We stayed at the Sheraton in downtown Nashville and it proved to be the perfect location for a weekend trip sans vehicle.  It is walking distance to Broadway, which is where the honky tonks, bars, and restaurants are, and to Bridgestone Arena.  We arrived on a Saturday morning, too early to get into our hotel room, so we left our bags with the hotel valet and walked down to Broadway in search of some breakfast.  Our breakfast came in the form of live music and bloody marys at Tootsie’s Orchid Lounge, since no restaurants on Broadway were open, and none serve breakfast.  We waited until 10:30 when Jack’s BBQ opened up and, judging by the line, plenty of others couldn’t wait for the restaurant to open, either.  I ordered the beef brisket plate which comes with two sides; I chose macaroni & cheese and hot apples (it was all fat free, by the way).  That brisket was probably the best bbq I have ever had.  Perfectly tender, lean meat, incredible smoky flavor. From the array of self-serve bbq sauces, I went with the Kansas City, and it was a perfect match for my brisket.  The mac & cheese and apples were incredible, as well.  We visited Jack’s again two days later and did not have quite the same experience.  We all were quite disappointed with our food.  I ordered the brisket plate again (it was too good the first time; I had to), with mac & cheese and cream corn (both were delicious).  The brisket, however, was fatty and a little tough.  The employee cutting and carving the meat wasn’t the same guy from our first visit so maybe he had something to do with it.  Whatever the reason, I was seriously disappointed.  I’d still recommend Jack’s, though.  We might have just caught them on a bad day on that second visit.

Some other dining highlights from our weekend in Nashville:

Big River Grille & Brewing Works – We chose this place on Saturday night for our pre-game meal.  At 5:30pm, we were told it would be a 30-minute wait for a table; that’s how crowded it was.  Luckily, we found a four-top in the bar area so our wait was quite short.  Since Big River is a brewery, I gave their 16th Avenue Pilsner a go.  It was good enough for me to order a second.  The food was solid but nothing overly spectacular; typical American, upscale bar food-type menu.  I had hazelnut crusted chicken with a sun-dried cherry sauce, served with white cheddar mashed potatoes – quite tasty.

The Pancake Pantry – Now I understand why there is a line outside this restaurant every morning.  I would go back to Nashville JUST to eat again at The Pancake Pantry.  All you need to know is: Sweet Potato Pancakes.  They’re not stingy about the portions.  I got a heaping plate of warm, powder sugar-dusted goodness, served with homemade cinnamon cream syrup.  I can’t write about it anymore because I’m starting to drool.

The Stock-yard Restaurant – Named one of America’s top 10 steakhouses, the restaurant is housed in a building that originally served as the offices and overall business center of the Nashville Union Stock-yards.  Built in 1924, the interior looks much the same as it did when cattle and hogs were being auctioned off on the lower level of the building.  I’m not a steak eater so I admit that I enjoyed the history and the atmosphere more than my food.  I had filet mignon (about the only cut of steak I can handle), prepared boursin style.  It was enjoyable and it filled my steak quota for the next year or so.  The highlight for me, though, was walking through the halls of the restaurant and touring the upper floor (which is encouraged by restaurant personnel).  The one-time offices, saloon, and barber shop are now finely-appointed individual dining rooms.  It was like a step back in time.  The Stock-yard also is home to the oldest bottle of wine in the USA, a 1776 Madeira, which is kept in a safe behind a glass display window.  I can’t even imagine what that wine might taste like nowadays…

Puckett’s Grocery & Restaurant – Even before we left for Nashville, I had a hankering for biscuits and gravy.  If you remember, we had a hard enough time finding breakfast in downtown Nashville, let alone a specific breakfast item.  It was our last morning in Nashville so we asked our hotel concierge where we might find the elusive biscuits and gravy.  He pointed us in the direction of Puckett’s, newly opened and within walking distance of the hotel. Plain old biscuits and gravy are served only as a side order, but there is an item named Bubba’s Eggs Benedict (which I ordered):  “Split biscuits, topped with your choice of bacon or sausage, covered with two fried eggs, cooked to order, and smothered in pepper gravy.”  I was so excited when our food arrived but that quickly ended when I realized the gravy was cold.  Again, Puckett’s had just opened for business so I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt; they were still working out the kinks.  I just asked our gracious server for some extra – hot – gravy, and all was right with the world.  We sat in Puckett’s for a long time after we’d finished breakfast; it’s that comfortable.  And even after we’d paid our bill, our server kept coming back to refill our water and coffee.  Later in the day, around lunchtime, we walked past Puckett’s and there was not an empty seat in the house.  Despite our one minor setback, I’d go back to Puckett’s, especially to sample the lunch and/or dessert menu.

