A Visit to Millennium Park

Yesterday Lima and I met up wth a couple friends and their daughters at Chicago's Millennium Park. Millennium Park is a 24.5 acre park right in the middle of the city, showcasing unique sculpture, beautiful gardens and landscaping, a music pavilion and much more. I am going to be the first to admit that the photos I took (or tried to take) don't do it justice. I was taking the photos before my friends arrived and so I had to contain Lima in her umbrella stroller while I took some shots or else risk her running off unattended. She's just figuring out how to try and jump out of the stroller when she's tired of it (ugh!) and even though she's belted in, I worry that she could throw her weight just the right way and tip the whole thing over. (It's just a light umbrella stroller, so the worrywart in me thinks that could happen.) So I took these photos while yelling "Please sit down! OK, just one more minute. Be careful, you could fall out!" and other such things. Given the circumstances, I did the best I could.





If you want to see some photos that really capture the beauty of Millennium Park, check these out by Mark Gallagher at gallagher.com.

Once my friends and their kids arrived, we nestled into a secluded corner of the park so that the kids could run around and play without being in the midst of so many other people. One of the moms brought cantaloupe and watermelon which were greedily devoured by the three kids. They seemed to get a real thrill from thrusting their tiny hands into the fruit container and pulling out a slippery, sticky piece of the fruit. I think even they knew it was messier than they'd ever be allowed to be indoors at the table so this activity had a forbidden fun to it.

After about an hour, I took my fruit-stained Lima Bean to another part of the park where we were going to meet up with Win. He was able to break away from work for an early lunch and it was such a nice treat to see him in the middle of the day like that. Since I needed to get Lima fed and home in time for her nap, we had to keep things basic (as is usually true with a toddler in tow) and we decided on lunch at Caffe Baci across the street from the park. Win went with the Walnut Apple Salad (which included walnuts, sliced apples, gorgonzola cheese and dried cranberries on mixed greens with a light dressing) and I had the Mozza e Pom Panini (fresh mozzarella, tomato, basil and a touch of olive oil and black pepper on a baguette). Both, pictured below, were very tasty.



Later that night I got another ice cream inspiration. Tuesday night was ice cream sodas. Last night's idea was homemade ice cream sandwiches. So out came the delicious vanilla bean ice cream again to be sandwiched between two chocolate chip pecan cookies.



Nothing fancy but good, good, good.