Chicago!

A couple weekends ago, my husband and I made the drive

down to Chicago for a long weekend with friends.

It was a BLAST!

It was the first time I had ever spent a night away from my babies,

minus when I was in the hospital giving birth to the next sibling.

So, it goes without saying, I was nervous and sad to leave them,

but I knew my husband and I deserved it.

We left them with my in-laws (side note: I have rock star, kick ass in-laws),

where I knew they would have a great time.

The whole trip was really for an outdoor hockey game at Soldier Field.

Like I've said in previous posts, hockey is life in our house, so

the opportunity to watch the MN Gophers take on the WI Badgers

was not something my husband could pass up.

We got to Chicago Saturday afternoon and did a little walking

downtown. I don't know much about architecture, but

the walk was fun. There are so many gorgeous structures in Chicago!

We stayed on the 26th floor of our hotel. Here's a little

glimpse of our view:

Our dinner reservations Saturday night weren't until 8:30. (I know, who eats that late?!

But in our defense, it was Valentine's weekend and no one realized

how difficult it would be to make reservations.)

So we all grabbed a quick slice of Lou Malnati's pizza to hold us over.

Yum-O.

Turns out it was cheaper for the six of us to take a limo

versus a cab (yeah... go figure), so that's exactly what we did.

On our way to dinner:

We had the most expensive dinner of all time at Benny's.

It was really good, and we had a great time!

I've never had a dry aged steak before, but was

talked into ordering it by my husband. He was right!

Oysters Rockefeller, crab cakes, steaks, wine, creme brulee....

there was nothing bad about the meal.

Except for maybe the $340 bill that it came with.

And that was JUST mine and Jay's portion!

We won't be doing that again any time soon, but

it's fun to go all out every once and awhile.

The hockey game was Sunday, and you'd think after the huge meal

we had the night before, that we wouldn't need breakfast. WRONG.

A friend of a friend suggested this awesome little dinner called Eggy's.

Holy shit. Best breakfast I've ever had. In. My. Life.

I had never heard of Poutine prior to Eggy's, but it sounded too good to not try.

French fries and cheese curds, topped with two eggs, all smothered in sausage gravy.

A heart attack waiting to happen and completely worth the

triple bypass I'll someday now need.

Now, the hockey game.

We called up the limo driver from the night before,

and he was more then willing to take us to Soldier Field as well.

Yep, we were those people. Haha!

Does Soldier Field look like a spaceship to anyone else?

Despite freezing my ass off and the Gophers getting stomped,

it was still fun to watch hockey outside.

That pretty much wraps up our trip.

There was of course a stop for Chicago dogs and some

shopping before making the drive back to good ole' Minnesota.

It was an expensive trip, but worth every second.

:)