da Cubbies!!!

After our three nights in the Wisconsin Dells, it was time for our second weekend in Chicago. While we did not know it, this was to be the weekend Detroiters took over the Windy City!

We got up early, did not bother with breakfast to save time, and drove straight to Chicago on I-90. The traffic was fine until we got to the airport, crazy after that.

We drove around Wrigleyville for awhile, and found a good free place to park on the street (it was available only during the day - at night you had to have a parking permit to park there). It was a short walk to the stadium, though we were all very hungry, and a bit mean as a result. I also had to use the bathroom, and it was very hot and humid. This was a high grouchiness potential moment.

Luckily, across from the stadium, I glanced up and recognized the name of a legendary sports bar whose name I saw in every book I have about touring Chicago. That's right - we were standing right outside the door of one of the greatest sports bars in America - the Cubby Bear Lounge! http://www.cubbybear.com/wrigleyville/index.html

We quickly asked if they were serving lunch and if children were welcome. The answer to both was yes, so we headed up to the area called the Upper Deck, where we grabbed the last open table, with a great view of the stadium across the street.

The menu was short and simple, but we found out that the food was well prepared, and the portions were huge. And, to my everlasting delight - they had their own brand of Cubby Bear Root Beer! It was delicious and ice cold, and I thought I was in heaven! And the waitress even brought free ice cream to me and the kids.

After eating our huge lunches, we headed over to the stadium. We had great seats - lower level, right behind home plate. We all loved Wrigley Field - old fashioned, charming - everything a baseball stadium should be. I loved the organ music - it reminded me of listening to Tigers games and Red Wings hockey games on the radio when I was a little girl. Everything just seemed so real. Couldn't find a greater contrast to glitzy, loud US Cellular Field. Here the baseball was enough. You didn't have to have kissing cams and dancing girls and constant loud videos of the team winning games.

The Tigers played very well, and we Michiganders cheered for them lustily. The Cubbies fans are more than a bit frustrated with their team this season, and booed lustily. But the Cubbies fans booed their team; they did not harass fans of the other team. The worst they did to us was to yell that the Lions still suck (which they do).

Anyway, I loved Wrigley Field, and we all had a great time at the game. We drank huge amounts of fluids because of the heat, as well as frozen lemonade. We had a great time.

After the game we found the Jeep and drove to our favorite Chicago Hotel, where we almost always stay, the House of Blues.  http://www.houseofblueshotel.com/ We checked in, then rested for awhile. The heat had made us all pretty tired.

In the evening, we walked to a huge nearby sporting goods store to see if they had any wrestling shoes in Steven's size (he had worn holes in the soles of his old ones). They did not, but the trip was not wasted, as we found a soccer jersey of Bill's favorite team (Real Madrid) on clearance sale. We also stopped off at a drugstore on the way back to the hotel, and bought lots of drinks and snacks for the room. Bill was about to drop from the heat, so we did not even go out for dinner that night (we were also still very full from that huge lunch). We stayed in and rested.