Well, Matt took off work on Friday, and while I was thinking "lets lay around and do nothing" he was thinking "hey, lets kick off the holiday season with going out to every holiday attraction available". So, since it ended up being 3 against 1 once we factored in the little people, we went. We took the blue line to Daley Plaza where the Christkindle Market was going on, complete with all kinds of handmade German crafts/ornaments/gifts, German food, and, of course, Santa. It was packed.
In fact, it was soooooooooo packed that we decided not to wait in line to see Santa. We'll see him on the train later anyway...
But we peeked into his little house and before the security could shoo us away, he caught our eye and winked. He even laughed and waved. He was a pretty good Santa I thought. Much better than the drunk one with the beard half-falling-off that we got a picture with last year on the blue line train.
That's the giant tree-shaped Christmas tree cone thing that stands in the middle next to Santa's little house. We had planned to buy the kids fun German foods and maybe a special ornament, but the lines were looooooooooong and the ornaments would have cost as much as our Christmas tree, so we ran into a little hot dog place instead. This made me feel like my father. He was big on taking us to cool stuff, but not wasting money on the junk. For the most part that's cool, but every once in a while, you want the junk that is supposed to go with the experience. I wonder when my kids will ask for the junk. So far, they seem okay with just the experience.
Next we headed a block over to the old Marshall Fields which is now Macy's. They do these pretty horns out front every year (forever...my dad remembers them from growing up here) as well as these great windows with little live scenes going on inside them all around the building.
In fact, it was soooooooooo packed that we decided not to wait in line to see Santa. We'll see him on the train later anyway...
But we peeked into his little house and before the security could shoo us away, he caught our eye and winked. He even laughed and waved. He was a pretty good Santa I thought. Much better than the drunk one with the beard half-falling-off that we got a picture with last year on the blue line train.
That's the giant tree-shaped Christmas tree cone thing that stands in the middle next to Santa's little house. We had planned to buy the kids fun German foods and maybe a special ornament, but the lines were looooooooooong and the ornaments would have cost as much as our Christmas tree, so we ran into a little hot dog place instead. This made me feel like my father. He was big on taking us to cool stuff, but not wasting money on the junk. For the most part that's cool, but every once in a while, you want the junk that is supposed to go with the experience. I wonder when my kids will ask for the junk. So far, they seem okay with just the experience.
Next we headed a block over to the old Marshall Fields which is now Macy's. They do these pretty horns out front every year (forever...my dad remembers them from growing up here) as well as these great windows with little live scenes going on inside them all around the building.
Like this one. Claire was fascinated with the windows. She wanted to stand in front of each one forever. Luckily, there were some street performers out doing this drum performance on overturned buckets, so Sammy was distracted while Claire got her "window time".
Most people love Chicago best in the summer, and I'll agree that outside cafes and beaches and all that are great. But I've always told Matt that if we ever moved from the city, he'd have to bring me back every year for a night in December because I love Christmas in the city. Did I mention Garrett's popcorn shop? Oh my...the whole city smells like carmel popcorn right now.
By the way: we did let the kids pick out an ornament later that night at World Market. Buy one get one free! They may not have been hand-whittled, but they're hanging on a $50 artificial tree for Pete's sake!
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