chicago wrap up

one more photo before leaving chicago. can anyone really resist the blues brothers? i enjoyed chicago, quitology (in the lincoln park area i think-had to ride the subway to get there) was awesome a great selection of non-traditional fabrics, big airy store and a wonderful shop owner. sheffield's proved to be an awesome choice for dinner, just one stop north on the cta-salad with grilled chicken and an ice cold beer (chicago proved to be very warm) once we were back in the city we stopped a more cupcake-DI-VINE. i had the chocolate champagne and the raspberry cream (not at the same time, saved one for the next day) oh my! after a short rest at the hotel, i headed to the navy pier for the fireworks which were a lot of fun-made a quick stop at dominick's for bananas and apples for snacking and the flight home. on thursday we stopped in at millenium park to enjoy the gardens and sculptures before heading in to see some amazing art. the only disappointment at the museum was that the american quilt and english embroidery exhibits were closed. have also learned that i much prefer NY style pizza-don't know what's up with chicago deep dish-like where's the cheese and don't get me started on the crust-don't know what's up with that. all in all a good trip, treated myself to some goodies, and the art was truly stellar. decided to try my hand at videotapping the fireworks. and that's a wrap.

chicago

am enjoying visiting a new city. the hotel is sumptuous and the weather stunning. part of me wants to use my downtime to continue exploring the city, and another wants to enjoy the quiet solitude of the hotel room. i've tried to balance the two. on monday i explored the area and visited loopy yarns and had dinner at italiasia. dinner was a bit of a disappointment and the dessert horrible. i wish sara had been there cause she would have been able to describe the sad excuse of chocolate mousse cake- i needed a steak knife to cut through it. should have had it removed from my tab-oh well. yesterday after training my co-worker and i visited a used jazz record store-i bought the boys a few lps, did some clothes shopping and had a wonderful dinner at india house-more food than either of us could have eaten, but very good. today our plans after training include visiting quiltology, more cupcake, bbq at sheffield's (couldn't resist), also a bit more shopping and looking forward to fireworks on the river this evening. tomorrow will be the art institute of chicago and chicago style pizza-i'm sure there will be lots of knitting in there as well. photos are on flickr, but for some reason links i can't get links for this post- :-(

celebrating the 4th

started the day at the road race-5th time-always fun, and think it should be classified as atlanta's longest outdoor party-there are probably as many people that watch it as there are that run it (okay, MAYBE not that many, but close).
got my "prize"
after a much needed nap and shower, we had a wonderful time with friends from church, charlie and lynette. great food* and company.
*edited-forgot to list the baked beans, cheese and crackers, and changed pie to cobbler-it was awesome!

here's to celebrating the fourth.

lunch.

i live for lunch. i headed outside to eat, enjoy the shade, some knitting and podcasts. although it's in the low 80s it was truly glorious. i also get to do some stealth people (co-worker) watching. we have several large trees in our parking lot, so no one usually seems me until they get to their car. i love the startled looks! i really really didn't want to come back inside. oh, and hello july-where did you come from?!