Visitors

James' Mom and aunt drove me and Jesse back to Chicago last week and stayed with us for a few days.  Here are some of the highlights of their visit (thanks to my mother-in-law for the pictures!).

1. Giordano's Pizza.  Deep-dish pizza is a must on any trip to the Windy City.  Jesse has gobbled it up in the past, but would only eat a few bites this time.  I'm not sure what there isn't to like about it, but for whatever reason it just wasn't his thing that day.

2. Millenium Park in scorching heat and very high humidity.  We got quite a bit of exercise and we felt like we were going to die of heat exhaustion walking from the car to the Bean.  It was my fault, since I didn't realize we could have parked much closer than we did.  We survived, though.

3. The Shedd.  Jesse loves this place.  It is especially great how he can just walk right up to the glass and see in.  He loved seeing the dolphins and whales and penguins, and he especially loved playing in the Polar Play Zone, where kids can pretend to be penguins by climbing up rocks and sliding down chunks of "ice".

This was right before the start of the biggest meltdown I've ever seen Jesse have.  He was totally done seeing the fish, and even though he ended up doing fine once we got out of the aquarium, the meltdown continued (and grew a lot worse) once we got back to our building.  There was lots of flailing and screaming and head throwing, but once dinner was served he went back to his normal self.

4.  And of course, Jesse loved all the time spent with Grandma and Aunt Carol (not to mention getting to see Daddy again).