as you can see, I had to get creative with the set up of my counter-top appliances or risk having NO counter space to work with. While a bit odd looking, this set-up seems to be doing the trick. The other challenge to using this kitchen is the cabinets. In an attempt to create more storage, the owners installed extra long cabinets. This is great in theory, but makes life a little more difficult on Jason...any time I need something that is in the upper half of the cabinet, he has to come get it for me. Thank goodness for my 6'6" cooking assistant!

Here's our building from the outside:


The ground floor of the building consists of the lobby and mail box area, so our place actually occupies the 2nd and 3rd floors of the building.

Living right across from Oz Park is great. It's a very clean, safe, and family oriented area. The park was created in memory of the author of the Wizard of Oz who was born in Lincoln Park. The entire park has a Wizard of Oz theme. This includes the Emerald City Garden:


And statues of all the Wizard of Oz characters throughout the park:


All in all, I feel very comfortable living here. There has really only been one cause for alarm on my part...these disturbing signs that seem to be EVERYWHERE I turn:



That's enough to make a girl start hearing things when she's trying to sleep at night!!