I’ve never met a Botanical Garden I really loved. I’ve visited quite a few and while they were nice to visit, I never felt compelled to go back. That all changed with a visit to the Chicago Botanic Garden and boy was that a shock.
Who would have guessed the arctic north would have such a wonderul place. Just a few miles from my house? And, as our fabulous tour guide said (over and over again) it’s all FREE! And we definitely intend to take advantage of the FREE! Pst, she really was fabulous. Great fun. The right type of attitude and personality for a tour guide. (More Videos of Chicago Botanic Garden, including a bunch of train shots.)
OK it’s only free if you don’t need to park a car. If you do need to park a car, it’s $20 a shot. Or if you don’t want to take one of the trams that carries you around the gardens. But, with a membership, the parking is FREE! And the trams come at a discounted price.
We did in fact buy a membership and we’re looking forward to many more visits this year – maybe even in the winter, when it’s snowy and icy.
The day we took my mom, we were there for hours and hours and we didn’t even make a dent in seeing everything – and we were exhausted. I think TW and I are going to make a spreadsheet and pick one piece of the garden to visit on each trip. That’s the only way to see everything. There’s just so much and it’s such a lovely place to visit.
The cafeteria isn’t great (but it has Wifi.) The library looks interesting but by the time we got there, we just wanted to sit in the air conditioning and rest for a bit. We were there during an orchid show and that was pretty interesting too.
We went back today, just me and TW, for the Farmer’s Market and that was nice. Small, only about 8-10 booths, including the Youth Garden kids who work at the Botanic Garden and sell the stuff they grow. I think we’ll probably sign up for a CSA box this fall… now that will be interesting.
I totally missed the opening day of Randolph Street Market and am disappointed. It’s only open on the last weekend of each month, from May – September. That doesn’t give us a lot of opportunities for fun antique shopping, particularly with the July dates being during BlogHer and the August dates being during TW’s birthday weekend.
I went ahead and purchased the season pass, hopeful that the valet parking and the admission to the extra events would make it worth it. We shall see.
We bought just a few things during our first visit. TW’s mom bought an aluminum cake holder (no idea why she did this but she did.) I bought a shirt for Michelle, for Christmas. TW bought cool retro pattern potholders.
We were tempted by some retro kitchen tables and chairs, a retro desk, some really fantastic wood furniture that would have solved all of our kitchen problems but won’t work now due to the wheelchair needs of TW’s mom.
Also tempted by huge neon signs, old toys from our childhood, and lots of other antiquey goodness that we do not NEED.
The other bakery on Central St, in Evanston… the one we thought we’d buy stuff for the meet up… is Tag’s Bakery. They definitely had good stuff but nothing that screamed “meet up”. If I wasn’t already aware that Jamie was bringing cupcakes, I probably would have grabbed some but who needs 500 cupcakes at a BlogHer meet up of 15 people? 
We did buy stuff just for us to eat. The lemon bars were excellent and the kids really enjoyed the eclairs. Some of my crew sampled their Florentine cookies and said they were fabulous.
Last month, we went in search of some sort of treat to take to the Pre-BlogHer meet up in Chicago and found ourselves on Central St, in Evanston. There are two bakeries on that street (not counting Foodstuff which has baked goods but is not just a bakery) and Great Harvest Bread Co was the one we did not think we’d buy anything from.
We were wrong. I think we spent $50 there!
We grabbed huge sticky buns and toffee chip brownies to take to the meet up and there were plenty for us to eat before and after. These things are HUGE so I cut them into quarters and a quarter was still huge. And they’re amazingly good.
We also grabbed a loaf of Apple Crunch bread, based on the recommendation of Prince J and RJ. They were right, it was awesomely delicious and I could eat the entire loaf (but didn’t.)
It’s a good thing this little bakery is not in the most convenient location for us (parking stinks) or I’d probably be there every week.
We ended up at Oz Park for a pre-BlogHer meet up and I was kind of excited to check it out. I am a Wizard of Oz fan. (Nobody else really is – well Jenn is but she wasn’t in town during our meet up.)
I loved the Dorothy & Toto statue and the Tin Man statue. Those were the only two I saw. And was there supposed to be a yellow brick road somewhere because if so, I missed it. (Not hard to do since we were there for a meet up and didn’t take much time to explore the park itself.
It was pretty crowded, lots of kids in the play area. And we did walk past the Emerald Garden which did look quite appealing. I’d go back to hang out (and grab an Orange Julius from across the street.)
