Thursday in Chicago

Call it the lazy person's exploration of Chicago: looking out the hotel window to take in the city's landscape. Except perhaps it's not lazy at all. In the last days of April, you have to be up and watching pretty early to catch those ribbons of predawn color! (Sunrise in Chicago today was at 5:54.)






Of course, you can crawl back to bed then and wait for the moment the sun first shines at the sprawling city before you.






Perhaps you can tell -- it's a beautiful spring day in Chicago today!

At an appropriately polite hour, I set out for my daughter's house.

We eat breakfast together, my girl and I. There is a routine now: I arrive, we work around the schedule of Primrose, eventually we sit down to our oatmeal and fruit.






Primrose sleeps.






Eating, sleeping -- such important steps in a young child's life! Okay, in all our lives!






And now she is awake!






We play. She likes the mirror! 






Some elements of play require reassurance. I'm on it!





Sure, I am here to help. But at this stage of Primrose's life, my help is limited. And so I turn to other small things I may do for the young family. Today, I cook up a bunch of comfort foods: crunchy chicken and tomato risotto have been childhood favorites for my girls. Out come the pans!

And in the evening, my daughter and I set out for a walk with Primrose. The goal is to pause for a glass of wine together.






We're at the Robey's lounge. We settle down for a glass of rose cava.

Primrose has other ideas. She does not think she should be left out of this eating/drinking business.

You have to laugh at her insistence! We go up to my room, where she settles in contentedly, enjoying, I'm sure, the view onto the city.






Afterwards, I walk with my girl and Primrose for a bit, pausing by a store while my girl buys some foods and I insist that Primrose admire the spring flowers that are (finally!) blooming...






And then we part ways. They return home, I stop by Bonci -- an immensely popular pizza place where you buy slices -- cut to your preferred size! -- of very original, very delicious pizza. I choose the smoked salmon cheese and zucchini one and an incredible slice with spicy eggplant and octopus.






... and of course, I look out my 12th floor window -- at the golden light of the setting sun.





If ever there was a time for me to love this view onto the city of Chicago it's now. Home to half my family, home to Primrose. You look at things differently when there's a child in the picture. Very differently.

Wednesday in Chicago

There are several key points to this day. First of all, it's rather cold. Well who cares! The sun is out. Only the timid shall stay indoors.

(On my walk along the 606  -- an elevated bike path/pedestrian passage that crisscrosses the neighborhood where I'm staying -- offering views to the streets below.)







Secondly, the babe appears to be ready for action!






Just a minute there! First, mommy and I need a good breakfast! if you can remember  anything about your grandma, it's that she enjoys a good breakfast.






Thirdly, today is the day that I have a celebratory birthday lunch with my daughter. Oh, and my granddaughter!






What a lunch! A three course meal at the French Le Bouchon. To make up for the trip to France I gave up because of Primrose.






If it's a birthday, there will be a photo of the 65 year old.






Wait, let's do this better: grandma, daughter, granddaughter.






It has been rumored that I spend lots of time playing with Primrose, cutting back too much on her much needed rest. I offer proof that she does sleep under my watchful eye! Or is it that she is practicing a yoga pose?






You may wonder why after leaving Primrose's home, I don't make use of my time in Chicago to explore. Walk the city streets, take photos of Chicago scenes.

Not this time. This trip is for Primrose.

And when the sun sets, I like to look out my Robey window, appreciate the world there before me, then retreat and think about the day I've just had.

Tuesday in Chicago

Sunrise from my twelfth floor room in Chicago's Robey Hotel. I can just catch the thin ribbon of water that is Lake Michigan...






I don't pause for breakfast here. I'm up and walking the familiar blocks to my daughter's home...






There, Primrose is ready!
"And the plan for today is...???"






Let's start with a bath, little girl. That's plenty exciting!






And now my daughter and I finally do pause to eat.

(Breakfast for mommy and grandma!)







"I'm all fresh and ready! Now what??"
Sleep, little Primrose, sleep.






Rest up for all that we have to do today!

 Like what? Where to?

Well, there's the trip to the grocery store! And to the Home Depot!

She sleeps through both.






Indeed, she is your model calm baby today. I would like to say that I helped through all the tough times, except there were no tough times. So instead, I made a huge pot of red lentil soup for the family to eat in the days ahead.






... and since there is good music in the background, I dance. With Primrose of course.






The girl is unmoved by my clumsy steps. It is her nap time and she isn't going to fight it. From my embrace, to her mommy's...






And in the early evening, I leave. By the time I reach my Robey room, the sky is transitioning from blue to golden gray.






It's a beautiful day to be in Chicago! Or Madison! It's such a shame that I can't keep one foot in each place at all times...

to Chicago

It's time that I got to know my youngest granddaughter. Primrose, who lives with her parents in Chicago, is now nearly four weeks old -- a good age to have me show up and disrupt any patterns that my younger daughter may have established for herself and her baby! I can only hope that the disruptions will be of the helpful kind.

I am heading out to the windy city on a very early morning bus. So early, that my predeparture mini-breakfast is taken alone. I haven't the heart to wake Ed.





It's a rushed little meal -- which is why I can take it outside. Were it more leisurely, I'd have to admit that it's too chilly to eat it on the porch.