A couple more quick notes about Nashville:  I loved all the live music in the various bars, but my favorite venue is Robert’s Western World.  It’s the one spot on Broadway to hear real, traditional country music (the type I prefer, not the modern-day pop-music-with-a-slide-guitar-thrown-in that is passed off as “country”).  Secondly, the Sheraton was a fine place to stay.  Read my review here on TripAdvisor.  And, lastly, my photo set from the trip on Flickr, to which I’m still adding photos.

Felicia offered to pay for a hotel room for the night and found an affordable rate at a Comfort Inn in Woburn, just minutes outside Boston.  The woman working the reception desk at the hotel was extremely friendly and helpful, and was able to direct us to inexpensive parking in Boston (we still had the rental car and public parking can be expensive in Boston, just as in Chicago).  We parked in a public lot off Seaport Boulevard, near the World Trade Center, for $12.  Yes, $12 for the entire day.  That’s a steal.  Once we parked, though, we honestly had no idea where we were going, so we just started walking.  And we walked.

At the top of our “must see” list was Boston’s North End, that city’s own Little Italy neighborhood.  All we had was the tourist map given to us by the hotel employee in Woburn.  We were able to plot our route but the scale of the map was distorted so we weren’t sure of the distance.  Turns out, it’s about two miles from where we started to the North End, but it was an enjoyable walk and didn’t seem to be that far.  The route took us through what seemed to be Boston’s financial district, which is dotted with historical markers, so we stopped a few times for pictures and history lessons.  When we finally did make it to Hanover Street, the North End’s main drag, I felt as though I were taken back in time.  It looked and felt a lot like my neighborhood in Chicago’s Little Italy when I was growing up.  The first person we encountered on Hanover Street – this cute, little Italian man – greeted us with a “buon giorno”.  I was so happy that I almost cried.

Our first stop was Modern Pastry for some sfogliatelle – yum!  Afterward, we weaved our way up and down Hanover Street, stopping in the various shops, talking to some of the locals.  The North End also is home to some historical markers, stops on Boston’s Freedom Trail, so we had to take those in.  Another highlight was St. Leonard Roman Catholic Church.  It looks a lot like my parish church, The Shrine of Our Lady of Pompeii; it really took me back.  We lit some candles and “talked” a bit to Santa Lucia (after whom my daughter is named), and made our way down to Caffe dello Sport for an Aperol spritz.

We could have spent the rest of the day and the entire evening in the North End, but there was so much more to be seen.  We turned our focus, and Lucia’s stroller, toward Beacon Street.  Our main destination was the Cheers bar, of 1980s-1990s television fame, but the highlight for me was Beacon Street itself: a busy, wide thoroughfare, lined with federal-style rowhouses on one side, and  Boston Common and the Boston Public Garden on the other.  We stopped in at Cheers, had a decent meal and some beers (no beer for Lucia, though), took the requisite tourist photos, and hopped across the street to the Public Garden.

None of us were prepared for the hilarity about to ensue when we entered the Boston Public Garden.  There is a popular children’s book from the 1940s called “Make Way For Ducklings”, wherein a family of ducks makes the Public Garden its home.  There now is a statue (or statues) in the Public Garden commemorating the book and the author; it consists of nine bronze statues, one of the mother duck (Mrs. Mallard), followed by a line of her eight ducklings.  I was familiar with the book, and I knew the statues were there, but Lucia had never been exposed to the story or the book at all.  So when she completely lost her mind upon seeing those statues, we were all shocked into hysterical laughter!  Lucia spotted the statues from several feet away.  She raised one arm, pointed in the direction of the statues, and began yelling, “Oooooh!  Ooooh!”  As we got closer to the ducks, she was fighting to get out of her stroller; I couldn’t undo the latches quickly enough!  Once she escaped the confines of the stroller, she ran as fast as her chubby little legs would allow over to the statues, where she proceeded to walk up and down in a line and count each duck over and over and over again.  After about thirty minutes, when it started getting dark, I said to Lucia, “Ok, it’s time to say goodnight to the ducks.”  Without any further prompting, Lucia gave each individual duck a hug.  I thought she was finished, but then she looped back around, and again walked up to each duck to give them a kiss!  I couldn’t take it – definitely cuteness overload!  It was dark, we were tired, so we flagged down a taxi on Beacon Street to take us back to the car.