I don’t seem to blog very often about places we don’t like, possibly because there are very few places we don’t like. The Dixie Kitchen is a place we did not like. Some of us liked it less than others. None of us have even the first clue why President Obama enjoys eating here. (Did he get a kickback?)
It’s not bad food, but it isn’t great food. I’ve never seen Fried Green Tomatoes the way they made these. The Plantains were excellent but is that really southern cooking? Not anywhere north of Florida, really.
I enjoyed my taco scramble a good bit, very spicy. I think I am the only one who didn’t walk out of there with mean things to say about my meal. But, that’s because what I ordered isn’t in any way shape or form traditional.
TW’s fried green tomatoes and her mom’s oyster po’ boy were disappointments because they expected “real” fried green tomatoes and oyster po’ boys. They didn’t get what they were expecting.
Chicago has been celebrating PRIDE all month but it’s this weekend that is the big one. The street festival was Friday and Saturday, the PRIDE parade is Sunday. We couldn’t attend both the festival and the parade, we have too much to do and too little time. So, we decided we’d just do the street festival this year.
I think we made the wrong choice.
The festival wasn’t bad, it just wasn’t worth as long drive or the $14 parking. The community vendors were good, friendly and giving away lots of freebies. The merch was slim and not nearly as interesting as other PRIDE festivals we’ve been to. There was a heck of a lot of food and had we been in the mood to eat, we’d have appreciated it. There was even more alcohol and that’s not our thing.
The biggest difference between the festival in big city Chicago and small town Gainesville… Chicago has lots of pretty woman and pretty men all who had better haircuts than those in Gainesville.
Next year we’ll do the parade and wander around Halsted and Belmont for the window shopping and people watching.
I have a good dozen Chicagoland places to blog about, but no time to blog about them.
So, here’s a quick video, taken on the iPhone 3gs, when I was in Chicago with Jenn & Teddy last week.
This is the Centennial Fountain
It shoots a water arc out into the river, though it didn’t when we were there and I have no idea how or when it does so. I just know that it does and we saw it in action a couple of days earlier when we were in a Water Taxi.
The L & L Snack Shop has been on my short list of breakfast spots to try. All of the restaurants on this particular list have to be near the assisted living facility we go to every weekend in Des Plaines. The L & L is the last on this little list I’ve been accumulating and I found it by shaking the Urban Spoon iPhone app.
Greasy spoon food. Our favorite. A restaurant people seem to LOVE – or hate. This spot was right up our alley. Boy was it.
When we got there, closer to lunch than breakfast, all of the booths were full and about half of the counter stools. TW’s mom was with us so a counter stool was out, though if it had just been me and TW we’d have grabbed those stools and been happyyyyy.
So, we stood outside and waited for a free booth. One emptied but it was a tiny booth for two, jammed right up against the counter stools with no way to get a wheel chair in, so we waited some more. Finally a party of three left the booth right inside the door – a two seater with extra room for a chair.
We knew what we wanted since TW and her mom had read the menu while we waited. I knew what I wanted from watching everyone order and eat.
While we waited for our food (and discussed the waitress in detail – fascinating woman, errr. Heh) I pursed the reviews and was reminded of the chef’s love of ham. “You’re going to get ham whether you ordered it or NOT.” Damn, none of us ordered ham and I was thinking we totally should have.
It didn’t matter, the reviews were right. We all got ham – even TW’s mom who ordered eggs, wheatcakes and sausage got a chunk of ham. Even TW who ordered an amazing looking egg n cheese sandwich with hashbrowns and a side of corned beef hash got a chunk of ham. And yes, I who ordered no meat at all with my french toast got a hunk of ham.
The ham… fabulous.
In fact all of the food was fabulous. The corned beef hash… freaking amazingly good.
Way back in November when Lorena came to visit, she did a yarn crawl through Chicago. We really wanted to join her at Loopy Yarns but we had to work and couldn’t make it. After that, I sort of forgot about Loopy.
And there it was, near Dearborn Station, while we were at Printers Row Litfest. TW headed in while I took a photo and Loopt that we were there. A spinning wheel was sitting out front. A crowd of people were inside. A couple of chairs were conveniently placed where I could plop myself down in one and enjoy the people watching and look at the yarn from afar. I was tired by that point.
The people watching was excellent. The nice young guy who works there talking to the woman about sock yarn was fabulous. The old women in sweater sets. The young hipster couples. Fantastic. I love that store and I didn’t even make my way downstairs where there was a huge pile of colorful fiber just laying there.
We must go back when I’m not so darn tired so I can fondle the fiber.