Chicago

We had a great time in Chicago but are happy to be back home. Here is a summary of our trip (more for my memory keeping than anything). We left the house around 9:00 am to make the 3 hour or so trip. Isabella and Ava were pretty sad with us leaving, so I left my cell phone with Isabella so she could call anytime she wanted (um, which she did call about every hour - LOL). We make it downtown and find the theater without much trouble. We pull into the parking garage and see the price to park for 3 hours or so - $27!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We would have backed out and went looking someplace else, but the other lot we pulled into was for about $22-$25 and it was an open lot and I just didn't like the looks of it. We suck it up and take the "we're on vacation attitude and are willing to pay it. Head to the theater thinking we have about 30 minutes or so before the show and remember - oh yeah, Chicago is an hour behind Indianapolis.

We walk around and do a little shopping (Steve fell in love with Nordstrom Rack) and headed back to the theater. Wicked was fantastic, fabulous, worth every penny, want to go back and see it again!!!! (can you tell I really liked it?). Didn't hurt that we had seats in the 3rd row center stage - so we could literally see the actors sweat and spit. LOL Here is a little info about Wicked: http://www.wickedthemusical.com/#AboutWicked

Find our way to the hotel and check in. The hotel is soooo nice!!! (Thank you priceline.com for allowing us to afford it). We didn't have reservations until 9:00 pm (10:00 Indy time) so we decided to go get a little bite to eat in the hotel bar to tide us over. Oh, I forgot - we valet parked our car at the hotel - if I thought $27 was expensive I was prepared to be shocked for this - $45 for parking at the hotel. At this point, I was really sick of handing out money!!!! LOL

The being tired of handing out money didn't end when we went into the bar and ordered an $8 beer - for one - not both. I decided to go ahead and get an imported beer since it was only a whopping $.50 more - LOL. So, I savored my $8 Amstel lite like it was my last beer on Earth. I don't know why the money thing was bothering me so much. Maybe I was so surprised it was as expensive as it was or Steve has just stopped all of my spending almost totally that I just hadn't spent money in a while. I just kept making mental notes of how much everything was costing.

We headed out to dinner at Charlie Trotters and were excited to see what the night would hold. We knew the dinner would cost a small fortune and had prepared for it in advance. They had two options - a Vegetable Menu or what they call the Grand Menu. Both were tasting menus and we cose the Grand Menu at the discount price of $155 per person (YES, you read that correctly). I told Steve I really didn't feel like drinking so I was going to order ice tea. Of course, we could have opted to have a wine pairing with the meal (to the tune of $100 more per person) - gosh this money thing was really on my mind wasn't it. LOL I'm sick of hearing myself talk about it. Steve ended up getting a local beer instead of the wine (I promise I told him to go for it) but he said he really wanted to taste the food "purely" (that must be Chef talk). Well, I'm not a real big seafood eater since having Isabella - previously I pretty much lived off of fish. First course - fish, second course - fish, third course - you guessed it - FISH. (You can view the menu at http://www.charlietrotters.com/restaurant/) Backtracking a minute, the Captain did say if we wanted ANYTHING to ask for it. So, we did. Steve asked if he could swap out the 3rd course for the 3rd course on the Vegetarian menu as well as adding a cheese course. The Captain said "we will take care of you". If I am being truthful, I have to admit I kept thinking I wonder how much this "taking care of us" was going to cost. (hey, I can make fun of myself!!)

In the end, we had TEN (10) courses with our meal. I truthfully wasn't digging the food until about the 6th course (the veal and it was DIVINE) but the experience was phenomenal. Towards the end of our meal, our captain realized Steve was a chef and asked if we wanted to go and see the kitchen. Uh - heck yeah we want to see the kitchen of one of the top rated restaurants and chefs in the WORLD!!! He took us into the kitchen, Charlie Trotter had already left for the day but we did get to meet and talk with the Chef de Cuisine (I think that's his title), see their herb garden outside, tour the wine cellar (the massive 2000 bottle wine cellar), see a bottle of wine prices at $19,000 (from 1923) and one priced at $21,000 (from 1903) shhh, I even touched them! LOL And then, when we left the Captian gave us his personal Charlie Trotter wine tool, a Charlie Trotter book, Charlie Trotter cook book, Organic salad dressing all in a nice little bag. Oh, and he printed off menus for us with what we had for dinner. At this point, I had forgotten about all the darn fish/seafood courses I had just consumed. LOL

We got up the next morning and went and ate at Lou Mitchells - a famous little diner close to Union Station. http://www.loumitchellsrestaurant.com/ At this point, I was missing my little munchkins and tired of giving our money away so we decided to go back and check out of the hotel and head home. Plus, I was tired and worn out. LOL

I would never want to live in Chicago with little kids, but I definetly want to take the girls there when they are a little older and can go to American Girl store, The Shedd Aquarium, maybe a Cubs game and to see Wicked again. But, it was a great way to celebrate our 9 years of marriage!