Day 1 of ?? in Chicago

Well, we're definitely on edge with everything being up in the air right now, but we're making the most of it while we're here in Chicago. I've never been and Rob has only been once before, so it's been fun for us to explore. After Cleveland, it's nice to be in an actual city again -- makes us feel at ease. Chicago reminds me of a nicer, cleaner New York, not as much soul and not as much attitude (in fact, people are weirdly nice here), but I'll forgive them for that.

Our good friend Christina helped us come up with a good first day itinerary. We started with a bag of popcorn from Garrett's, the Chicago blend of caramel and cheddar. Pretty solid breakfast.

Then we brought it over to Millennium Park and listened to a live orchestra. Such a beautiful setting! If this were New York, they'd charge $20 to get in or else you'd never even find a spot. But here, there was so much space!

The park also had this really awesome waterfall for the kids, with images of Chicago faces projected on one of the walls. Plus there's a huge, beautiful garden, the "bean", and a new bridge they're building that will connect to a new park on the other side of the highway.

Then we headed over to Navy Pier, gorged on some fried dough...

.. hung out for awhile waiting for Rob to bring me new shoes because of course my sandals broke...

Had a pretty good hot dog from Portillo's (love that poppy bun!)...

And took the pooch to a giant wide open dog run way out in the suburbs, which we realized (after we hopped the fence) that it was members only. Oops. But she got some good exercise. It's hard keeping a dog active on a road trip, and finding gems like these is pretty awesome. We had a great time running through the fields together. Now, to get her to hunt geese or ducks or something, because after we pay for these car repairs I think we'll be dependent on foraging til Washington. 

We'll get a better vehicular diagnosis tomorrow. Keep your fingers crossed.