We were due to fly back home to Chicago the following day (Saturday) but we still had time to kill.  Being huge baseball fans, we knew we had to at least SEE Fenway Park.  The Red Sox were out of town that weekend so there was no chance to go to a game.  It worked out well, though, because traffic around the park was lighter and we were able to find street parking.  We walked around the perimeter of the park and checked out all the flags and statues.  Of course the experience would have been much more fruitful if we’d been able to go inside Fenway, but it was neat to still be that close to it.

Our time to head to the airport arrived; we bid adieu to Fenway and to Boston, each of us knowing full well that we would be back one day.  I thank my mother and my sister for talking me into spending that time in Boston, and for a wonderful vacation.  Lucia had a great time, too.  She’s my perfect little travel buddy!

At this time of year (late September), ferry schedules and options are not as plentiful as during the summer months.  The schedule and location that worked best for us was from the Steamship Authority departing from Woods Hole, which is about a two-hour drive from Provincetown without weather or traffic delays. The trip is not all four-lane highway driving; plenty of time is spent on winding, two-lane country roads. Read: allow extra time when making the trip to Woods Hole and don’t “almost” miss the ferry like we did. We had allowed ourselves enough time to make the 9:30am ferry, but we ran into some construction along the way.  We made it to the port just in time; it was maybe 9:26am, only to find out that we could not park our car in the lot there.  We would have to drive four miles to the Steamship Authority’s remote lot and take the shuttle bus back.  Excuse me, what?  I must have looked at and examined the Steamship Authority website three dozen times before departing for Woods Hole, and nowhere was the parking situation mentioned.  I breathed deeply and was about to resign to the fact that we’d have to wait for the next ferry (departing at 10:45am), when the Steamship Authority employee said to me, “Or you can park in that private lot right across the street.  I don’t know how much he charges….”  I peeled out of the parking lot and into the private lot, where we learned it was $20 to park for the day.  Deal.  We parked, unloaded the car and Lucia, and made a beeline for the ferry ticket window.  Reservations are not necessary for the passenger ferry so we were able to get our tickets on the spot.  The round-trip cost for three adults was $53 (Lucia sailed for free).  There is also a car ferry – now THAT is another story.  Before I learned differently, I figured a car would be necessary on Martha’s Vineyard, even for a day trip, so I began looking into car ferry information.  I started having second thoughts when I saw the price.  It would cost over $300, round trip, during the off season!  That is way too much money to spend for a day trip.  If we were staying on the Vineyard for a longer period of time, say, a week, it might make more sense.  We decided to nix the car idea and just use public transportation once we arrived on the Vineyard.  One more note about the car ferry:  reservations during the off-season are not necessary but are recommended.  During the high season, however, reservations for the car ferry are an absolute must.

The ferry ride itself was rather enjoyable.  It was a Tuesday morning and it was easy to find seats.  The deck, on the other hand, was packed.  It was a gorgeously sunny day so I don’t blame those dozens of passengers for wanting to be outside, enjoying the pleasant temperatures and bright sunshine.  Plus, there’s just something about being on a boat, no matter how big or how small.  It was Lucia’s first boat ride so of course I had to take her up top.  She ooohed and aaaahed, and was so not afraid!

Our initial stop on the Vineyard was Oak Bluffs, an immediately pleasing little hamlet.  The walk out of the ferry station leads to an expanse of sprawling green lawn in the form of Ocean Park.  The park is centered by an adorable gazebo and is surrounded by timeless Victorian homes.  We walked along the dockside, poked our heads into the shops there, and turned our attention to Circuit Avenue.  Felicia read that Circuit Ave. is the best place to spot a celebrity on the Vineyard.  We didn’t run into any famous people but we did find lunch at Linda Jean’s Restaurant (delicious scallop roll and some of the best pancakes in the land).  Tummies full, we continued our walk over to find the gingerbread houses.  Yes, that’s right – gingerbread houses.  They’re not edible but they sure are cute.  They are actual Victorian cottages that officially make up the Martha’s Vineyard Camp Meeting Association Camp Ground.  These colorful, quaint domiciles are what fairy tales are made of; I couldn’t get enough of them.  Doesn’t help, too, that these dollhouse-looking cottages are beautifully arranged around the grand, 100′ x 130′ Tabernacle at Trinity Park.  As we walked through the park and gazed at the gingerbread cottages, I fully expected Hansel and Gretel to come walking past at any moment.

