LPZ Fall Fest

Hello Friends,

Autumn events abound, and I thought I’d share one that we tried. There’s a bit more pressure on the post, because this weeeknd is the last weeknd for the Lincoln Park Zoo Fall Fest.

The flier is true! They have a variety of programming available to entertain whatever your child likes.

The girls were great about indulging their nerdy father as I snapped photos all around the fest. Really, as long as there was an attraction nearby, they were cool with it.

One of the great things about Lincoln Park Zoo is that it’s close to home. Our drive is less than a half hour, even with some traffic. Another great thing is that they have all of the animal houses to warm up inside. Not only do you get a break from the cold (and spending tickets), you can check out the animals. The cafe also stays open for full lunch service and cookie decorating .

There are a couple of things to be aware of. Parking in Lincon Park can be frustrating. Zoo parking is great for members, but it does cost. The zoo admission is still free, but you pay for the fest attractions.

Again, this is the final weekend of the LPZ Fall Fest. Did I mention the pumkin patch? Well, there is one. Hopefully, you get lots of sun and low wind when you go check it out.

Happy Fall, friends. Which ever fest or farm you check out, I hope it’s fun. We’ll see you out there!

My First Field Trip

Hello Friends,

The girls have taken field trips for a few years now. Obviously, there are school trips, like two or three each year. Last summer, Sweetie took field trips through her summer camp as well. Me, on the other hand, I’ve been avoiding them like the flu. But, not anymore!

These are all pictures taken while I chaperoned Cricket’s trip to the Lincoln Park Zoo with the two PreK-4 classes. An afternoon at LPZ is an easy sell for me. And the timing worked out, with no second child in tow, no half day pick up, and work that I could delay.

I was definitely nervous, at first, worrying that it would be me alone with half of Cricket’s class. I was envisioning parading around the zoo, chasing stragglers from one exhibit to the next. It wasn’t all that different from what I expected, except my group was five children (yes, Cricket was one of them), and I was joined by another Mom and a nanny (with a student’s younger sibling in tow). A third Mom even joined us during lunch. So we had/made a village.

Overall, the kids were great. Sure, they are four and five years old, but they were fine. The day was perfect, with the right balance of warmth, sun, cloud cover, and breeze. The bus ride? Well, definitely brought back elementary school memories. Taking all that into account, I guess I could help with another trip next year.

I don’t know about your kids’schools, but St. Viator has all sorts of ways for parents to get involved. The general feedback that I have heard (mainly from teacher Moms) is that field trips are one of the most important and helpful ways for parents to participate in school events. Personally, I liked seeing the kids enjoy the zoo and the animals. It’s no coincidence that all these pictures show the kids at the enclosure glass ir wall. They were so into the animals. And watching their antics was icing on the cake.

We are winding down the school year. For yhe most part, the girls are all smiles. I hope your end-of-year adventures are good as well.

The Spring Break We Were Looking For?

Hello Friends,

Yep, that’s where I’ve been for the past two weeks: spring break. For some families, this meant a trip to the warmer parts of the U.S.. For others, an overdue trip to international beaches. And for us?

Local. Definitely local. And any of you watching the news over the past two weeks (or living here) knows we started this Chicago spring break with a snow storm and just about ended with one too! That was followed by some fevers, coughs, and rain. All challenging, but definitely not the end of our story.

We had to get healthy and get creative. So our adventures included a trip to the Atheneum Theater to see the Emerald City Theater’s performance of Corduroy;

lunch and an afternoon spent at Lincoln Park Zoo;

an egg hunt and activities at the Kilbourn Park Community Garden;

Our own Easter celebration, full of eggs, family and food;

and, thankfully, some time spent in the yard.

The sun came out later in our break than we anticipated. The warmth, even later yet. Again, those of you living here with us know how weirdly Chicago Spring can act.

Sweetie headed back to school last week for Thursday and Friday. Two days, end of the week, with an assembly…yeah, they didn’t really count. Cricket went to work with Wife on Thursday, then used Friday and Saturday to work on getting healthy…again. So today, when the bell rang at 7:50 AM, into the school they went! 40°, rain, and all!

Did you all have a goood spring break? Is yours still pending, even later than ours? I hope you have a chance to relax, recharge, clean out, really, do whatever you need to on your break. Did we have the spring break we were looking for? Eh, not too sure about that. Thankfully, I was too busy enjoying the spring break we got to worry about it!

We’ll see you out there, friends!

Zoo Camp

Hello Friends,

Man, how the summer has flown! I hope you can forgive my absence. We have been both travelling and entertaining family here at home. The girls have enjoyed all kinds of summer adventures so far. They’ve travelled, had beach visits, sampled children’s museums and my favorite, attended camps!

