Josh was give a gift certificate for a one-night stay at the Belden-Stratford Hotel in Lincoln Park as a “thank you” gift for helping to organize a silent/live auction at the church where he works. Since the chance of he and I getting away for a night without the boy is unlikely to happen in the next, oh, ten years or so, we decided to use the gift certificate on Wednesday night.
(On Wednesday afternoon, we met Josh’s sister and brother-in-law at Shedd Aquarium. We knew it would take us at least an hour to get home from there via the CTA, so staying in Lincoln Park, twenty minutes closer to the aquarium, was quite the treat.)
You know, I think we live in a fairly nice apartment. It’s quite spacious, has a lovely kitchen, a fireplace, and two bathrooms. Our room, wait, our SUITE at the Belden-Stratford put our apartment to shame. Take a look at these pictures. If you put all of those together, you’ll get an idea of what the suite we stayed in looked like. It had one and a half bathrooms (the full bath had both a tub with jets and a separate shower); a full-sized kitchen with full-sized refrigerator, dishwasher, microwave, pots, pans, and wine glasses to boot; a huge living room, a dining area, and a ginormous bedroom. The walk-in closet off the bedroom was large enough to fit at least a full-sized bed it. It was fucking ridiculous.
After screeching and carefully checking out each room, I called our friends, who live right around the corner from the hotel, to come and hang out with us in our swanky digs. Their oldest daughter is a day older than Jude, and she and he had a great time running around the place, jumping up and down, screaming, and tumbling on the bed. The awesomest part of the night came at around 9pm. Just as Josh and I were settling in to watch Serenity, we got a text from our friends telling us that there was dessert waiting for us at the fancy French restaurant that’s connected to the hotel.
We canceled our Thursday morning chiropractic appointment so that we could take full advantage of our time at the hotel. We got up around 7, vegged out for a bit, enjoyed the free continental breakfast the hotel provided, and went to the Lincoln Park Zoo for a bit before heading home to Rogers Park for a nap.
I hope we get the chance to stay at the Belden-Stratford again, though I don’t relish the thought of having to pay for the honor.
