The last of the Chicago pictures finally...This was taken outside of the Shedd Aquarium. Chicago's harbor was very pretty full of boats with the cityscape in the background. It was a beautiful day. We walked all the way to the buildings in the background to get to Millenium Park where they have several interesting sculptures. Keep in mind - we did not have a stroller, so Nick carried Laedyn almost the whole time - & this was after touring the Aquarium. He'd run the Sunburst Marathon the day before too...talk about Super Dad!!!There are several adjacent walking/biking paths along the edge of the Harbor. We followed those along for awhile, and eventually crossed a road to get to what seemed like a string of city parks. Apparently it's just one long park called Grant Park. The park was built on fill created by debris pushed into the lake after a fire in 1871.

In the first park area we ran across this impressive fountain called the Clarence Buckingham Fountain. It was modeled after a fountain called the Bassin de Latone at Versailles near Paris, France. It sure is reminiscent of the grandeur of old world Europe. Brandon & I walked all around it so I could take bunches of pictures. Laedyn had fallen asleep over Nick's shoulder, so they sat at a bench waiting for us.
A slightly closer view from a different angle.
Brandon was having fun ducking in and out of the perimeter fence. I think he felt like he was getting away with something by entering the fountain grounds...
I liked the visual line of the fence and the shadows it cast on the gravel. It looks like many countless people have leaned on that fence!After our close examination of the fence, Brandon and I got everyone ice cream from a little coffee shop/ice cream parlor. It was homemade, hand dipped and really yummy. I had a rootbeer float, Nick had mint chocolate chip and Brandon had chocolate. Laedyn had a little bit of each! By the time we got done with our ice cream treats, the fountain had begun shooting up this tall plume of water. The plume shoots up as much as 150 feet. Nick and Laedyn came over for a closer look this time. When we moved further around the fountain it even created a rainbow for our viewing enjoyment!
Further along in our tour, we found a lovely flower garden leading into Millenium Park. The garden is called the Lurie Garden and it covers 2 1/2 acres. Brandon enjoyed playing with his new binoculars there while I took pictures. That was his choice of souvenir from the Aquarium. He showed them to many people we met on our walk through Chicago...
There's a huge performance venue in the middle of the park. The pavilion was designed by Frank Gehry and is called the Jay Pritzker Pavilion. It can accomodate 11,000 people between the actual seats and the lawn seating. Looks like it was almost to capacity on this day for the Chicago Gospel Music Festival. It was PACKED as you can see. We didn't stay long, but were able to enjoy the music as we continued on our walk.
See? Nick didn't have to carry Laedyn all day, sometimes he had to carry Brandon!

This sculpture is the main reason Nick wanted to come to Chicago & it was really neat! I could have stayed there all day taking pictures. What an interesting and unusual thing to build. It's called the Cloud Gate, but I guess mostly people call it The Bean. The Bean is 66 feet long, 33 feet high, and weighs 110 tons!!! The arch that you walk under is 12 feet high. It's made of polished stainless steel plates and was designed by Anish Kapoor, a British guy. The Bean from another angle.
Brandon & Nick reflected on The Bean...
Family portrait on The Bean!
Brandon took the exploration of The Bean reather seriously. Honestly, this made me a little nervous! What if it moved somehow???
As I said ... The Bean presents many opportunities for interesting pictures.

Here's another sculpture / fountain / wading pool / reflecting pool called the Crown Fountain. It's made of glass blocks and stands 50 feet tall. The faces change periodically, and are just random Chicagoans. There were lots of kids playing in the water. Brandon was terribly disappointed that we didn't let him pay in the water too. There's another pillar just like this at the far end of the reflecting pool. All around the perimeter is a disappearing edge over which the water drains. I don't think it was more than a couple inches deep anywhere.
I guess the wading pool needed some refilling. Isn't that funny??? Apparently the spitting water is meant to give homage to gargoyles of old. True gargoyles had open mouths that spit water in a similar manner to assist in draining rain runoff from rooftops. "Gargoyles" that are purely ornamental and do not function as waterspouts are actually called grotesques or chimaras. You learn something new every day I guess!!!
Brandon isn't in this shot because he was still mad we didn't let him play in the wading pool / fountain!
This is what makes Nick a true Super Dad. He carried both of them like this for quite awhile - this was about 6 hours into the day and it was the day after he ran a full marathon. WOW! I told Brandon I would keep this picture for display when he graduates from high school. He was terribly grumpy by this time. We were all tired, but I imagine Nick was more so than the rest of us. After this we drove for about 5 hours...

HAPPY FIRST BIRTHDAY LAEDYN!!!

Romeo thought something in this toy box smelled intriguing. He kept sticking his head way inside of it. Crazy cat!
Brandon chose this Hello Kitty plush bag with a matching blanket. Laedyn seemed most excited by this present. She squeeled in delight and gave it a big hug. I think that pleased Brandon.

Yes - she got a whole bunch of new toys... alot of them were musically oriented. She loves to "dance" whenever she hears music, so we all obliged her by getting music generating toys. It's likely to drive us crazy, but she's excited. On Sunday we had a "Playdate with Cake" and invited some of Brandon's friends to come over and play with him in his pool. The only catch was they had to sing happy birthday to Laedyn and eat some birthday cake ... I set up the water table for the little ones. Laedyn LOVES to splash in the water.
We also cut up a watermelon. Laedyn sat on her picnic blanket and was eating it happily.
Kade came over to see what Laedyn was doing and kept leaning over and taking bites out of her watermelon. It was TOO funny. Laedyn would just look at him, frown a little, and then eat some more herself. Kade is Kaleb's baby brother and is in Laedyn's class at daycare.
Laedyn and Kade playing in the water. Kade is more than a month younger then Laedyn.

The big kids in the pool are Kaleb, Joylyn, Townley and Brandon (barely visible behind Townley). Laedyn really wanted to be a big kid. All the splashing and spraying didn't phase her at all. I kept worrying she'd tip over headfirst into the pool. She never did...

Brandon was convinced that Laedyn had to have a flower cake for her first birthday. Here's the result. I think it turned out really well! The cake is lemon and Brandon helped make it by stirring the batter.
I figured I'd better provide some chocolate too, so we made very colorful cupcakes. Brandon decorated about half of them for me.
All the kids got to wear little party hats.
She LOVED her cupcake!

After she finished the cupcake I gave her a little bit of the lemon cake. She loved that too. Then she was reaching for one of the plates and pointing at it. When I gave it to her, she tried to eat it too. I think she thought it was just another cupcake - a really really big one!

Lovely. There was blue icing up her nose, in her ear and all around the back of her head.
There were chocolate and lemon crumbs all inside her bathing suit. The only solution to getting it all off was to hose her down. She thought it was great fun & giggled at us!
Tyrus came to help eat cake. Can you believe how tall he is? He's 13 now.
Later, after we were all alone, Laedyn kept trying to get in the big kid pool. I suddenly remembered I had a pool just her size. Mark blew it up and we filled it with water. She was thrilled! Brandon even sat in it and played with her for awhile.

At the end of the day, after dinner and baths, both kids were almost instantly asleep. Imagine that! We need to have cake and pool time every day!!!