And now I am in Chicago.





When I had offered to come down for the week, I had said that I would not stay with the young family. The neighborhood hotel is not expensive and my stay there will give the parents time to be with their newest member alone when the dad comes home from work. In my mind, knowing when not to be there is as important as knowing when to be there for them. I'd like to believe that they're thinking "can't wait for her to come back" rather than "can't wait until she leaves" thoughts.

It's a beautiful (if cool-ish) spring day in Chicago and I check into the Robey Hotel...





... with a great deal of joyous anticipation. I leave my bag and fly to my daughter's home!

Oh, Primrose, how you have grown and prospered!






The littlest one is no longer a newborn, but instead, a babe with curious eyes and a winsome grin. And a real snuggler!






Has it been three years since I spent the day with a girl this young?






I used to think newborns were a challenge -- how do you communicate with someone so young that anything and everything is up for grabs still? But Primrose is developing a voice: a range of gurgles and cries, of memorable actions and reactions. How can you not be thrilled with it all?!





I tear myself away when the little one's dad comes home. My resolve is strong: give them some time alone.

Across the street from my hotel, there is a pub of sorts. It's a great place for a good quick meal. I eat a slab of trout, thinking that it's probably from Wisconsin.





And now evening is setting in rapidly. I should settle into my room with the grand view of the city...





I should read, or perhaps write, but in fact, all I can do is stare at the photos of my grandchildren. I hope they're all well tonight. I hope they're floating into sleepy sweet dreams...

a working Sunday

First of all -- thank you. Such sweet, sweet comments and emails! I truly love reading your notes -- many of you have been spending time with me on Ocean for a number of years and it feels grand to hear from you every now and then!

But now, there is no monkeying around anymore. I may be 65, but I surely have outdoor work to do today. Ed does as well, but he is hobbled a bit by the still frozen mountain of wood chips. His flower bed building proceeds in small spurts. Me -- I have no such excuses. Winter weeding must end today, seeding must begin right now, pot filling must start, chicken chasing must continue.

And the weather is perfect for it. Yes, it's barely 50F (10C) when I take out the breakfast dishes, but there's a hazy sunshine and a promise of an additional dozen degrees before the day is out. It will be the first time we will have passed 60F this year -- nearly a record for the latest warm spring day ever.

Our chicks will be six weeks old tomorrow and there is no question that their being outside is good for them and good for us. They are by now noisy and they mess up their box at a rate that I can only keep up with if I sit next to them with a shovel in hand. I am so glad that they've taken to the outdoors (in the kid playpen) so well, even though I protest loudly when Ed tries to take them out too early, when it's still nippy out there.   
They have their feathers!  -- he'll say.
Too cold still, wait another couple of hours, it's too cold!  
They'll be fine.

Like two parents, bickering about how many wraps their kids should have on their way to school.


Well, if the chicks can be outdoors for breakfast, so can we.






Oh, but to eat all our morning meals on the porch now! The views, the air, the songs of the birds -- this is what spring and summer are like! We have put in our dues. Now come the rewards!

But it is a slow process this year. In terms of blooms -- yes, I noted a crocus or two as I was working the flower fields today, but honestly, only the blue scilla sibirica under the grand maples is giving us a feast of color.





Everything else is still trying very hard to wake up.

As I glance toward the play pen to see how the chicks are managing, it strikes me that perhaps I could play favorites for a few minutes: Tomato is by far our most friendly and docile chick. She never runs from being picked up and so putting her out on the grassy knoll outside the pen should be fun for her and easy for me (though under a watchful eye: there have been a number of hawks circling our farmette these past few weeks).

Well, she hardly noticed that she was a free girl at last. She made every effort to get back to her two sisters. The racket they all made brought Peach and Java to the side of the pen.

Oh, Java! You are so my most perfect hen! You're full of grace and protective instincts! I see you now, walking up to Tomato, checking her out, making sure that no one is being harmed...






Tomato has a lot to learn yet.





May she take all her lessons in life from you, Java!

I don't plant the annuals yet. I'll be away for a few days and Ed has enough going on without having to worry wether to shelter my annuals for the night.

But I do put in the pansies. Where oh where would we here, in Wisconsin, be without our colorful early spring pansies! They'll lose their cute compact shape by midsummer, complaining no end when the heat takes hold, but right now (and again toward fall), they deliver!






As I fill a tub with pansies, and sprinkle alyssum seeds here and California poppy seeds there, and push flowering peas by the trellis and sugar snap peas by the tee-pee, Ed does the laborious work of expanding my flower bed out front.





In the meantime, Stop Sign has come and gone twice over and the birds twitter and sing and the sun warms every bit of our farmette land.



Evening. Snowdrop and her mom are walking up the path for a farmhouse dinner.







It's somewhere between six and seven and yet the sun is high, streaming its beautiful light into our dining area. (Snowdrop is delighted with the birthday balloon).






Since her father is absent (for a work event), the little girl sits at the head of the table...






And after, there is lots of time for beautiful play.











Such a grand weekend it was! The first of many in this best of all seasons. (If your birthday falls smack in the middle of a season -- you're allowed to play favorites!)