Date night

Since we have been married, James and I have been able to go to Chicago and see a show around this time of year. It started two years ago when I was in school and taking a music class. For that class we were encouraged to see a professional musical and then write a report on the performance of the singers. I had always been interested in theater but never really did anything about it. So that year was a good excuse to finally do something! "Wicked" was here and we had heard rave reviews about it so as an early Christmas present, James took me to go see it. We went downtown and had an early dinner at a sandwich shop then caught a 7:30pm showing. It was amazing and we had an incredible time. "Wicked" was the perfect show for us to see as first-time theater goers. It kept our attention the whole time and had such great scenery and storyline.

The next year we were actually living downtown and "Phantom of the Opera" was coming into town during the winter season. So we saw that as well and decided that if we could, then every year around this time we would try to go downtown and see a show. It was a fun little tradition that we started and I am glad that we have been able to keep it up.

This year we went and saw "A Christmas Carol" on Dec 4, a Thursday. We had yet to see a holiday show and decided this would be a good one as they put it on every year at the Goodman Theater. It started out being the coldest day of the season to date (18 degrees as the high) which was not so plesant. James worked for a few hours that morning and arrived home by lunchtime. We had plans to eat downtown at the famed Morton's Steakhouse so we saved our appetites by skipping lunch (I had a late breakfast anyway so I wasn't hungry.) Our dinner reservations were not until 4:30pm and the show started at 7:30pm. So we decided to do some Christmas shopping at a mall close to our house. (Downtown shopping is so not us!) We were able to get a bulk of our Christmas gifts out of the way and then headed for the drive downtown. We got to Chicago around 3:30pm and parked directly across from the theater (the less walking the better on a freezing day!) We were really close to the Daley Plaza though and since we had an hour before dinner, I wanted to go check out the Christkindle Market that they have there every year. Its a German market that has hot German food for sale (the smell of the brats!) and German Christmas ornaments, etc. They have a huge tree up and always have a really nice winter train setup.

The tree at Daley Plaza

We are standing in front of the train display. My nose is already red from the cold!!

We didn't stay very long as it was freezing but it was fun to at least walk around for a few minutes and see the displays. We decided to make the few blocks walk over to Morton's and hang out in the bar before we were ready to eat. We needed a place to warm up! We made a brisk walk over to Morton's and relaxed in the bar as we slowly warmed up. James had a beer and I had an orange-cranberry juice. (That was the most inventive non-alcholic drink the bartender could come up with.) At 4:30pm we were seated down for dinner and had a wonderful and relaxing dinner. We wanted to be there with plenty of time to spare and not rush through dinner to make it to the show. We both had never been to Morton's before but heard that their steaks were amazing. So a steak and lobster dinner it was! It was so nice to just go out for a special dinner and be able to reflect on the past year with my adorable husband. We had a fantastic time. Before we knew it, it was time to head for the theater.

Our dinner place.

The theater as seen from the parking garage.

Our playbill.

We arrived at the theater with time to spare and walked through the gift store that they had. I wanted to get a "Christmas Carol" ornament and mentally kicked myself that I had not done so for Phantom or Wicked. We found the ornament and made our purchase then made our way to our seats. This theater was not as grand and spectacular as the Oriental (Wicked) or Cadillac (Phantom) are. This one was built much more recently while the other two have been around for a long time and have ornate carvings and rich tapestries in the auditorium. Goodman is more simple and modern. The show started and we had a great time watching it. As we were nearing the end of the show, Ebenezer Scrooge is realizing his mistakes in being stingy and coldhearted and how he wants to change things for the better, there was a little girl behind us who started clapping her hands and talking excitedly about Scrooge's change of heart. When the show ended, the same little girl kept repeating over and over to her parents of what a wonderful Christmas gift it was to see the show and how thankful she was for it. It was very sweet to hear her graditude towards her parents and how excited she was.

The show ended around ten and we were both pretty tired so we headed home. We didn't get to see the lights on State Street or the window displays at Macy's but we had a great time being together and that's what is the best thing of all.