Mom and Felicia had to tear me away from the gingerbread houses; I could have stayed there all day.  But we had plans to visit two more towns on the island, Edgartown and Vineyard Haven, and we would be doing so by bus.  The Martha’s Vineyard Transit Authority is efficient and very simple to use.  (Stop at the visitors’ kiosk at the foot of Circuit Avenue for bus schedules and other valuable information.)  Our stop for the ride to Edgartown was basically at Ocean Park.  There was a transit employee there, answering questions and selling bus tickets; it was a pleasant surprise and made our public transit experience very simple and stress-free.

We arrived at the visitor’s center in Edgartown at the same time as about 300 tour buses (ok, maybe not 300 but there were A LOT).  It was quite chaotic, there were people everywhere, and we needed to find a place to change Lucia’s diaper.  We were able to get our bearings and take care of business once the crowd thinned out.  We made our way over to the Dr. Daniel Fisher House.  Built in 1840 for the man it’s named after, the founder of Martha’s Vineyard National Bank, the Fisher House is now the headquarters for the Martha’s Vineyard Preservation Trust.  It is a gorgeous Greek Revival dwelling, bordered on one side by a lovely garden and gazebo.  I can see why it’s a popular place for people to hold wedding receptions and other significant functions.  Virtually next door is the Old Whaling Church, another grand example of Greek Revival architecture.  Originally it was a Methodist church; now it is owned and operated by the Martha’s Vineyard Preservation Trust, and serves as a meeting and performing arts center.  After checking out the big sights, we made our way down Main Street, past more shops and boutiques and galleries, which, to me, seemed a bit more high-end than their counterparts in Oak Bluffs.  It was also a bit more crowded there, but I still enjoyed the history, architecture, scenery, and narrow streets.

Next, it was on to Vineyard Haven, so we hopped back on the bus at the Visitor’s Center.  I’m glad Vineyard Haven was our last stop because it was a major disappointment.  If it had been my first encounter with Martha’s Vineyard, I would have turned right around and gotten on the ferry to go back to Woods Hole.  There were some shops and the usual tourist sights, but that’s it.  We did a quick walk through and decided to head to the harbor to get the ferry back to Woods Hole.  Side note:  yes, it is possible to take the ferry over to Oak Bluffs, and then take the ferry back from Vineyard Haven, or vice versa.

Overall, our day on Martha’s Vineyard was very enjoyable.  Oak Bluffs was the highlight for me by far, and I realize we missed a lot of the island because we were on a limited schedule and did not have our own vehicle.  Also, I’m sure our experience and our perception of Martha’s Vineyard would be drastically different if we had spent our time there at one of the tony beachfront resorts.  Would I go back?  Maybe, but I’d like to see Nantucket once before making a return trip to Martha’s Vineyard.

The walking and people-watching opportunities are endless in Provincetown; however, there is plenty more to see, do, and taste!  Here is the list of my top 4 favorites:

1 – Commercial Street.  I mentioned it before, and it deserves mentioning again.  This main drag is lined with shops, restaurants, galleries, ice cream parlors – you name it!  We spent our first full day in Provincetown on Commercial Street and we still didn’t see it all.  It required two or three more trips just to make sure we didn’t miss anything.  A stay in Provincetown of any amount of time will definitely result in at least one jaunt to Commercial Street; take it all in and enjoy.

2 – The Lobster Pot.  This restaurant has been a mainstay in Provincetown for decades.  I’d read the online reviews before we got there and plenty of people complained that it’s a tourist trap, that the quality of the food is sub par, etc.  Knowing that everyone is entitled to his or her own opinion, we gave it a go so we could decide for ourselves. If I say that we went back for dinner a second time, do I have to tell you much more?  We enjoyed two solid meals at The Lobster Pot with absolutely no complaints.  Service was friendly and efficient and the seafood was as fresh as can be.  On our first visit, my entrée was Portuguese fish (the Portuguese have a long history in Provincetown and their influence is still evident today):  linguiça (Portuguese sausage) encrusted cod, served over The Lobster Pot’s original seafood stuffing, served with a side of orzo.  It was mouthwateringly delicious, and the portion so huge that I had the leftovers for dinner the following night!

