Chicago - The Magnificent Mile

Here's the Chicago Post - it's a long one since we were there for three days!

We arrived on Friday in the Windy City ready for a yummy dinner at Gino's East famous deep dish pizza. Kim forgot the camera so we don't have any shots of it, but it's a fun place to eat with graffiti on the walls. We added our own graffiti, "Glab National Crossing 07" to the wall! We had a yummy traditional deep dish with crumbled sausage - it was outstanding!

In the morning we were off to Frank Lloyd Wright's Robie House and the Wright Three Tour.

We had been looking forward to the Wright Three Tour of the Robie House ever since The McMahon's told us about the book and the tour. Before our tour, we had time to experiment with the Froebel Gifts - gift boxes that have shapes and designs. Wikipedia says, " The Froebel Gifts are a range of educational materials designed by Friedrich Froebel who advocated the importance of free play in childhood. Each gift (Gabe) was designed to be given to a child to provide material for the child's self-directed activity." Christiana taking a break with Nanny and Grandbob

The Froebel gifts and the Pentominos were a fun challenge. We felt like Calder from the Wright Three!
We enjoyed the Wright Three Tour and learning about Frank Lloyd Wright and the ART of the Robie House. We agree with Tommy, Calder, and Petra that the house is a work of art and we're glad it was saved from being cut into four pieces and sent to four museums. We highly recommend this book - The Wright Three by Blue Balliett for children of all ages.

After our tour in Hyde Park, we drove through Chicago to see the sights - the Federal Reserve Bank, The Sears Tower, and then we came up on the filming of the next "Batman" movie and here's a prop, this S.W.A.T. vehicle from the movie. We didn't see any famous stars, but we saw them shoot this scene.

"Watch those lights, the last one you went through was red."

We were enjoying a really nice outdoor dinner at the Weber Grill Restaurant at the corner of East Ohio and State street, until a fire broke out across the street.

We captured a number of photos - thankfully we believe no one was hurt and we even spoke with a women who helped escort a group of 12 kids out of the building.

Later that evening, a few of the crew went for a city walk by night ... here are a few of Kendall's creative pictures.

Sunday a.m. we were up early and off to American Girl Place! We had shipped Kirsten, Felicity, Molly, and Madison to Nanny and she brought them to Chicago. We shopped, visited the doll hair salon, shopped, had lunch at the American Girl Cafe, shopped, and headed back to the hotel! It was so much fun!

So many choices!The girls had their doll's hair styled at the Doll Salon. They turned out beautifully. The girls were so glad Nanny brought her Samantha along for trip as well.

Special Memories! After a little R&R, we headed out to the Navy Pier

We took a sunset ride on the 150 foot Ferris Wheel modeled after the very first one built for the Chicago's 1893 World Colombian Exposition. It was a beautiful view of the Chicago Skyline and Lakefront.

But, we weren't done with our tour of Chicago yet .... wait until you hear this story! Don just happened to hear about this great place in the suburbs of Chicago on the Food Channel when he was running on the treadmill at the hotel. So, after the Pier, we got in the car and drove to South Chicago to find Frosted Mug where they make their own root beer and Italian beef. I won't go into all the details of our ride in South Chicago, I'll just say two things - Number 1. Grandparents are Saints! Number 2. We are SO glad we didn't have any car problems and that we got better directions for the way home!

Meet Caroline, our final scooper of the trip! She is also the car hop at Frosted Mug and we really enjoyed talking with her.

Thanks Nanny and Grandbob for meeting us in Chicago and making our last stop so spectacular!

We love you!