While picking out new books for the kids at the library last week, I noticed the library rents out weekly passes to all the museums.

My eyes scrolled down the list and lit up with delight when I saw the Shedd Aquarium.

Sam and Aaron watching dolphins

When I was at home with Jack and Ben, I had a great group of girlfriends that I used to troll around with. I remember many fun mornings spent at the Shedd with our kids. One year we got a membership and would visit often.

November 2010, Ben and Jack as penguins

The next year the family membership doubled in price and that was the end of that.

The Shedd aquarium “Kids Museum Passport” at the library provides general entry to the aquarium but surprisingly doesn’t include the polar play zone, wild reef, amphibians special exhibit, 4-D Experience, Stingray touch or aquatic show.

The kids passport doesn’t include the kids play zone?!

In the end I paid extra for it. Guess how much it was? It was an extra $20 a head, which is the same price I’d pay for the kids without the museum passport, and about $10 less for me.

Already I was annoyed with the Shedd.

Perhaps the kids felt it too because they were kinds of cranky at the start. Or maybe it was the staff.

Our first stop was the Wild Reef, since Aaron was shouting for sharks. We had to wait for entry to the elevators because the woman guarding it was giving a tongue lashing to the teenagers in front of us, warning them harshly not to play on the elevator.

I went in the elevator, it was a normal, albeit dark, elevator. I’m not sure why she was so uptight about it. But I passed her a few more times that day and she did it to all the teenagers in the line that day.

The exhibit itself it amazing, and we spent a lot of time sitting on the floor looking up at the huge tank full of sharks.

We also spent lots of time at the polar play zone. We piloted a submarine.

See the spinning Beluga Whales in the background?

We also dressed up as penguins and played in a pretend penguin habitat. Just like Jack and Ben!

And we pet starfish.

I don’t think I’ll take them back soon. Not that it’s not an amazing place to visit, but it’s just too expensive to do on a regular bases.

I will be looking at the library for other passports though, and hopefully they won’t bad at this one was. Stay tuned…

My handsome men heading to the temple.

L’Shanah Tovah!

Today we celebrated Rosh Hashanah.

Now that Jack is in Hebrew school, he has started to observe the holidays with Adam.

Which means he doesn’t attend school, but goes to the high holiday services instead. He was pretty happy to trade 7 hours of school in for 1 and 1/2 hours at the temple.

Afterwards we celebrated with some of the traditional new year food.

I had a big helper in the kitchen this year…

Together we made this:

http://toriavey.com/toris-kitchen/2013/08/honey-apple-cake/

It turned out just like the picture, and tasted delicious!

We also feasted on latkes, green beans, turkey, matzoh ball soup, challah, and chopped liver.

The kids fully enjoyed the opportunity to eat carbs exclusively for dinner and dessert. It was a carb fiesta!

Blessing the bread

May everyone have a healthy and happy new year, whenever it starts for you!!!

On a playdate this week, my friend Laurie mentioned that the Lincoln Park Zoo was holding it’s annual Fall Fest. Today we decided to go check it out.

The Zoo is free to enter, and since it’s close enough for us to walk to, it’s always considered a great, low cost form of entertainment.

But that changes if you decide to buy tickets for all the exciting things there are to do for Fall Fest.

We didn’t see them all, since every time you decide to enter with 6 people to any of these attractions it’s $30, but we did use the tickets wisely. A $30 ferris wheel ride? Probably a waste of money.

But for the corn maze it was a bargain.

Next to the maze were barrels of hay. A couple of barrels of hay? Hours of entertainment!

The twins spent a lot of time in Tot town too.

But the obstacle course was over in about 2 seconds, and the kids immediately asked to do it again.

We missed the pumpkin patch, but it seemed to be a good area for very young kids.

The carousel, which is there year round, was part of the ticket sales, as well as the train which we missed.

We left with three tickets, so looks like we will be back again soon…

Has anyone else noticed all the great new playgrounds sprouting up around the city?

It is all part of Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s Chicago Plays! program, launched in 2013 that ambitiously aims at adding or renovating over 300 parks.

Today we enjoyed the fruits of his labor at Morrie Mages park. 

There were all kinds of different ropes to climb as well as new and unusual play structures.

The park is completely fenced off and includes a large open area to run and for Aaron, find sticks!

There are also some great picnic benches!

Now I’m on a quest to try out the other 299ish parks that are getting a face lift…

The last tooth Ben lost I tried a new tactic, a hunt of different colors. Under his pillow was an envelope with a square of color. He would have to find the color on the front of next the envelope somewhere in the house, open it to reveal a new color, then find that new color on a front of a new envelope.

It was a disaster. Ben has a lot of trouble locating the colors and sometimes he would find the wrong one and not realize it wasn’t a match.

So when he lost his tooth on Wednesday, I went back to what I knew was a favorite hunt of his, easter eggs.

Eggs were hidden in all kinds of nooks and crannies in our house, each one contained a picture of the place where the next egg was.

As usual, Ben has his trusted side kick, Jack there to help him navigate the hunt.

In the end, he got cold, hard cash.

On a tip from my friend Kelly, I signed up for a new service called Pearachute.

The service gives you options to drop in play at many different ‘pay to play’ spaces in the city and suburbs.

I really like the flexibility, and the fact that you can see so many different places, your kids never get bored.