3 – MacMillan Pier.  The sightseeing, whale-watching, and fishing boats depart from MacMillan Pier, so if you’re taking part in any of those activities, you will inevitably find yourself there.  But if not, it’s still worth a visit.  I walked from the entrance just off Commercial Street, all the way to the end, where the fast ferry to/from Boston arrives and departs.  The pier is lined with kiosks, their occupants selling everything from kitschy souvenirs to original works of art, and by commercial fishing boats.  At any given time you can find a handful of folks fishing off the side of the pier, too.  It’s fun to watch the fishing boats come in and sail out, and to watch sailboats and other watercraft float on by.

4 – The beaches.  The majority of Cape Cod is part of the federally protected Cape Cod National Seashore (CCNS).  We visited two beaches near Provincetown that are part of the CCNS unit:  Herring Cove and Race Point.  It would be a long, difficult walk to reach either beach from the center of Provincetown; it’s doable by bicycle and extremely easy to reach by car.  We had a rental car so we drove first to Herring Cove Beach where we found plenty of convenient parking.  I imagine that would not be the case were it the height of summer (keep in mind that we visited on a weekday during the off-season).  Also, be sure to check the CCNS website, run by the National Park Service (NPS), for applicable fees.  Normally there is a parking fee at the beaches but we avoided that since, again, we were there on a weekday in the off-season.  One NPS employee I spoke with advised that at this time of year, visitors must pay to park only on the weekends.  Herring Cove Beach is long but not very wide.  It is only about twenty feet from the parking area to the ocean (fine with me as I’m not a fan of trudging through sand).  The views are amazing!  Our visit was cut short, though, due to the ferocious winds.  It was a bright, sunny, blue-sky kind of day, but Herring Cove is completely unsheltered; there is nothing to protect beachgoers from the wind.  We packed it up and headed over to Race Point Beach where, again, we were met by oodles of parking.  The access to the beach, however, was a walk straight downhill – in the sand.  Going down to the water wasn’t so bad, but I knew the walk back up would not be fun.  It’s worth it, though.  Race Point Beach is expansive, in both length and width, and there were a lot more people there than at Herring Cove.  Even still, we had plenty of room to spread out our stuff and be comfortable.  I enjoyed watching some fishermen cast their lines right from the beach.  I saw one angler reel in a nice bluefish (and subsequently release, thank you).  Another fishermen wasn’t so lucky:  he hooked a fish and fought to get it ashore, only to have a seal come up from the water and steal it off his line.  I’d never seen a real, live seal before (except for at the stupid zoo).  It was like watching something on Animal Planet, I swear!

By no means are there only four great things to do in Provincetown.  These four just are my favorites.  Since we traveled with my toddler daughter, experiencing the nightlife was not really an option for me.  If it were, I’m sure that would have been highlight #5.

After a few days of searching and getting into contact with property owners, we decided on a two-bedroom condo with an assigned parking space.  The price for the week was the same as maybe three or four nights at a local inn or bed and breakfast.  We’d also be able to cook  some, if not most, of our meals and not have to spend a fortune on dining out.  We discovered an added bonus when we arrived:  the condo was in a prime Provincetown location, just a short walk from the lively Commercial Street, the town’s shopping, dining, and nightlife hub.  It was the perfect spot.  We’d need to use our rental car only if and when we wanted to leave the center of Provincetown.  The condo itself was on the top floor of a typical, old Provincetown house that had been split into separate units.  It has two decent-sized bedrooms, a loft as an extra sleeping area, laundry facilities in one of the bedrooms, and a full (albeit small) bathroom.  It was quite comfortable for the three adults and one child in our party, and the cable television and wifi were appreciated.

Our condo rental proved to be a near-perfect base for our Cape Cod adventure.  The only drawback is that Provincetown is at the very tip – the very end – of Cape Cod.  The drive to get anywhere else on the Cape is a bit long, and since there is only one main highway across, we’d be passing and seeing the same stuff over and over.  Because of this, we ventured away from Provincetown only once (not counting our drive back to Boston prior to our departure), to catch the ferry to Martha’s Vineyard in Woods Hole.  It was a two-hour drive one way just to get to the ferry.  I did want to visit Nantucket, too, but I did not want to spend another day driving a total of four hours just to get to and from the ferry port.  Keep this in mind if planning a trip to Cape Cod; consider staying somewhere more centrally located if visiting the islands is a priority.

