Trip Part 3

Friday, August 7 – Saturday, August 8

Illinois is 2 things…corn fields and Chicago.  That is all.  I actually began to get angry with the corn fields…they were never ending.  Oh, and there was construction on the interstate…and in Illinois, that means you come to a grinding halt after going 2 MPH for 45 minutes.  We finally got to Chicago around 8:00 pm.  I had been in contact with Jennifer and through all of our texting we made plans such that:

• She was waiting outside for us when we pulled up to her building
• She handed us a remote control for her space in her parking garage
• We were off the street and into her parking space in no time
• She had hot Giordano’s deep dish pizza waiting for us

We were all VERY happy and excited to see Jennifer standing there…we had missed her more than we even realized!

Her apartment is perfect and it was super-nice of her roommate to leave town so that we could take over the space.  We decompressed, ate deep dish pizza, visited, and marveled at the view from her balcony.  

I think we all go to bed around 10:00.

Saturday, we woke up and ate the cereal and bagels that Jennifer had bought for us and mapped out our day.  We were going to walk and soak up the city.  The first stop was Millennium Park and “The Bean” – which is really named Cloud Gate.  This is a reflection of the city in The Bean:

Actually, though, we stopped at Crown Fountain first.  The kids enjoyed watching the faces, but wanted to hop in the water, of course.  On the way to Millennium Park, we watched the first person in a left-turn lane NOT go when the people behind him thought they should…and a gut a few cars back jumped out and yelled (in a totally Chicago accent), “What are you waiting for?” – we felt like we were experiencing stereotypical Chicago!

After “The Bean” we headed over to Maggie Daley Park and the kids played while Jennifer and I visited.  After helping a lost little boy find his father, we walked over to Mariano’s grocery store and picked up lunch from the huge selection of grab and go. Richard and I had an incredible ham and cheese sandwich on a pretzel bun, Jennifer had a salad and the kids ate…Lunchables…and bologna at that.  I never let them get bologna at home…I do have Lunchable standards.

Then we began the trek to Lake Michigan. This brought us to the Chicago River, so it was a treat to get to see that!  

Once we arrived at the beach, Richard and the kids changed into their swimsuits in a port a potty and then jumped in the lake.  It was 80 degrees (and frankly kind of on the cool side), but there were tons of people soaking up the “summer”. By this point, Mary was conked out in her stroller, so Jennifer and I got a table at the outdoor “café”.  Also by this point, Jennifer’s work cell phone was exploding with emergencies which took her about 30 minutes to sort out.  I enjoyed my water (bottled) and ginger ale until Mary woke up and then she enjoyed my ginger ale and ice.  Eventually, Richard came over to get Mary, change her into her swimsuit and get her into the (in my opinion, freezing) Lake Michigan.  Once the required pictures were taken, we changed Mary back into her clothes and got the other children’s shoes back on their feet, but they walked home in their swimsuits. 

We intended to walk home via Navy Pier, but it looked to contain too much humanity for my patience level, so we crossed back over and walked by the marina.  We stopped for ice cream at a place where a small was 3 scoops.  3!  Turns out they were small scoops, but still!  We ate out ice cream and looked at sail boats…and then started walking.  We walked A TON…in fact, I got over 20,000 steps on the fitbit.  The kids didn’t really complain and we all had a great time.  Our return to Jennifer’s apartment took us past Buckingham Fountain and we piddled around the area long enough to see it at its maximum height.

Once back to Jennifer’s we all showered, I did our wash, we ate leftover deep dish pizza, watched movies and played poker (Luke was very excited to try his hand at Texas Hold ‘Em) until 10:15 when we watched the fireworks at Navy Pier…from Jennifer’s balcony.  It was a perfect end to an amazing day exploring Chicago.

Coming up – Sunday in Chicago!