Monday's hike

http://www.mapmyrun.com/hike/united-states/id/boise/664364881

A bit longer than expected, but a good one.

Albertson Park

Here's a lovely specimen from a walk in the park the other day.

So I finally figured out that by saving pictures as jpegs instead of bmps allows the size to shrink, therefore allowing me to post on blogspot without any previously encountered frustrations. Duh. More to come...

Happy Birthday Meredith!

Well it was actually almost 2 months ago, but here's the proof. Dinner at PF Chang's (of course!), photos at the Depot and dessert at Le Cafe du Paris (also, "of course!"). :-)

Chicago part deux

I was surprised by the green that envelopes Illinois, from corn fields to the acres of groomed lawn in the state parks. We went hiking in one of the parks which was full of canyons with little streams running through them:




We walked all afternoon at the Taste of Chicago food festival in 100+ degrees, so this footbath in the middle of a city park felt really good.

Starved Rock State Park, where every trail is either sand or boardwalk. There are miles and miles of both. At first we thought the sand might have been trucked in, but as you look around the forest there seems to be a sand bed just beneath the surface. Sand. In the middle of Illinois. Who would have thought?

My first night in town. We watched fireworks from the banks of a canal running through town, which reflected all the lights beautifully.

Chipotle Chicken Pizza

I made this for dinner about 2 weeks ago and it turned out great! Jiffy pizza dough mix and my own toppings. This was one dish I actually didn't mind eating 3 days in a row.

Tante's favorite

but only for a few more days! Aww...

aka chi-town

Architectural model of Chicago

Chrome sculpture in the public park