Last month, Danielle Walker released her newest cookbook called Eat What You Love. I’m a big fan of hers, and love her story of healing through food. Seriously, if you don’t have the book, you should get it ASAP.
She announced that she was going to be doing a book tour and I wanted tickets so badly. We live close enough to one of the cities that we could actually go to something like this. Scott got me tickets for Christmas, and we’ve been excitedly planning a trip ever since. Experiences, not stuff!
There are a ton of Amtrak stations not too far from us, so we chose the one with the cheapest tickets. On Monday, our train going to Chicago was an hour and a half late. We sat in a crowded terminal for so long, all while I felt super anxious. I don’t like crowds or cities, so the whole thing was making me more nervous than it should. But, I was so excited for a trip with just my husband that I was willing to be terrified. Once we finally boarded, I felt like I could relax some.
The train ride was beautiful. Snow covered cornfields as far as the eye could see. Gotta love Illinois. It only took a couple of hours to arrive in Chicago, and we got to walk through Union Station. We rented a hotel within walking distance– we stayed at the Holiday Inn. If you are planning a trip and wanting to stay in downtown, I would recommend it. It’s walking distance to Union Station and right next to one of the L stops. Anyway, we stepped out of Union Station and it was immediate pain. Y’all, it was SO COLD. Bitter cold. Painful cold. What in the world, Chicago? Uncool.
We had a little time to kill before the event, so we rode the L to the Michigan Ave. area. The whole city is still decorated for Christmas, and completely beautiful. We ate an early dinner (or late lunch?) and walked to the American Girl store. It was beautiful! I love American Girl dolls, and always looked forward to getting the catalog in the mail. Now, my daughters are exactly the same way. I took a ton of pictures so that I could show the kids when we got home. We picked up a book for each of them as a souvenir. #booksforlife
We walked around a few other stores, including Anthropologie. I probably left a lot of drool on their floor. My goodness, it was stunning. The volcano candle smells like heaven. We hopped on another L and after a transfer or two, we made it to the event center.
The night was a blast, but I want to write a separate post just for the book tour. It was worth it! I’ll leave it at that for now.
Tuesday, our train was scheduled to leave at 4. We were a little concerned because Chicago was under a winter weather advisory. We didn’t want to get stuck in Chicago. Well, another day would have been nice, but would have caused a lot of problems. ha! We couldn’t do anything about it, because our train was the only one left that would get us home. We made a day of it and checked out of the hotel and walked more of the city.
We walked/slipped all through the magnificent mile with our backpacks on our backs. We found Dylan’s Candy Shop, which I didn’t know was such a big deal. We picked some fun flavors to try (bacon!) and headed to Union Station to eat dinner before getting on the train. They called us to board as soon as we had our pizza and my green juice in hand.
We made it home just in time to put the girls in bed. It was such a fun trip.
Some things to note:
We were on a budget. If you are going to be also, here are some tips: I packed some coffee packets and my hydroflask coffee mug so that we wouldn’t have to buy any expensive coffee. I was also able to fill it with water for a drink. We ate at restaurants we knew would be cheap so that we wouldn’t have a surprise expensive food bill. This was a bummer because we like to try new places when we travel. But, we had to make an exception this time. Just because you are walking through beautiful stores does not mean you have to buy things. Just enjoy the experience. Buy the day pass for the metro if you are flying in or riding the train. It was $20 for the two of us, and we could ride as many times as we needed or wanted to. This allowed us to not have to pay for a taxi.
Dress. Warm. We both forgot to bring a scarf, and our faces were painfully frozen from the bitter cold and freezing rain. Chapped lips and cheeks are miserable. Wear boots and layers. You will not regret it. I’ve never been so thankful for our wool socks.
We knew that we would have to carry everything we packed at some point, so we packed as light as possible. Walking the city is work enough without having fifty pounds of luggage to take with you everywhere.
Here’s what I wore to stay warm/dry:
backpack
yellow hat (yellow is sold out. It’s double lined and kept my head warm even when the hat was wet.)
sweater blazer
chambray shirt
coat (similar)
boots
socks
Scott’s hat
Here’s what I packed so we could stay healthy:
thieves oil (rolled on our feet morning and night.)
immupro
Hand sanitizer— obviously
Amazing Grass greens (I put these in my water for extra nutrition.)
Valor— this helped me not have a complete panic attack from anxiety..
Probiotics
Multi-Vitamin