Wine, Wine and More Wine

Mondays are apparently my days for talking about how much wine I drank over the weekend. I can't help it, I love wine, and my husband might just love it more. So when I first learned about Chicago Gourmet that was happening this past weekend, I was excited, but also hoping I secretly wouldn't be able to go because I'd be pregnant. That's what us "infertiles" do. We plan things, fun things, like vacations, nights out with friends, things that involve alcohol or doing back flips, secretly hoping that we won't be able to join in the fun. Secretly hoping we will have to cancel, or just have to sit on the sidelines and watch everyone else have fun. When you've been trying to have a baby for 2+ years, more times than not, you have no reason to cancel. Kevin and I made a pact...if this past IVF cycle didn't work, we'd go to Chicago Gourmet. Tickets were a bit expensive, so this was a treat of sorts for us. But oh so much fun.

Chicago Gourmet was held in Chicago's Millennium Park, starting on Friday, ending on Sunday. We decided that we were just going to go on Saturday. We arrived at noon to endless booths of wine. We were like Bailey at the dog beach, unable to contain our excitement, and overwhelmed with all the fun ahead of us. We went straight for the closest booth to the door, sidling up, trying to act cool, like we go to wine tastings every weekend. I don’t think we were fooling anyone, because we just stared at all the bottles of wine they had, and then said kind of loudly, “this is our first booth!!” The "sommelier" nodded his head and grinned at us, and we had found a new best friend. He poured us at least 3 full glasses. We started with a sparkling Prosecco, and ended with some red I will never remember. 15 minutes later, our cheeks were hurting from the huge grins on our faces. This might be what a little piece of our heaven would be like.

Not only was there wine, but plenty of food from the top chefs in the Chicago area. We walked around, tried some wine, ate a crab cake, and repeated this for over 3 hours. The weather was a perfect sunny 80 degrees, the wine was delicious, the food scrumptious, the accommodations outstanding, and Kevin and I? Well, we were drunkity drunk drunk. Yes, a baby in the belly is always the goal, but sometimes, being able to join in the fun is just what the doctor ordered.