A List Of Things Thrown Five Minutes Ago

WHAT'CHOO TALKIN' ABOUT, "WILLIS"?  Too many bullet points on my recently completed one-week sojourn through Chicago and the Wisconsin Dells with the girls:

• We got lucky on Chicago weather last week. My goodness. 80 and not-humid at Taste of Chicago Wednesday night to meet some friends at the free fun. concert?
• Cannot say enough good things about CityPass. Had the attractions we were going to do anyway, at a good discounted price, and the ability to skip the entrance line at the Shedd Aquarium alone was worth quite a bit.
• Cannot say enough good things about the Museum of Science and Industry, which I hadn't been to since Law School. Spacious, full of interactive stuff for the kids, and educational on top of it.
• The Shedd Aquarium, on the other hand, was way too crowded, didn't seem to have much of any educational value at all, just a constant look at this fish! now look at that fish! But the kids liked it.
• Field Museum: Sue, wow.
• The Architecture Foundation boat cruise was too ambitious for the kids—thought it might at least satisfy them on a "look at the pretty buildings" level, but it didn't. Some basic knowledge retained, but ... too soon.
• I didn't realize how much I missed Stanley's until I was back.
• So much we didn't see, and I kinda wish we had just done a full week in Chicago and arranged a mini-ALOTT5MAcon. Next time.  And the girls want there to be a next time. Among other things, we never hit Navy Pier or the Zoo.
• What can I say about the Wilderness? Imagine a hotel at the quality level of a Days Inn, but with Four Seasons-level waterparks.  I loved that there were multiple separate smaller water parks (three indoor, three outdoor) rather than mammoth complexes; it was much easier to track the girls that way. Rides at all levels of daring, from lazy rivers and splashgrounds with giant buckets o'doom to gravity-defying loops with weight minimums (because you'd never otherwise generate enough velocity to make it over the top). The food was crappy, not just on-site but everywhere in town.  Didn't matter.  Kids loved it.