Chicago!

With kids, you do well if you know how to pivot when the moment calls for it. You make plans, but a child may have her own ideas. Or, she may suddenly need care and boom! Your plans must change. To find joy in a new path -- that's your challenge, and if you make an adjustment, and if you still keep that happy momentum going -- the day will turn out just fine. More than just fine, in fact. Beautiful.

This morning, I wake up to find Primrose a little under the weather. Enough so that we need to adjust. As she catches up to her energy levels, I focus in on her sister, whose energy levels are super charged!

 

Breakfast, with Juniper. And newspaper reading with dad.

Kids bounce. One minute they need to rest, another minute they're up and running.

Still, we shift plans. Parents are off with older girl for a doc visit and errands. Juniper and I play, which always involves music and dance.

And with a pretty clear bill of health, we jump back onto our initial goal -- of going to lunch at Time Out. You, the traveler of yore, may recognize Time Out as a big name in the travel guide business. Well now. They've branched out. Chicago (and Lisbon, I hear) has a food court that's under their sponsorship and it is excellent! I choose Ethiopian cuisine. Others spread themselves out between the continents. Asia, Africa, Texas. It's all there. 

(feeling better?)

Great foods push me to eat a big lunch, even when normally I resist. 

 

(happy post-lunch crew)

 

 

Filled with good food we make our way back to the car.

I'm dropped off at the neighborhood grocery store to pick up a thing or two, the rest proceed home for naps, other errands, and eventually we're all home and my daughter brings out the rolling pin (figuratively speaking) and sets to work making Madelines. 

It's raining outside. Milky coffee and Madelines on a rainy day? The best!

Dinner is also at home. My girl cooks for us all and she is one wonderful cook.

And so ends my second day here. With a massive degree of contentment. And love...