We are wrapping up our summer at the Lincoln Park Zoo Conservation Camp. I wrote last summer about Sweetie’s adventures at LPZ Camp, and now Cricket is old enough too.

Gettin’ comfortable with the group

The girls enjoy the crafts and games, and especially love the daily trips into the zoo to check out the animals and their behaviors.

Very comfortable!

The zoo and camp are located in the very accessible Lincoln park neighborhood, so kids come from all over the city. We randomly reconnected with some friends from swim lessons. One of those wonderful coincidences where both the older and younger siblings are the same age. Good times!

I hope your summer is wrapping up well. Travels? Camps? Whatever your adventures are I hope your kids are loving it. Next week…school!

Summer Camp Fun

Hello Friends,

I hope you are enjoying your summer adventures. Some of my best summertime memories are from summer camp days. Whole days spent running around, playing games like kickball and capture the flag, art and crafting, and swimming. There were the years when Sister-Younger-Older was a camp counselor, a very cool “in” for my young, four-eyed chubby self. There were my early teen years as a “junior” counselor, keeping the younger campers organized. Our summer camp was a bike ride away from home. No overnight camp for me, but still good memories.

We first signed Sweetie up for camp sessions at Lincoln Park Zoo two summers ago. While that was fun, it was only half days because of her age. Last year we added on two weeks of St. Viator camp. The Cricket was too young last year so she was in D³ Day Camp all day, every day. But this summer everyone is old enough for some sort of camp!

Sweetie gets a full summer; two weeks at St. Viator camp, five weeks at Kilbourn Park camp (through the Chicago Park District). and three weeks at Lincoln Park Zoo! The Cricket is in a “play” camp three half-days a week for six weeks and two weeks at LPZ camp (that birthday cut-off almost got us again!).

Right now they are both fully into their Chicago Park District camps. We heard good things about the Kilbourn Park camp, and that was cool because it’s our go-to park. Cricket does claim that she doesn’t want to go pretty much every day, but it seems like every junior counselor knows her name. Given all the hugs that she gives and gets, something good is going on. They dig all the theme days and love the field trips.

Is camp part of your summer adventures? Day camp or overnight? Whichever, I hope you and your kids are making great memories this summer. Remember the sunblock and water bottles, maybe some bug spray too. We’ll see you out there.

Day’s Detour: the zoo

Momma Z’s early morning text read “Are you guys up for hanging out today?? We’re tired of cleaning and running errands!” The message was perfect, because we were also sick of running errands. For those of you who don’t live here, Chicago is experiencing unseasonably warm temperatures. Temperatures have been in the low-to-mid 70’s all week and perfect for adventuring.

After some quick decisions we headed down to the Lincoln Park neighborhood to the city zoo…the Lincoln Park Zoo! The zoo is free and perfect for walking around to enjoy a great Chicago fall day. Momma Z and Linda picked us up and had us at the gates by 10:30AM. With the perfect temperature and full sun, the lions were much more active than usual. In fact, I think they were the most active I have ever seen.

Whoa…check it out

After that good start, we headed to the reptile house to catch a live animal presentation. The critter of the day: “Meatball” the three-ring armadillo! So the girls got to check out Meatball rootin’ around some woodchips. And while they couldn’t appreciate the educational stuff, it was still cool. The entrance room of the reptile house is all carpeted, so the girls safely toddled around from exhibit to exhibit. And a bunch of the exhibits have “pods” at kid height, so they could actually see the animals.

We were able to enjoy a packed lunch in a clean, shaded pavilion and wandered through most of the zoo. As a random sidenote, the bathrooms by the pavilion were new and clean, and there was a clean changing table in the Men’s Bathroom. Good job LP Zoo! Overall they are doing a bunch of renovation to the zoo, making it even better.

The girls’ interest level varied by the animals. Obviously, they were more into the active animals and barely noticed the ones that were snoozing. Most of the animals were active like the lions so there was a good show overall…definitely worth the entrance fee (Free, remember?!). We had a special treat watching feeding time in the vulture cage. It was morbidly fascinating and Momma Z and I were stuck – it was better than the Discovery Channel. I decided not to post any of the rat lunch pictures (yes, I took more than one).

What do you think those are?

So the day was a great adventure overall. Many thanks to Momma Z and Linda for helpin’ us get out and enjoy the day…and for driving. Random note #2: Momma Z rocked a great Lincoln Park parallel parking job, sticking their Subaru Wagon in a spot just big enough. Good thing I kept my mouth shut! Random note #3: we wandered past the cast for an upcoming TV show, “Sirens”, as they were eating lunch. No offers to be extras though, oh well. And the day’s main lesson; always check the signs on the exhibit before you search the foliage for critters.

Everyone needs a break sometime