My dear, sweet, amazing husband took my on a surprise weekend get away to Chicago for my birthday. He had told me to keep my weekend clear of plans and to pack cute warm clothes but never told me his plans until we were driving to the airport and he handed me my plane ticket. Reece knows how much I love big cities. And Chicago was one that I have never experienced but was always planning to. All the classy restaurants, famous art museums, and architecture. And there is no better place to see architecture than Chicago let me tell you. We flew there on wednesday night and checked into our hotel The Drake Hotel. A beautiful hotel at the top of the magnificent mile. That first night we just ordered room service and watch movies. The next day we went to the Art institute, we got to see "Sunday on La Grande Jatte" by Seurat, "Nighthawks" by Hopper, and "American Gothic" by Wood as well as many priceless works of art from ancient japan, through renaissance but..... all of the 19th century through modern was out on loan while the modern wing was being refurbished. Tear. I guess we will definitley need to come back to see some of my favorites...."Paris: A Rainy Day", "Van Gogh's room" . We did get to see the photography section and then the miniature rooms which were absolutely incredible.
It was fascinating to see a big city in a different light (seriously the light had such different qualities and colors). I have never seen a big city in the fall, only the summer. It was fun to bundle up and walk the streets.
One of my favorite little details about the miniatures was how all the rooms were meant to look lit by natural light coming though windows and doors. It really made the scenes so much more beautiful with the diffused side lighting. Then if you looked closely every window gave a glimpse into a mini world extending outside the walls. So cute.
I see you.
After the Institute we ate yummy Brazilian-japanese fusion food at Sushi Samba. I love bold yet chic restaurant decor. Love it. We started out with the flash fried river crabs which you spritz with lemon and then pop the whole thing in like popcorn. Once you got over feeling their dry little legs on your tongue they didnt taste that bad. Then we had the most yummy beef bbq skewers on a bed of the sweetest (biggest) corn kernels I have ever tasted. Followed by more interesting than yummy sushi and than a plate of fruit with different sauces and flavored pearls.
After an Afternoon nap we ventured back out for some famous chicago deep dish pizza. The Pizza takes forever to cook so while we waited we played with our cameras and candles. We ended up going through 4 different candles (that we had to steel from other tables) to finally get the effects we want. Yes, I am a perfectionist when it come to my pictures.
The pizza was alright but not amazing. But our server did draw us a cool little doodle on the back of our receipt. After we went and strolled around the completely vacant Navy Pier. Twinkle lights and boardwalks make for a very romantic evening.
The next day I insisted we go take pictures at a gorgeous little cathedral tucked in the middle of the sky scrappers just down the street from our hotel. The overcast darker light just saturated the ivy, fall leaves, and aged stone. So pretty.
Then we went to the Aquarium. Reece knows that I absolutely love most all living things. I love aquariums and zoos. I was sad to hear the sea otters and other mammals were "out on loan" while their area was also being refurbished. Couple more tears. They did have one river otter which I watched swim backflips in his pool for hours. The exhibits that were open were still very cool.
We then ate chicago dogs for lunch over looking an amazing view of the cityscape.
Every time I saw that slanted roof I thought of adventures in babysitting. I loved the message. Its what I call my hubby all the time. We pretended that Reece had arranged it for me.
Chicago at night, much like most big cities, beautiful sea of colored lights. Although the ambiance was quite different than our beloved NY. In NY we loved how the streets were always full and the city never slept. It went along well with our eating late and night owl personalities. But Chicago (probably also because it was so extremely cold) seemed pretty quiet after 8.
The next afternoon we took an architectural tour on the river. We learned tons and loved everything that we saw. But it was so unbelievably cold. I handled the uncontrollable shaking all up until the last 10 min when I needed to run below deck to warm up. We had yummy sandwiches and soup for lunch at the corner bakery which warmed our bodies and souls. We than ran to a matinee of the new James Bond Quantum Solace. Daniel Craig, still my favorite Bond.
Our last day we finally got to see and play around the famous cloud gateway sculpture. It was so entertaining. Seeing how you are reflected in different parts of the sculpture as well as seeing how the cityscape got warped and bent, never got old. We finally pulled ourselves away from the silver bean to go on a walking sculpture tour in the area. The last one being a Chigall mosaic. Beautiful.
Every city cant be complete without a "Madison" named street. We are famous. We also stopped in at the W hotel as we have been obsessed with them since we lived up the street from one in NY. Yes it is affirmative, we want to stay here our next visit. Also very chic and bold decor.
We then went to brunch at a cute little plate called Hot Chocolate. You could choose your hot chocolate by the percentage of chocolate and the percentage of milk. I had 80% dark chocolate 20% milk and a little bit of cinnamon. The cups are served with homemade marshmellows that just melt perfectly into your warm cocoa. I also had brioche french toast with lemon curd whipped cream. Amazing. Like usual, I had my sweet while Reece had his savory, an egg and ham sandwich with chillies. We checked out our location compared to our friends' new address and were surprised to see we were just blocks away. So we walked through the neighboods to drop in for a surprise. We almost missed them as they had recently moved down the street but we were so glad to finally meet up. We love you Kelli and Tyson. We miss ya tons. It was great catching up. They were so sweet to drive us back to the hotel to get our bags and then to the airport to catch our flight home, all the while enjoying each other's company on the drive. Thank you.
(I absolutely love how there is a couple making out in the background of this pic. A little surprise I didnt know about till I posted, blush.)
(dont mock the ugly hair, I was suffering from a bad case of hat hair)
All in all I had the most amazing time. We did enough to say that we experienced Chicago but left much to still look forward to seeing in the future. Thank you Husband for such an incredible gift. Thank you. You make everything so special. I love you so much. I simply adore you.