Chicago's MSI and Millennium Park

Yes, it's still cold here. Today it was good to get out and do lots of running around - for Fergus especially since he had enjoyed an indoor day yesterday while Gillian, Effie and I went downtown to American Girl and the Lego store.

Catching the train:


The Museum of Science and Industry:






Millennium Park - running around Crown Fountain in front of the 50 foot people towers (in warmer weather, water shoots out their mouths):



The Bean at Millennium Park:





Pavilion art-work-thingy...


Pizza on the way home:

Trip to American Girl store

Waiting for the train downtown:


Riding the 'L'


Outside the massive mega-store o' dolls:


Inside:


Negotiations:


Success:

Happy Thanksgiving

...our second consecutive Canadian thanksgiving spent in the states. It's Columbus Day here - which doesn't seem to mean much to anybody. Martin has the day off, not because of Columbus but rather since it is Max's birthday! He turned 8 today - woo hoo!!!

Rachel has been planning our trip for quite a while. I think we have a 14 day itinerary and we are here for 10. We have knocked very little off the list so far but that suits us fine cause we're going at a pace that accounts for much at-home star wars and lego playing time. We haven't made it downtown yet but that will come quick enough because Eff's itching to get to the American Girl store.

Yesterday we tried going to a playground - it was locked:



Fergus' contribution to the photo journal - the bum tree:


Logan Square


We've been hearing about this restaurant for a looong time and it was as good as advertised. Rachel and Martin's favorite neighborhood restaurant - Lula:



Frolicking in a park:




Ferg got a new Mario outfit...



Max's Leaning Tower of Pisa birthday cake:


Lego seance


And here's Rachel and Martin's 100 plus year-old super cool house - in mid-attic reno mode:

Rush... live in chicago!

...that'd be folk legend Tom Rush - touring his first studio album in 35 years!! He was pretty good. A nostalgia trip for Gillian. The two of us saw him at the Old Town Music School. We were the youngest people there.


Tom's guitar!


Mr. Rush and a fan:

Welcome to...

...unseasonably cold Chicago! It dipped to 4 celsius here today. Never mind, we're enjoying the big city sights and the big city food options greatly. Not to mention our big city friends and their awesome home. Some fool wore shorts out today...

Yikes!

... someone turned 10 today.

Desire

The above shows a spreadsheet that Effie and I created to monitor our progress in financing the purchase of the greatly desired Rock Band Beatles. Trading pop bottles for a Wii game also helped to clean out the garage of sticky stacks of orange bags. I’ll just accept that we are procrastinating hoarders and see the positives in the fact that we found over $100 worth of recycling in there!

We didn’t quite make our total before succumbing - but there is only so much of a head start we could give certain other rock band playing families:

Catch and release

Today we learned about that great Canadian pastime... softball! Or rather, we discovered another example of doing things your own way. When it was suggested to him that one normally, for maximum effectiveness, throws with their dominant hand and catches with the other one, Ferg replied with "who cares". I do admire his style. Eff also employed her own unique style: