parks! very serious business indeed

I've caught up on my NaNoWriMo writing so guess what that means?

I GET TO BLOG!!! yeah! woo hooo!!!!

I'm doing a little bloggie dance.

I thought I'd show you some pics of where Ace and I have been walking in the mornings.

this is one of the park districts in my area.

as I've said before, Chicago takes it's park seriously.....very seriously.

they have these mowed trails to walk. During the summer there are wild flowers everywhere.

I have no idea how many miles these paths cover but I've been walking them for a week and haven't made a dent in them.

This is one of the lakes the paths go around.

Ace likes to go out on the dock and look at the geese.

An old silo that has been converted into a lookout tower. The first time I went in here I was amazed.

A spiral staircase with three levels and a mural painted over the whole thing.

Area around silo. Fire pit and seating. Picnic tables.

an old barn made in to a picnic area.

I was most impressed by this building....

I thought it just had some bathrooms in it.

this is what I found inside the old barn. It's finished off like a little conference room.

there is Plexiglas on the ceiling so you can see way up into the old rafters of the barn.

this is the view out the front window.

I turned around to leave and saw this....

I felt like Alice In Wonderland with the bottle that says "drink me".

so I pressed the button....

and then this happened. And I said "oh my!"

And THIS came down out of the ceiling....

so Ace and I took a seat.

We watched a movie about the park and what it was in the past (I'll give you a hint...It was a farm!)

Ace thought the movie was very interesting.

He gave it 2 paws up!

on the way back to the car we past a butterfly house.

and some formal "English looking" gardens....

we didn't have time to check out one other building (I'm not sure they allow dogs in there)

I spotted this right before we left. Oh No! Puppy isn't supposed to be walking out on the trails!

That's ok! I didn't mention that there are miles and miles and miles of paved trails all around here too.

this was how Ace spent the next 2 hours after we got home.