A.B.A. (Always Better with Abbotts) in Chicago!

Okay, so A.B.A. is actually the American Bar Association, which brought Ben's brother, Josh, to Chicago for their annual conference August 1st-4th.  We thought "what the heck, we have half our stuff unpacked, let's go to Chicago!"

We had a little hiccup when we arrived in Indianapolis to take the train and discovered parking is $22/day.  Who does Indianapolis think it is, Chicago?!  But after getting a surprising full refund on our tickets (I thought the policy was to get vouchers for future travel) the blow of having to drive up ourselves was softened and we continued on our way.

 A good omen that our trip would be FABULOUS!

We had a few hours to ourselves before Josh got in, so after parking out at the cheapest lot we could find for three days ($4 a day.  See Indy, even Chicago isn't that full of themselves) we decided to finally check out Navy Pier.

 This statue of Captain George "Cap" Wellington Streeter" really caught us off guard.
The caption read:
"'The eccentric resident who gave
Streeterville its name.'"


 Chatting up Bob Newhart.

 BIGart:two of many pieces along and around the Pier.

Helicopter, on a boat.

 Indoor Rain Forrest.

Indoor Jelly Fish.

 Indoor Merfolk.

Shrimp!

Josh had asked us to act as tour guides so I had a tentative list of possible places of interest - both new and old to us.  We began Day 2 with breakfast at our favorite restaurant: Orange With a Peel.  We shared our usual frushi, pancake flight, and savory dish (Caprese) with the addition of Green Eggs with Ham.

 Green Eggs with Ham.

Abbotts on the Blue Line!

From there we walked through Millennium Park and to the Art Institute of Chicago.  We were so happy to be able to visit this museum again.  It has so many great things, about half of which we missed our first time around.

 Victorian folding chair and American Gothic... Abbottized!

For dinner I thought we would have Chicago Deep Dish Pizza at Giordanos.   It was delicious!

After dinner we rushed to the red line and up North to see a sketch comedy show my friend, Chris, directed.  He has been doing some really good work that is getting great reviews and touring around; we are so proud of him!  It's such fun getting to visit friends around the country and seeing the things they're getting accomplished.  The show, called "the Heat" was a lot of fun.  The guys kept quoting skits from it through the rest of the trip.

I've lost my pictures of pizza and the show...  apparently I need to be extra careful and double check when transferring images from camera to computer that they don't do that.  Blergh.

At the end of Day 2, we were exhausted and guys requested Day 3 to be relaxing.  Josh had an early morning meeting, so Ben and I slept in, got breakfast, and brought it back to eat and watch the Olympics.  When Josh returned he quickly assumed a relaxed position next to us in front of the TV.  It was perfect!  We did take a break to get lunch, explore the Chicago Cultural Center, and get some popcorn from Garrett's (to snack on while watching more Olympics, of course).

Our fourth and final day was fairly simple.  We checked out and went North again to see EdgeFest.  It sounded super exciting with live music, art, and the promise of bacon treats.  Seriously, the website made it sound like EdgeFest was actually just BaconFest.  We were somewhat disappointed (or at least I was) with it's smaller-than-expected size.  It really was just a street market.  There were some fun booths, we especially enjoyed a booth of old ads, maps, fashion plates, etc., and Josh had a bacon donut.

 BACON!!!

It was a BLAST hanging out and catching up with Josh!  He and Ben always crack each other up.

We drove through a HUGE storm on the way home.  It was so awful at one point we had to stop and eat dinner and hope it would pass by the time we finished.  It did mostly pass and we made it home happily reading Sherlock Holmes aloud along the way.