1 – Spend at least one month in Calabria and at least one month in the area around Napoli to explore and learn about my family’s roots.

2 – Go to Bhutan.

3 – Go fly-fishing in Mongolia.

4 – Go to Argentina and visit vineyards, drink lots of malbec, listen to tango music, and just take it all in.  (Side note:  Argentina is my current travel obsession.)

5 – Return to Africa.  At the top of my list to visit in Africa are Mozambique, Ethiopia, and South Africa.

6 – See Dry Tortugas National Park

7 – Travel around Scandinavia.  I’ve been obsessed with the region, specifically Norway, since I was a young girl.

8 – Visit Isle Royale National Park.

9 – Go to Alaska, and not via cruise ship if I can help it.

10 – Western Canada, namely Banff and Vancouver.

11 – ICELAND

12 – Finally make it to Glacier National Park

I think that about covers it.  Of course, all of the above will be in addition to returning to Yellowstone with my daughter and then taking her to Disney World… Oh dear, I see another list in the making.

What’s on your bucket list?

Posted by Francesca

I’ve had a few animal encounters in my life, most of them occurring in or around Yellowstone.  But my most infamous animal encounter story goes a little something like this:  I was 10 and with my family on our annual Florida vacation.  The five of us were bike riding on then-undeveloped Sanibel Island.  We were biking for hours on narrow trails that bisected swamps and cut through heavily wooded areas.  Dad led the pack, followed by Mom, then me and Felicia, and Frankie was taking up the rear.  When it was time to start heading back to the bike rental place, we left the scary trails in the woods and rode out onto a residential street.  We were happily biking along, admiring the big, new houses on that particular street, when all five of us came to a screeching halt.  I swear, it was like something out of a cartoon.  A whole line of Folinazzos on bikes braking and skidding because of the massive, greenish/blackish reptilian figure that appeared a little ways down the road.  My breath was lost somewhere between my diaphragm and my mouth; all I could muster was a breathless, “Is that….. an alligator?!”  By golly, it sure was an alligator.  At the time, in my 10-year-old mind, that enormous alligator turned its head, looked at my family, and said to itself, “Oooh, lunch.”  At the same time, a disturbing thought penetrated my paralyzing fear:  a few days prior, in a one-day-when-you’re-on-Jeopardy!-moment, my father informed us that alligators are capable of running up to thirty-five miles per hour.  All I could think of was my then-four-year-old brother at the back of the line being unable to pedal his little legs fast enough to outride that alligator.  I was snapped to by my father’s voice instructing all of us to slowly and calmly turn our bikes around and begin pedaling in the opposite direction.  I thought I was going to pass out.  That alligator almost ate my whole family!

True story.  Well, almost.  The reality is that the alligator was crossing the street about thirty yards down.  Now, in my thirty-six-year-old mind, I’m pretty sure it didn’t even turn its head and see us.  But that doesn’t make for a very fun story now, does it?

Posted by Francesca

My paternal grandmother (Mimi, as we called her) loved the U.S. Navy Blue Angels, one of the highlights of the Air & Water Show.  Because we lived so close to the Lake Michigan, we got to witness essentially four days’ worth of mid-air maneuvers by these skilled pilots.  (Four days = two days of practice + two days of actual Air & Water Show.)  Without fail, Mimi pulled out her rickety, metal sunbathing chair and set up in our backyard to watch the Blue Angels fly, twist, dive, and roar overhead.  If I didn’t know any better, I’d say this was the highlight of her summer.  And, our backyard – if you want to call it that – was no more than an 8×8 patch of grass behind our 6-flat apartment building on West Lexington Street.  But when I was sitting out there with Mimi watching those planes, and watching her face glow ever so slightly with delight, I could have been anywhere in the world and it would not have mattered.  My Mimi pretty much was my best friend until she passed away in 1988, when I was 14 years old.  I miss her like you can’t imagine, even more than twenty years later, but getting to see those Blue Angels every summer makes me remember those days in our little backyard, and a whole host of other happy memories from those brief fourteen years I had with her.  I hope the Blue Angels keep on flying forever.