But be warned, it is not a discount site, sometimes the price you pay to pearachute is more expensive than the general entry fee.

Having said that, because of the new service, we motivated to check out the Little Beans Cafe in Evanston.

It took us a mere 22 minutes to get there, which is just about how long it takes to get to the one in the city if you include trolling for parking, but this one had so much more.

With the suburbs comes extra space. Ample parking and a drive through were features you just can’t get in the city. And because they had so much space, there was a ton of different rooms to play in. We took advantage of them all.

The ‘Little Bean’s Village’ room was similar to the entire cafe in the city, except there was an extra crazy laser light room that we danced around in for a while in the back.

But in addition to that, they also had ‘Big Beans’ area with obstacle course.

And karaoke room! 

There was also a full gym area where you could play hockey, soccer or basketball.

On the way out I saw a library with arts and crafts. They also hold kid classes.

I’d have to say, traveling an extra 10 minutes to have parking, four times as many things to do in a less crowded space for less money makes me wonder what else is in the nearby suburbs for the kids and I to explore.

By accident this weekend we ended up at Montrose Beach instead of our normal haunt at Foster Avenue.

Normally I pick Foster Avenue Beach for it’s quiet, family friendly atmosphere. But the parking was full and we had to wing it.

Much as I prefer a family beach, I must say I found Montrose Beach highly entertaining.

It is much more lively for sure! I think I passed three different speakers blaring anything from Hotel California to Mexican Pop.

Besides your standard ice cream cart, we saw vendors with long sticks of cotton candy attached and carts full of Duros.

We even saw a guy cart in his own drum stove and make tacos on the spot! 

There was also a lively outdoor seating area with alcohol service and food. This was a nice addition to the beach, even if alcohol sales it meant there was a line for the woman’s bathroom.

I know America has a lot of problems, but one of our greatest successes is our diversity. While walking back to the car, pot smoking African American youths sat next to a chatty group of Korean grandmothers. Right behind them I spotted a bunch of headscarves huddled together sharing food.

The kids settled right in, doing their normal routine of running everywhere. I’m not sure they know how to walk…

It was another lovely beach day, the last before Jack went back to school. Until next year, beach days!

Three days after my father left, my mother and sister flew in to help me out for the rest of my month with 4 kids.

I often see the quote, “Family is everything.” Right now everything in my life is about my family, and I am so incredibly lucky to come from the kind of family who rallies around me to help me when I need it the most.

My first family (father, sister and mother) coming out to help tirelessly for the month of August with current family must feel like the guy who figured out peanut butter goes with jelly. The joy of watching everyone I love from different generations interact together makes my heart sing.

Friday was my mother’s birthday.

Her treat was for her to surprise me on a shopping trip by paying my bill.

Then Adam and I dumped the kids on her and my sister for the night and went to the Billy Joel concert.

Wrigley Field

We didn’t even come home afterwards, instead using our Hilton points to stay the Waldorf Astoria.

While we were relaxing and sleeping in, my sister and mom put up with many tantrums, fights, butt wipes (and butt cream!), and still managed the house so well that when Adam and I returned home it was much cleaner than I ever manage to make it.

Lara turned all the kids into ‘hot dogs’.

Double Trouble

We also had a 1:1 ratio for the kids at our annual block party. Which mean Jack benefitted as well, he was allowed to invite some of his buddies to enjoy the fun as well.

We also got a chance to eat lots of Chinese food!

At Shine…

Shine Restaurant

And Dim Sum at Ming Hin…

And Cheng Du Impression…

This morning Lara left, but I still have mom to help me make it until both older kids are back in school.

If the saying “Family is Everything” is true, then I truly have everything.

The annual bock party was scheduled for this weekend and despite a forecast of rain, it ended up a muggy and wonderfully sunny afternoon.

I was very lucky to have extra helpers in town!

Mom and my sister Lara with my friend Laurie

We let the kids enjoy all the festivities with abandon, even though it meant they conveniently forgot dinner.

There were so many treats, it was easy to forget something like dinner, even though Summer House Santa Monica catered again and there were quite a few grills on the street cooking hot dogs, hamburgers and brats.

The kids enjoyed MANY cones at the cotton candy machine.

This year, not one but TWO ice cream trucks came to the street.

The regular band was there to keep the spirits high. So were the kegs. I saw a woman come by with trays of jello shots this year but I think I’ll have to wait until the kids are a lot older to enjoy those!

Walgreens came by and did face painting.

And one of the neighbors organized a craft table.

The Great Scott put on a fantastic magic show. This year Ben was called up as a helper!

Afterwards The Great Scott twisted balloons for all the kids.

The bouncy house area was expanded as well. After many complaints, they added a second one and split them according to age groups, under and over 5 years.

Finally it grew late and the glow stuff came out. 

The kids came home sticky, exhausted and happy. Till next year!

After our return from quiet Michigan towns, we wasted no time becoming Chicagoans again.

Sunday we found a field by the lake that wasn’t crowded at all and watched the Chicago Air and Water Show.

My Dad was still in town and it seemed like the perfect thing to bring an aviation wizard to.

Between the buzzing sights from the air, there was plenty of down time to play and picnic.

As usual, Grandpa Devensky spent the entire time making our kids laugh and feel special.

As usual, if there are sticks involved, Aaron is happy. 

As usual, Chicago had another brilliant show.

Dad left the next day.

As usual, he will be sorely missed.