A mini-vacation

We haven't had a real vacation in years. This summer has been crazy, with Chris gone for two weeks for work, but we decided we really needed to take the boys somewhere, even if it was only for a couple of days.

Cue a whirlwind tour of Chicago.

The view from our hotel.

We started Monday with a trip to a water park with Lisa and her boys. Chris and I even went on the water slides (I haven't done that in... I don't remember when). A few hours playing in the water wore Wil and Sam out; Sam slept on the trip downtown.

After checking in at the hotel (the Hyatt Regency on Wacker Drive, which we would definitely go back to), we took a taxi ride to the tower formerly known as Sears. The boys wanted to see a skyscraper. Seeing the view from the top of one was beyond exciting for them.  

The view from 103 stories up, through the floor.

Tuesday morning we were treated to a view of window washers. They were on a building across the river. Between the window washers and the spiders outside the Willis Tower windows, the boys were in awe of things up high. 

Window washers, as seen from our hotel room.

Highlights of the hotel, since the boys had such fun feedback: Wil loved the bathroom. They both loved the view. Sam really liked the escalator, although Wil preferred the elevator.

So how many museums can we go to in one day? 

We started with the Field Museum of Natural History.

All three of my boys in front of Sue.

The boys were really only interested in the dinosaurs there, so we moved on to the Shedd Aquarium. It was incredibly busy, with a line out the door and down the stairs. Luckily, we had purchased CityPasses the previous night, which offered admission to 5 attractions, including express entry. We got to go right in, skipping ahead of the hundreds of people lined up baking in the heat.

Next up was the Museum of Science and Industry, a big part of why we chose to go to Chicago.

Watching a 1/3 scale Mars Rover model.

 The Henry Crown Space Center was very popular with our space loving boys.

They also enjoyed the Farm Tech exhibit.

Sitting in the cab of a combine.

 After watching the model train from every possible angle and a brief stop at the Science Storms exhibit, it was on to the reason Chris and I wanted to go - Mythbusters: The Explosive Exhibition.

Sitting on a swing supported by interleaved phone books.

 Wil's favorite was building a house to see if it could withstand wind. (Three Little Pigs - straw vs. wood vs. brick)

Wil building his 3rd design. 

  Then he had to test it:

Chris and Sam each tried pulling a table cloth without knocking over dishes.

There were many other myths to test, along with props and items from the show. 

Our last stop was the 727. Sam was thrilled to see the cockpit and sit in the seats. But by this point, we were all tired and ready to head home. 

If you were keeping track, we stopped at 3 museums in one day. Buying the CityPass was a great idea. We had planned to stop at 3 of the attractions (Willis Tower, Field Museum and Museum of Science & Industry). Without it, we wouldn't have stopped at the Shedd Aquarium (between expense and the long line). We saved money by using it, and would have saved more if we had spent more time and taken advantage of all the options. We skipped the Adler Planetarium, which would have been our 5th attraction. 

We'll definitely look into CityPass if we go to one of the other cities that offers one and next time we plan a museum tour of Chicago. And we'll definitely go back to Chicago to spend more time at the museums, but not until the boys are a little older and can appreciate more of the exhibits.

GenCon 2011 in review

GenCon is over for this year, so it's time to review our mini-vacation.

Games: We played Munchkin Zombies Friday night (It's Munchkin! With zombies!) and yes, we bought it to add to our Munchkin collection. (I won our game.) We also tried a mini-figure game system thingy called Battles of Westeros, a BattleLore game. It's a strategy game, sort of like the minutia of a round of Risk. We were both new to the type of game. It just wasn't our cup of tea, but that's the point of GenCon - to try new games and see if there's something out there you have been missing.

Seminars: We went to lots of seminars, mostly on writing. Last year was the year for film seminars for Chris so this year we went to writing seminars for me (and Chris since things like world building and storytelling are also important for filmmaking.) I don't think I heard anything completely new, but a lot was confirmed. There were a few small things I needed to be reminded of, and it certainly wasn't wasted time. Hearing from a bunch of published authors who all had different takes on the writing process was informative.

Films: We had one film seminar on independent filmmaking. We also saw the sci-fi shorts block, which included one fantasy piece. It was an interesting mix. We capped off our time at GenCon with a viewing of "Beverly Lane", a fun zombie flick. May I just say, if you like zombie comedies, this was a delightful one.

Puzzle Quest: We tried our hand at the puzzle quest this year. There were 18 puzzles based on characters from "Alice in Wonderland. After solving those 18, there were 6 Alice puzzles. The goal was to solve them and find Alice. We only solved 8, but had a good time trying on the rest.

Bingo: Of course, one of the best parts of GenCon is all the costume watching. I decided to make a game out of it this year by creating a bingo card (after all, this was a gaming convention). Out of 25 squares, I found 21. Not bad. For an even bigger challenge, I took pictures as I found things on my card.

So here is GenCon in photos.

Wearing my Wil Wheaton shirt, in front of a war jack.

Anime characters

Zombies on the exhibit hall floor.

Just a bunch of fun costumes.

Transformer and Cobra Commander.

There were a lot of Jedi.

And Vader with Obi-Wan and a Rebel.

Super-Ma'am

Fun steampunk

Kilts were well-represented.

Slave Leia and Stormtrooper.

Not sure, but neat costume. 

Chris dozed off in one of the writing seminars.

A couple of Captain Jacks.

Jareth, Pikachu.

Tusken Raider on the escalator.

My elf costume.

Spiderma'am and Wolverine.

Steampunk family.

Steampunk wheelchair.

Chris having an anachronistic moment with his iPhone.

Red shirt with sword in his back.

Our band of steampunks.

Robin

My steampunk costume. We'll add 'stuff' for next year.

And speaking of next year, we plan to go, but it's mid-August, so we'll have to see since Wil will be in Kindergarten and school starts around that time.

GenCon BINGO

GenCon 2011 starts tomorrow. Yep, we're going to get our geek on this weekend. Costumes will even be worn. There will be loads of fun people watching, which brings me to GenCon BINGO!

I saw a card posted for ComicCon and thought it was a great idea. I don't know how well my card will do or how many spaces I will fill (I plan to keep playing even if I get a traditional BINGO), but it should add to the fun.