Posted by Francesca

I should have just said no.  Actually, I take that back.  If I hadn’t gone, I would not have met Denis Savard again, and he would not have signed my jersey for my daughter.  But I promise that I will not attend another Blackhawks Convention if I can help it.  Some issues I had that need to be rectified:

1 – Crowd management and control.  This is needed especially for people waiting outside the various ballrooms to gain entrance to the scheduled panels.  Once the doors to the ballroom open, people start pushing and shoving.  I’m surprised I saw no fights break out (Lord knows I wanted to knock out a few people….).

2 – Signage indicating entrance/exit into/out of the ballrooms.  This kind of goes along with #1.  People not knowing by which doors to stand and wait caused some of the pushing and shoving.  True story:  there was a panel in progress in one ballroom and we wanted to get into the next scheduled panel in the same ballroom, so we were waiting outside the doors.  We were toward the front of the line and a pretty good line of people had formed behind us.  A few minutes before the on-going panel was to be let out, a Hilton employee told us we had to move out of the way because the doors we were standing near were the exit doors for the people in the ballroom.  That meant we had to go and stand by the other doors where another long line had formed.  It was unfair that we’d been waiting there so long, unknowingly at the wrong doors, and then we had to go to the back of the other line, thereby putting in jeopardy our admission into the ballroom.

3 – Fan questions for the panels.  I’m all about fan/player interaction, but some of the questions during the panels were so irrelevant, some even inappropriate.  This was especially true during the 2010 Olympics:  A Golden Moment panel, which was made up of Jonathan Toews, Duncan Keith, Brent Seabrook, and Patrick Kane – ya know, the young studs on the team.  It was mostly girlfans asking ridiculous questions, not even about the Olympics, one even asking to present Keith with a gift from her and her sister.  If fan questions can’t be omitted entirely, then at least have someone there to first screen the questions before the fans are allowed in front of the microphone.

4- Player inaccessibility.  One of the draws of the Convention is the opportunity to see the players up close, in regular clothes, and to interact with them.  The current Convention set-up allows for no interaction at all, outside of the autograph singings for which attendees must first obtain a wristband.  Before and after the panels and autograph sessions, the players are ushered in and out by a security entourage, as if they are dignitaries or major Hollywood celebrities.  That just made the players seem even more distant and inaccessible.

I still love my Blackhawks and always will.  Since it’s near impossible to get game tickets, too, I guess I’ll just have to settle for watching the games and seeing the players on television.

Posted by Francesca

Cherish forever, originally uploaded by Francesca….

The 3rd Annual Blackhawks Convention just wrapped up. I attended for the second, and probably my last, time – but more on that later. The highlight of the entire event, for me, was getting to once again meet my childhood hockey hero, Denis Savard.

I had to first wait in line to get a wristband for the scheduled Savard autograph signing, and then later on, I had to wait in line again for the actual autograph. Kind of annoying but it was better than having to deal with people pushing and fighting to get ahead of me in line (again, more on that later). Others in line had photos or hockey cards of Savard that they wanted him to sign; I had my very first Blackhawks jersey, which is a good 20-25 years old. My parents bought it for me when I was about 10 years old because Savard was my idol. I wore that jersey constantly; I probably would have slept in it if my parents had let me. I’ve long outgrown the jersey but held on to it for sentimental reasons. When Lucia was born, I decided I’d save it for her – it could be HER first Blackhawks jersey, too.

After waiting for over two hours, it finally was my turn to go up on the little stage to the signing table. I unfurled the jersey and placed it on the table. Savard and his security buddy seated next to him had the same reaction when they saw it: “Wowwwwww!” I said to Savard, “This is my very first Blackhawks jersey. My parents got it for me when I was like 10. Now I want to pass it on to my daughter.” He asked me, “What’s your daughter’s name? I’ll sign it to her.” So I told him “Lucia”, and of course I had to spell it for him. He signed with a silver Sharpie on the 8 (of 18) on the back of the jersey, “To Lucia / Good luck / Denis Savard 18 / HOF 2000”. As he was signing he said, “Now when Lucia has kids, if I’m still alive, I’ll sign it for them over here [motioning to the 1 on the back of the jersey].” When he was all finished signing he said to me, “Good thinking to keep that jersey. Keep the tradition going. You’re a good mom.” I wanted to cry when he said that to me. That is the ultimate compliment for this new, hockey-crazed mom, even more so coming from my all-time favorite player and childhood idol! Savard stuck out his hand to shake mine and then I just about floated off that stage. Denis Savard still is my hockey hero.